Highland Rake (12 page)

Dougald rode at her left flank, Angus on her right, displacing Niall. He hadn't been happy about it, though he still looked hopeful that Angus would stay with James, and Niall would take off with Gunnolf and Dougald when they decided to journey somewhere else.

She felt the two brothers watching her from time to time. She'd barely been able to eat a bite of the bread and nothing more that they'd shared that morning. She couldn't believe she'd been talking to her brother, whispering, aye, but was startled to realize Dougald had been crouching before her. How much had he and the others heard?

The men had talked plenty before they got ready to ride again. All but the four who may have overheard her speaking with her ghost of a brother.

"Do you often talk in your sleep, Lady Alana?" Dougald finally asked her.

She turned her head sharply to look at him. "What?" She'd heard him, but she didn't know what else to say. Mayhap this would be the perfect way out for her. She was prone to talking in her sleep. Wouldn't that solve her problems? Except when she was perfectly awake and still talking to ghosts.

"My sister used to talk in her sleep when she was overly tired," Dougald said, watching her, his expression one of sympathy.

Alana considered the notion more carefully. If she talked in her sleep, she wouldn't know about it, would she? Only others who might have heard her would realize she did such a thing. Watching the men in front of them to avoid looking at Dougald and giving herself away, she shook her head. "Nay."

"That is true," Dougald said, agreeing cheerfully with her. "If you talked in your sleep you most likely wouldna remember."

"I dinna talk in my sleep," she said, as if saying so would confirm that that's what it had to have been.

"One time, I thought she was talking in her sleep, my sister that is, but she wasna," Dougald continued.

Alana looked at him. His sister couldn't have spoken to ghosts, too, could she?

Dougald's expression had darkened, but he didn't say anything further to explain what had happened.

"'Tis going to rain," Connell warned.

She glanced in Angus's direction but Connell was riding his borrowed ghostly horse next to her. He motioned to the sky. "They willna want to risk you getting sick. They will have to take you to the nearest village. It will be hours before you can travel again. Mayhap no' until the morrow. You could attempt to leave then. I could help you get home. Mayhap this is the verra reason I am here. To see you home like Da did."

She opened her mouth to say something to him when he vanished, and she realized Angus was studying her. She clamped her lips shut and focused on the sky. The wind had picked up and the temperature had dropped several degrees. The sky had progressively darkened from a pale gray to ominous blue-gray, the clouds shifting and reshaping into mountains.

"We willna make it," Angus said to Dougald.

"Aye, but we are close now."

"To Craigly Castle?" Alana asked. It was early morning. They weren't supposed to arrive there until nightfall.

Dougald shook his head. "To a village near here. They have a tavern. We will stay there until the storm passes."

So her brother had been right about Dougald taking them to the village.

"The rain doesna bother me. We can keep riding," she said, afraid her brother would convince her to try to steal away from the tavern, and she'd get herself in more of a mess than she was in now.

Dougald gave her a small smile. "It pleases me that you are so eager to reach Craigly Castle. But Angus, here, might catch his death. James would have my head for it. So we shall stop at the village."

"Are you no' going to defend your honor against such a remark?" Alana asked Angus.

He laughed. "Oh, aye, 'tis a bonny barmaid Dougald wishes to see. But I dinna mind that he uses me as his excuse."

She gave Dougald a smug knowing smile, thinking back to his comment about women and loving one to the exclusion of all others to the lad. "Just one?" she asked Angus.

He smiled back at her, and she realized he had the most wickedly charming smile just like Dougald. She imagined then all the brothers were the same.

Within the hour, they were drenched, the rain coming down is such thick sheets, the men stayed close together so they would not lose sight of one another as they made their way to the village.

Dougald had even taken hold of her reins to ensure he didn't lose her. She didn't believe he thought she'd run away, but that he might lose sight of her in the deluge.

By the time they reached the tavern, she felt as though she weighed a hundred more pounds as wet as her clothes were. The ground was slippery and muddy, and Dougald gave up his reins and hers to one of the men, then helped her down from her horse, only he wasn't letting her go.

She didn't mind. It was bad enough that she was soaking wet all the way to the skin, but she didn't want to add a layer of mud to that.

He hurried her inside with all haste, his brother and Gunnolf leading the way, his cousin and a couple of the other men following behind them, the rest taking the horses to be stabled.

As soon as they walked inside, the laughter and talking subsided and every eye was upon them. The place smelled of ale and mead and of something cooking, roasted boar, she thought.

