by Elisa Braden
She leaned her cheek against the coach wall to get a better view out the window. Campbell and the taller solicitor handed a gaoler the papers ordering Broderick’s release. The gaoler was dark and small, his clothing neat. He nodded at something the solicitor said and waved to another set of gaolers.
“How bluidy many of ye does it take to read an order?” she muttered. The thistle dug into her palm. Her other hand hovered on the door handle. Angus and her brothers had warned her not to leave the coach. But, by God, if these damnable wretches didn’t bring her brother to her right this moment, she would walk into that prison palace and fetch him herself.
The second and third gaolers nodded their understanding, and they waved Campbell and Alexander through a second set of gates.
The coach door opened.
Angus gave a disgusted grunt and climbed inside, hunching as he took the bench opposite Annie. He looked haggard and old. “Not long now, lassie.”
She eyed the makeshift litter they’d installed diagonally across the benches. Made of a canvas sling lined with blankets and straw, it should prove comfortable for a normal man. But she didn’t know the extent of Broderick’s injuries. When she’d asked, Rannoch had gone deathly grim. “It’s bad, Annie.” Her youngest brother had run a hand over his eyes. “Very bad.”
Now, she saw her own dread reflected in Angus’s face. “Da.”
He glanced up.
“We have him back. He’s free. They cannae charge him again, can they?”
Her father didn’t answer straight away. Instead, he leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and patted the bedding she’d assembled. “This is fine work ye’ve done.”
“Da—”
“Ye’ll give him proper care, Annie; I’ve no doubt of it.”
“Of course I—”
Dark eyes met hers. “The truth is, we dinnae ken who hates him enough to do this.”
“What of Skene?”
Angus shook his head. “Merely the hand that pulled the trigger. He’s gone to ground. Even Alexander couldnae track him.”
Her heart sank. If they couldn’t locate Skene, they couldn’t find the man behind Skene. The one with the real power. She reached for Angus’s hand. “We’ll discover who did this, Da. We must.”
He squeezed her fingers and opened the coach door. “Aye, lassie. We must.”
Long minutes passed. Sullen rain began to fall.
She watched Rannoch and Angus pacing in the courtyard, glimpsed gaolers passing by on rounds, saw women and men beyond the inner gates working, chatting, and peering out at them.
Prisoners. They milled about as if nothing were amiss. Women carried baskets and men pushed wheelbarrows. Even children dashed by as though this were a normal castle inhabited by busy servants.
It seemed an absurdity to Annie. She closed her eyes and tried to think of something more pleasant. The scent of her kitchen when dinner was almost ready. The waterfall just north of Glendasheen Castle.
John Huxley’s kiss. Oh, heavens.
She sighed and sank back, remembering his lips. His hands. His fingers and the wondrous things he’d made her feel. And her chest ached. Because, as pleasurable as their kiss had been, what she most longed for were the moments afterward, when his eyes had blazed down at her with rapturous fixation. Seeing John Huxley as ensnared as she was had been glorious. Knowing how much he wanted her, how willing he’d been to forgo his own pleasure for hers, and how she’d calmed him with her touch—these were the reasons she’d lost her soul to him.
How utterly daft. And utterly true.
She chuckled softly at the thought, picturing him flushed and handsome, his hair thoroughly mussed, his perfect lips a bit swollen. Hugging herself now, she tried to hold on to the memory. To let it warm her while rain pattered then poured.
Slowly, the cold intruded. So did sound. She wanted to block it out. Squeezing her eyes tighter, she prayed the agonized growling she heard amidst the rainfall wasn’t a father’s rageful anguish.
She opened her eyes.
It was.
Oh, God.
Oh, sweet Christ.
He was a corpse. Two of her brothers carried a third between them. Long arms stretched across their shoulders.
Nothing but long bones covered by grayish skin. His face. Unrecognizable.
One of his eyes was …
Annie’s throat closed. She was going to vomit. Bloody hell, she must. Not. Vomit.
No! Her head disconnected from her body, floating toward the coach’s ceiling. But her hands knew what to do. They flung the door open. Her feet climbed down and raced toward her brother.
