Time Bound

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by Lora Andrews

“Go on, lass. You’ve my word I’ll answer truthfully.”

  Oh, great, more guilt. So while he stood there freely offering to answer any of her questions without any malice on his gorgeous face, she was burning brain cells trying to figure out how she could hide her ability from him.

  She was lower than pond scum. Maybe even the crud she hated cleaning at the bottom of her trash can. And since she couldn’t look him in the eye and ask him a single question without her conscience screeching, she shrugged and looked down at her fancy-dancy hiking boots instead.

  “Did you no’ say you visited the ruins afore?”

  “I did. Last year.” Before the start of school, she had walked these ruins and looked out onto Loch Fyne, promising herself she would take charge of her life.

  No more hiding. No more running.

  Ugh. She was still hiding and, apparently, still running from the truth. A lot of “stills” for a grown woman rebuilding her life. Caitlin glanced over her shoulder to the man unabashedly monitoring their conversation and clutched her fist to keep from reaching for the pendant.

  “It was after my grandmother’s death.” She paused, gathering the courage to speak her truth. “I came to Scotland and I stood at these ruins. But not to hide the stone. I swear I’ve never seen or touched it. I came here to find myself and figure out how to piece my life back together.”

  “Did you?” His look was earnest.

  “Nope. I guess I’m a work in progress.”

  “MacInnes is certain you will find this stone before the Samhain.”

  “And what happens if I don’t?”

  Ewen snorted. “His words were ‘That is not an option.’ I take that to mean he will no’ settle for less.”

  “Yeah. Why am I not surprised?” Over the years, rocks had tumbled off the side of the cliff, creating a small monument of stones at the base. Flutters lurched in her stomach, her irrational fear of heights acting like a noose around her neck. She sucked in a breath and turned her attention to the ruins before glancing back to her pensive partner in crime.

  “Ewen, did MacInnes draw blood from you? I saw the vial.”

  His jaw clenched. “Aye. It was one of the conditions of our arrangement. He spoke of immunizations.” Ewen scrubbed a hand over his face. “I consented, but I did no’ swear fealty. I will not aid the man in his dark quest.”

  Vaccinations? God, she couldn’t figure MacInnes out. “I think this is a test of some sort. This site was once used as a training dig in the late sixties. Anything of value is long gone. He won’t find his stone here. He’s looking for something else. I just don’t know what.” Her every instinct vibrated in agreement.

  Ewen angled his head. “You’re sure?”

  “Yes. Look around you. There’s nothing here. Everything was discovered during the archeological dig…” At his frown, she paused, searching for the words to explain modern day terminology. “Archeologists are scientists, people who study other cultures. They discover and analyze artifacts left behind by past civilizations. The items found here were preserved and became part of an exhibit open to the public.”

  “I see.” He focused his attention on the loch. “What did they find?”

  “Not much, really. When I visited the museum, all that remained was an unusual crucifix and a handful of artifacts. Pottery. Coins.”

  Ewen’s gaze flew to her face. “An unusual crucifix? Can you describe it?”

  The memory sent a shiver up her spine. “It was of Romanesque origin, which in and of itself isn’t a big deal. There are several others held in various exhibits throughout Europe, except…” Just thinking about it set her nerves on edge. “This crucifix was made of some kind of copper or copper alloy and someone deliberately heated the metal to bend the arms behind Christ’s head, distorting the limbs from its original outstretched position. Have you seen anything like that in your time?”

  For a split second, recognition beat a path across his face, then faded as quickly as it had appeared. “Nay.”

  Caitlin arched a brow. Nay? That look didn’t suggest nay, but she let it go…for now. “If a team of trained archeologists couldn’t find a rare, luminous stone, we certainly aren’t going to find a magic rock buried beneath layers of windblown earth fifty years later.”

  Ewen swung his hand out to the remains of a stone wall in the area of the castle’s base. “Is this all that is left of the old ways, then? Piles of rubble scattered across rocky fields? Is there no more?” Ewen’s voice caught in his throat. Of my life, the pain in his eyes implored.