Her mouth sobbed a denial. Her heart screamed that she would kill whoever had done this. She would kill them and serve them their own hearts for supper.
Apparently, she screamed these things in her head, because nobody heard. Rather, she was stumbling toward Broderick when Rannoch grabbed hold of her. He held her firmly with an arm across the front of her shoulders. “He’ll heal, Annie,” he rasped. “We’ll help him. Dinnae cry, sister.”
She clung to him, her knees collapsing. “Ah, God, Rannoch.”
“I ken. I ken.”
Campbell and Alexander carried their brother past her, and she could finally see what the Bridewell had done.
Every gruesome detail. That strong, square MacPherson jaw lacerated and swollen. The bones of his cheeks distorted as though they’d been broken again and again. The nose that she’d always teased him must have come from his mother, for Angus’s nose could never be so handsome—that nose was weirdly angled and flattened. And his eyes—those dark-storm eyes fair broke her in half. The one that remained intact was flat and distant. It didn’t flicker with recognition. It didn’t glance her way. His other eye was … not an eye any longer.
She wanted to touch him. Tried to touch him.
Rannoch held her fast. “Wait, Annie,” he murmured. “He’s injured everywhere. Ye must take care, ye ken?”
Breathing fast, she clung to Rannoch and forced herself to listen.
“Aye, ye ken.” Rannoch hugged her, drawing her closer and rocking her a wee bit. “Let us load him into the coach. Then, we’ll take him home.”
She nodded. Rannoch moved away to help from the opposite side.
She swayed in place as she watched Campbell and Alexander carry Broderick as carefully as a bairn. Watched as Angus, hovering at the rear wheel, staggered and caught himself.
“Da,” she sobbed.
He turned to her, his eyes burning with a father’s grief. Then, he opened his arms.
And she ran into them. Not to be comforted, though his strength often did that.
But to comfort the man who had chosen to be her father.
And had just lost his son.
TlU
Two months passed before they could even consider leaving Edinburgh. In the townhouse Rannoch had rented, Annie took charge and prepared a chamber for Broderick. Cooked a fortifying broth for Broderick. Hired four lads to clean and fetch water and wash linens for Broderick. She scarcely slept. When the physicians weren’t stitching or dosing or murmuring their doubts, she tended a vacant, feverish man’s wounds and sat beside his bed, keeping vigil.
She had no time to mourn. Every second was needed to hold what was left of her brother together.
The other MacPhersons did everything else. They interrogated gaolers at the prison. They bribed and coerced those who worked in the infirmary. They met with men they refused to name in parts of the city she hadn’t known existed. They stayed gone until the wee hours, and when they finally trudged through the door at day’s end, they looked as exhausted and helpless as she felt. Sometimes, they returned with bloodied knuckles.
She knew because she was awake. Someone must keep watch, she reasoned, in case Broderick decided to leave them.
After several more weeks of care, Broderick made his decision. His breathing steadied. His fever receded. His
eye began to follow her around his chamber as she tidied and chatted and read to him. The physicians pronounced him “on the mend.”
Throughout their stay in Edinburgh, they had visits from John Huxley. Annie’s focus upon Broderick lifted like a thick fog in a bracing wind each time she heard his crisp, English voice at the door. She’d wander downstairs, dazed and worn and a pure mess. He’d open his arms for her. She’d let him enfold her with his strength and heat, feeling such relief she couldn’t speak. Neither of them spoke, really. She didn’t ask why he was there, why he kept visiting every few days. She only thanked God for those few precious minutes until Angus sent him on his way so she could sleep—which she rarely did.
Eventually, the physicians decided Broderick could tolerate travel, so she arranged for the house to be cleaned and packed up, prepared a new litter for the coach, and waited for John Huxley’s next visit. Instead, Angus informed her Huxley had headed back to the glen. Her heart plummeted, though she understood. She still didn’t know why he’d stayed so long in Edinburgh.