  She bit back the urge to smooth out the rigid lines along the side of his face. “I don’t know. There are many castles in disrepair, or in ruins like this one. Some have been restored and others are open to the public for viewing.”

  “Ms. Reed.” MacInnes strode up to her left.

  Ewen’s face froze, and his body seemed to grow exponentially. Caitlin blew out a breath and waited for the barbs to fly. She was sandwiched in between two rival alpha males, the killer wolf to her left, and the Scottish god of war to her right.

  “Have you anything of interest to report?” MacInnes asked.

  “Did you expect me to find something your team missed?” She focused on the loch. Maybe MacInnes would take the hint and leave. From her peripheral vision, she saw the curve of his smile. No such luck.

  “To be perfectly honest, I had hoped you might feel something. A sixth sense, if you will.”

  “A sixth sense?” She carefully guarded her expression. “Sorry to disappoint you. So, where to next?”

  “Where to exactly, Ms. Reed?” Simon MacInnes barked a laugh that echoed into the wind and turned to join his men.

  “You’re a seer?” Ewen belched the word seer in the same way a person would spew a bite of something vile—with disgust.

  “No.” The word flew from her mouth as she moved away.

  Ewen’s arm shot out, and he grabbed her by the wrist. The jolt snapped between them. Feelings of anger and mistrust flooded her senses.

  He released her arm. “What is this ‘thing’ between us?” he spit out.

  Her breathing accelerated. Did she tell him the truth now after she’d just lied to his face? Tell him that zap was proof of her erratic gift, a gift that allowed her to feel his emotions? That she could see what he thought? Re-live his memories? His past? All through a simple touch?

  Her stomach filled with lead. She couldn’t tell Ewen the truth. Not here. Not with MacInnes so close by.

  Yeah, she was lying to herself about that, too.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  A muscle twitched in his cheek. Slowly, he turned that gorgeous face now hardened with distrust and captured her attention as if he’d physically bound her face between his hands.

  “Guard you. Fight to protect you and yours. Be your staunchest ally against your bitterest enemy. I can promise you all these things. But dinna lie to me lass. Dinna betray me.”

  Or else the fierceness in his eyes conveyed.

  “Think well what side you choose to call friend.” The words hung between them like a door slammed shut in her face. He turned and left her without saying another word.

  Caitlin watched those proud shoulders stalk away. Her eyes clashed with MacInnes. A smirk played across his face.

  She whipped her head back to the loch.

  Crap. She was so out of her league.

  NINETEEN

  Christ, she couldn’t be a seer.

  Yet, why would MacInnes drag her to the MacEwen ancestral lands in search of a bewitched stone in hopes she would feel something? And what the bluidy hell was a sixth sense?

  “Hey.” Arms swinging by her sides, Caitlin caught up to Ewen’s angry strides. Her footsteps scattered pebbles on the dirt path. “What do you have against psychics, anyway?”

  Psychics?

  Confounded language. By the time he’d unraveled the first part of a sentence, the second part was lost to him. He was tired of deciphering familiar
sounding words that were as foreign to him as the sight of the sleek metal cars gleaming ahead in the highland sun.

  He raked a hand through his hair. MacInnes and his two upper guardsmen trailed behind him and Caitlin, the murmur of their voices barely audible in the wind. Ewen focused on the vehicles stationed about sixty feet ahead, observing Marcus and a red-haired guard exit to stand at attention outside their respective car doors.

  “Look, I’ll admit my knowledge of your time is lacking, and I can’t begin to imagine how overwhelming this must all feel to you.”

  She matched his strides. The woman was a contradiction—highborn by appearance, yet her body showed signs of labor. The callouses he’d observed on her palms. Her physical conditioning. The sensual sway of her hips.

  “I know people with unusual talents were regarded with fear during your time, but Ewen, people born with psychic abilities are no different from you or me.” Those lovely green eyes watched him with something akin to curiosity.

  Or was it disappointment?

  “Is that a confession, Caitlin?”

  “No, it’s not a confession.” She let out a breath to temper the frustration he’d heard in her voice and looked over her shoulder before continuing in a hushed tone. “You can’t fault someone for something they have no control over. Would you judge a person based on their gender or their skin color alone?”

  “You canna compare the two. Magic is no’ natural.”

  “A psychic ability is not magic.”

  “No? Then what is it, Caitlin?”

  She opened her mouth then quickly pursed her lips, steeling her eyes forward.

  Ewen paused. “Even with the best of intentions, a power of that sort will grow and fester. It will consume and corrupt the bearer until they no longer recognize themselves.” Until they became but a shell of who they were, and you couldn’t do a bluidy thing to save them.

  “You can’t know that, Ewen.”

  “No?” He refrained from reaching for her and shaking sense into that stubborn head. “Listen to what I say. Magic knows no bounds. This I have learned. The darkness comes and destroys all that is light.”

  All that you love.

  “You honestly believe that?” she asked.

  “Aye, I do, but I wish to God I didn’t.”

  Caitlin shook her head and stomped to the waiting car.

  Ewen swallowed the thickness at the back of his throat and followed the curve of her lithe body as she maneuvered herself inside the car. She slid across the leather seat to the far right and threw one long leg over the other. He contorted his body to fit the tight confines of the much smaller vehicle they’d taken to the ruins. His knees were practically hitched to his chin. Blasted, he’d take the SUV over this cramped contraption any day.

  Daniel was at the wheel with another guard at his side, this one a rusty-haired, ruby-cheeked lad barely old enough to be free of his mam’s skirts. MacInnes, Gary, and Marcus entered the second vehicle stationed behind theirs.

  The engine rumbled. Caitlin’s floral scent swirled around him. A sweet, enticing fragrance that amplified his awareness of her proximity. Had his instincts been wrong about her? If his gut proved true—and it always did—then she was a seer. She’d betray him. How could she not with blood ties to both magic and the sorceress that wandered the highland fields murdering innocents in Ardgour?

  A sorceress who had saved his life.

  He knew better than to jump to conclusions. There was no solid evidence connecting the raven-haired woman to the murders, only the testimony of frightened villagers who had seen her at the site of both deaths. Nor had he seen any sorcery in this present time. No witch would allow herself to be captured and abused at the hands of a man like MacInnes. And except for the strange energy that sizzled between them, he had witnessed nothing out of the ordinary from Caitlin.

  The car moved along an uneven strip of land, jostling them inside its cushioned interior. When his knee bumped into her leg, a bolt of heat shot to his groin. He ground his teeth. These modern trews strangled a man’s bits. The next two miles to the kirk would be the longest of his life.

  Mayhap it was lust that drove the strange current between him and Caitlin. He’d been years without a woman, and he could no more deny his attraction to her than he could deny his next breath. From the moment he’d laid eyes on the lass, his body had hummed with want. An ardor that could drive a man mad. Caught in its grip, his brother had nearly started a war to conquer the one lass who’d stolen his heart.

  Ewen stifled a chuckle as he recalled his sister-in-law’s fiery rampage the night Donald had wrested her from the Camerons and brought her to Ardgour. The smile quickly faded from his lips when he thought of the child Mari now carried. A niece or nephew he would never know. What evil had befallen his people to destroy hundreds of MacLeans? To destroy a proud legacy in the sweep of a fortnight?

  “You’re frowning.” Caitlin’s sweet voice cut through the pain gripping his heart.

  “Am I now?”

  “Yes, you are. You should stop, you know. Or you’ll sprout wrinkles.”

  He frowned. “Wrinkles?”

  “Aye,” she mimicked his accent. “Wrinkles. It’s what my seanmhair always threatened me with. That and big hands if I kept cracking my knuckles.”

  The fabric of her trews did naught to hide the comely shape beneath. How could a man not imagine those legs wrapped around his waist? Or his tongue trailing the fragile skin along the slope of her neck.

  He cleared his throat. “I don’t remember my seanmhair. But I’ve been warned the wind will one day freeze my face to this.” He showed her his worst scowl.

  She giggled. “Okay, that’s a new one. You’ve got me beat by a mile.”