Now, five days later, she stepped from the coach, watching Rannoch and Alexander carry Broderick into MacPherson House. The long journey home had been an arduous one. Early summer rainstorms had turned the roads muddy, and the motion of the carriage disturbed Broderick. He didn’t speak, of course. He made no sound at all. But Annie had come to recognize every tiny twitch of his face.
When she could, she comforted him with piles of blankets, the laudanum from the physicians, and the soup he loved best, the one with leeks and potatoes. Because her voice seemed to help him rest easier, she’d read aloud from newspapers and blethered on about things that had happened while he’d been away.
She’d told him about Flora MacDonnell losing her dress shop. About Grisel MacDonnell moving to Dingwall. About hiring Betty MacDonnell to be her lady’s maid.
Mostly, she’d told him about John Huxley—more than she should have, perhaps, but Broderick was a good listener.
Now, standing in the drive outside her house, Annie watched her lads rush out to unload the coach and care for the horses. In her mind, she was listing everything she must do—rally her kitchen lads to get water boiling, start preparing dinner, ensure Broderick’s chamber had been properly aired and a fire properly built—when the muscles in her abdomen and thighs began to quiver. Her blinking fell out-of-rhythm.
Then, light began to dim.
She frowned. The afternoon was bright for a change, no clouds in sight. Why was it darkening? Her next blink went on too long. Birds chirped in the leafy birches, but the sound washed in and out like waves on a shoreline. The stones of her house blurred strangely. The doorway wavered. Shaking her head, she felt herself tilting. Or was that the ground?
“Annie?”
Weak. She was so bloody weak.
Her legs turned to water. Folded.
“Och, my sweet lass.”
Wool and peat and Highland air. Strong arms that had never failed her. Lifting. Carrying.
“Ye’ve fair worn yerself to the bone, daughter. ’Tis time ye slept.”
A kiss upon her forehead. Then, the light was gone.
TlU
Sound sifted into Annie’s consciousness through a thick, gray fog. Her eyelids weighed a ton. Try as she might, she couldn’t force them open.
“… cannae let ye press her into such a decision until she’s improved.”
“I’ve waited months already, Angus. Bloody months.”
“Aye.”
“… continue my search … after Annie … my wife … refuse to be separated from her … belongs with me …”
To her great frustration, his voice kept fading in and out. But she recognized her Englishman. She wanted him closer.
“… appreciate all ye’ve done, lad.”
“Then, let me—God, just let me—”
“Ye’re nae thinkin’ straight. She’s done in. Give her a day or two.”
Annie wanted to protest. She’d never be too tired to reach for him. Gathering every ounce of her stubbornness, she forced her eyelids up. The light was a bit blurry, a bit gray. It was her bedchamber window, she supposed. She recognized the blue checked curtains she’d sewn herself. With another great, heaving effort, she drew a breath and mumbled, “English.” Her pillow half-smothered the word.
But he heard.
The next sight to appear was his face. Ah, God, that bonnie face. Golden-hazel was surrounded by weary creases and streaks of red.
She blinked. Tried to move her arm. It weighed more than her eyelids.
Her Englishman knelt beside her. Then, the mattress moved, and he lay on his side next to her, his face inches from hers, his arms scooping her body into his.
“Huxley,” Angus warned from the doorway across the room. “Mind yerself.”
She ignored her father’s growl to sigh and smile. “English.”
Perfect lips touched her cheek. A bristly jaw chafed her mouth. “Good morning, love.”
Suddenly, she wanted to cry. Her eyes didn’t want to stay open. She felt like she was folding in upon herself. “English,” she whimpered.
He gathered her tighter, his arms binding her body to his. “Shhh, Annie. Rest, now. You’ve exhausted yourself, and you need sleep.”
Her breath stuttered. “B-Broderick?”
“He’s settled in. Betty is tending him, along with the surgeon from Inverness. Marjorie MacDonnell has been helping manage things here whilst you recover. Everything is fine.”
The world darkened to gray again. She didn’t know how long she drifted, but when she opened her eyes, he was still there. A warm, lean hand caressed her back. Gentle fingers played with her hair.