  The easy banter smoothed the tension between them. She angled her head to the window, the fleeting Scottish countryside a blur against the glass. “I’m sorry about before, but I meant what I said at the castle. I’ll do whatever it takes to save my family.”

  And he would do the same. “Fair enough.”

  Braw, beautiful, and loyal. The perfect woman. Only she was linked to magic, a mystical stone, and an evil man who would spare no expense to claim both. His jaw clenched. And now a crucifix symbolizing the crux ansata. Too many coincidences for a wise man to ignore, yet not enough clues to solve the blasted mystery.

  The car pulled to a stop behind MacInnes’s vehicle. They’d arrived at the Kilfinan Parish Church. Daniel and the ruby-cheeked guard exited the car. When the back door opened Ewen slid across the seat after Caitlin. Ancient tombstones surrounded a white masonry building.

  Caitlin followed MacInnes and approached the church steps warily.

  A tall, bespectacled man with a bushy beard appeared at the door. “Mr. MacInnes I presume?”

  “Reverend Mitchell.” MacInnes climbed the stairs with grace and extended his hand to the man. “Thank you for accommodating my family on such short notice.”

  The reverend blushed and shook his hand. “The Church and the Friends of Kilfinan Parish are greatly indebted to you, Mr. MacInnes. Your generous donation will allow the complete restoration of the Lamont Vault. Please, follow me. I have pulled the registries you’ve requested to see.”

  MacInnes gestured for Caitlin to follow him inside.

  Her shoulders tensed. She sucked in a breath and climbed the few stairs to the landing. Ewen was acutely aware of Gary and Daniel behind him. Marcus and the ruby-cheeked guard remained stationed beside their respective vehicles.

  “Is Reverend Patrick no longer with the church?” Caitlin asked.

  The tall man craned his head in Caitlin’s direction. “Did you know Reverend Patrick, lass?”

  “Yes, I do. I met him last year.”

  “My condolences then. We lost the Reverend almost a year to the day. His passing has left a great void in our parish community.”

  Her eyes sparked with sympathy. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  MacInnes searched her face, scrutinizing her ex
pression for …what? What did the man search for? Caitlin had not hidden her knowledge of this kirk, or the fact she knew one of the ministers at its helm.

  Aye, but the timing of the man’s death was suspect, was it no’? Verra close to when she had sought his counsel. Coincidence? He thought not.

  They followed Reverend Mitchell into the small church. Dark wood trusses ran the length of the cathedral ceiling. Followed by MacInnes, the tall man led them down a narrow aisle lined with shiny wooden benches on each side and guided them to a wooden door behind the pulpit.

  Gary loomed behind Caitlin and taunted her with his body. She hurried toward the back door.

  Ewen clenched his hand to keep from pummeling his fist into the guard’s sneering face. He was a bluidy cur who preyed on helpless women. But when he shoved at her shoulder, Ewen saw red. He pivoted his left foot so the sole was almost vertical, balanced his weight on his right leg, then kicked out with the left in a sweeping motion. His heel connected with Gary’s ankle, and the man fell back like a sack of oats.

  Ewen quickly fell into step behind Caitlin.

  Gary rolled off the floor.

  Daniel intercepted the guard’s retaliatory attack and violently forced the man’s arm down with his hand. “Stand down.”

  The cur snarled and glared at Ewen before marching to a position outside the door MacInnes had entered.

  “Watch it,” Daniel said in a low tone then signaled them ahead.

  Caitlin shook her head at Ewen. “You enjoyed that, didn’t you?”

  Ewen laughed. “Aye, I did.”

  “Me, too,” she said with a grin. “Not that I condone violence in a church, but he had it coming.”

  Ewen’s chest expanded, warmed by her response. They followed Daniel to the entrance of a small room with a worn desk stationed in the center. Several chairs were pulled out. MacInnes sat, with one leg crossed over the other, in a prominent position across from the cleric. Reverend Mitchell leaned over the desk, one hand splayed on one of several opened leather-bound journals.

  Gary pushed off from the wall as Ewen approached. Twisting his mouth into a snarly smile, he shifted his suit jacket from his waist to reveal his weapon. “Packed and ready, warrior.”

 

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