“H-how long … since we returned home?”
“A few days.”
“How many?”
“Three.”
She fought to lift her hand from where it nestled on his chest. She only just managed to trace his jaw before her strength gave out. “Ye’ve … stayed with me, English?”
“Yes.”
“Here?”
“Yes.” Warm lips caressed her eyelids, which had a great deal of trouble remaining open. “Angus is none too happy about it. But he can go hang. Wherever you are, that is where I belong.”
She wanted to thank him. She wanted to tell him how deeply she’d longed for him every day. Every hour. Every second he wasn’t beside her. But the sleep she’d missed over the past weeks robbed her strength.
With the scraps that remained, she whispered to her Englishman, “Dinnae let Marjorie MacDonnell near my kitchen.”
A deep, surprised chuckle sounded from his chest, moving through her ear and cheek. “No, love. I wouldn’t dare.”
And this time, she fell asleep with a smile.
Chapter Fifteen
TlU
Annie tugged Bill the Donkey along the newly graveled road, thinking how lovely it would be if every day could be this grand. The water of the loch shimmered in a soft summer breeze. All around, light danced and leaves laughed and birds sang a merry tune.
John Huxley had stayed with her for four days and four nights before she’d ordered him to go home, change his shirt, and have a shave.
That had been yesterday. Today, she would see him again. She shimmered like the water, danced like the light, laughed like the leaves, and sang like the birds.
She glowed bright as the bonnie sun. Because of him.
“Careful ye dinnae float away, lass,” said Mrs. MacBean with wry affection.
Annie grinned over her shoulder. The old woman looked rather handsome in her new tartan gown. When Annie had presented her latest gift to Mrs. MacBean earlier that morning, she’d insisted on helping with the woman’s wild hair, as well. Apart from a milky eye and a vaguely puzzled expression, Mrs. MacBean now looked like a proper chaperone.
Except for the apron. A worn, not-quite-white apron did not belong on such lovely wool.
“I’d be ha
ppier if ye didnae cover that fine gown I made ye with ugly auld canvas.”
“I’ll nae go soilin’ such a bonnie dress.”
Annie rolled her eyes.
“’Tis a protective cover,” Mrs. MacBean insisted. “Akin to the ones on books.” A pause. “Mayhap I should have a leather apron.”
Annie laughed. Then sighed. Then petted Bill’s nose. Then kissed Bill’s nose. He snorted as if to say she was mad.
Perhaps she was. Utterly mad for a certain Englishman.
“Now, yer gown, that one is made for seein’.”
Annie glanced down at her own dress, a simple sweep of satiny blue silk. She ran a hand over her hip and felt her skin warming at the thought of her Englishman’s face. How his eyes would glow. How his jaw would flicker. She lifted her hem. How much better it would be if she didn’t stain the silk with mud before he ever saw her.
Fortunately, the road to Glendasheen castle was much improved from the last time she’d made this journey. Dougal and his brothers had done fine work, widening the lane to better accommodate a cart or carriage and reinforcing the banks with larger rocks.
Huxley had truly turned a cursed castle into a blessed one.
They arrived in the courtyard to find Dougal directing his sons to return to the stables, as they hadn’t finished their tasks. Annie rolled her eyes. “Dougal, ye’d best stop spoilin’ those laddies,” she called. “Else, ye’ll be feedin’ them ‘til they’re fifty.”
Dougal’s grin broadened. He tipped his hat and repositioned it on his head. “Miss Tulloch, ye look bonnie as a summer day.”
“How do lasses go about in these dresses without fashin’ about every splatter of rain? It’s beyond my ken.”
He chuckled. “No fashin’ necessary. My Betty will take good care of ye.”
“Aye, that she has.” Annie looked around the courtyard as Dougal helped Mrs. MacBean down from Bill’s back and took the donkey’s reins. “Where is Mr. Huxley?” She tried to sound casual as she retrieved Huxley’s gift from the saddlebag.
Dougal directed them to the waterfall. “I think he meant to do a bit of anglin’.”