Men sat at five of the long tables. Although some moved to another table when Dougald's men arrived, many greeting him, and she assumed he was a regular.

"I will get you a room so you can get out of your clothes and dry them by the fire," Dougald said. "The rest of you, have a seat."

"Did you want me to bring up something for the lady?" Angus asked.

Dougald waited for Alana to say. "Nay, thank you." She was shaking so hard, all she wanted to do was get out of her wet things and get warmed up by the fire. A woman brought him a key to a room.

"What about the rest of you?" Alana asked, concerned any of them could become ill.

"We will get another room. The men can strip down and dry off there."

She couldn't help the heat that crept across her neck and cheeks. All she could think of was the way she'd seen those same men naked in the loch.

He took her upstairs and into the room, then removed the brooch on her cloak and laid the brat out on a bench near the fire, setting the pin on top of it. "Did you need help with your
léine
?"

She held her hand to her breast, not wanting to look so surprised, or shocked, but she couldn't help herself. "Nay," she said, sounding so upset, he smiled.

"I was going to send up a maid. I would not make a good lady's maid, Lady Alana."

"Of…of course."

"You willna be going anywhere, will you?" he said, still not leaving her alone.

"Nay, of course no'."

"I have your word?"

"In this weather? I would catch my death."

"Aye, you would. I will fetch a maid at once." Then Dougald left her, locked her in—so he didn't trust her as much as she thought he might—although he might have done so to keep other men from intruding.

She sat down on the wooden bench and began to remove her stockings and boots. She was shaking so hard from the cold she could barely make her fingers work.

Someone unlocked the door and a bonny woman around Alana's age hurried into the room, her hair dark and her eyes a pale brown, and dark brows knit in a tight frown. She closed the door. "I am no lady's maid, but I will see what I can do for ye. Ye look like a drowned rat."

Alana should have been angered by the woman's condescending words, but she found her comment too funny and laughed.

The woman stared at her for moment, probably surprised to get that reaction, then roughly hurried to help Alana out of her
léine
. "Ye know Dougald well?" the woman asked.

"Oh, aye," Alana said, and realized the pretty woman was probably the maid Angus had mentioned Dougald had been seeing. "I had considered marrying him as he has said he loves me more than he has ever loved a lass. But alas, I have fallen in love with another."

"You would be foolish to believe he would love only one lass." The woman smiled at her, and Alana assumed this was indeed the wench Angus had referred to that Dougald wished to reacquaint himself with.

Which reminded Alana that Dougald was no better than her brother when it came to dallying with the lasses. She shouldn't have cared, but she did. Mayhap because she'd wish the way he'd held her so close on his horse had meant he felt she was someone special to him. Someone who appealed in the flesh and not just to be bargained with as in MacDonald's case if her uncle was arranging for her marriage to Hoel.

She helped Alana out of her sopping wet chemise, then handed her a drying cloth. "I have no' clothes to loan ye as Dougald asked. Climb under the covers, and ye can get warm that way."

"Thank you."

The woman nodded, then hurried out of the room and locked the door.

Alana had barely slipped under the covers when her brother appeared, and she shrieked.

And knew at once her mistake.

"Get out!" Alana screamed at her ghostly brother as he appeared in the tavern room, giving her a fright. She pulled her covers higher as her heart pounded and blood raced.

"Someone has to stay here and protect your virtue," her brother said, leaning against the wall, arms folded across his chest, obviously not about to do as she bid.

Heavy footsteps tromped up the stairs at a run.

Connell unsheathed his sword and watched the door. Alana stared at the door, waiting for a whole pack of men to come barging into the room to rescue her. Hoping to stop the inevitable and save her pride, she held the covers up to her chin and called out, "I am all right."

The key poked into the lock with such ferocity, she thought the bearer of the key could have slain a villain with the brass object alone. The door slammed against the wall and Dougald, sword in hand, rushed to the bed while Gunnolf and Angus followed, both with swords drawn. Niall stayed in the doorway, guarding it. Gunnolf checked the window and made sure it was locked. Angus was peering under the bed.

Dougald raised his brows at her when everyone confirmed no one was in the room besides her.

"It…was a
rat
," she managed to get out, giving her ghostly brother a glower. He cast her a small smile and resheathed his sword.

She let out her breath, holding her covers tightly under her chin as if they might somehow slip down and reveal any naked part of her. Even her bare arms were too much for these men to see, but she was afraid to release the wool coverlet.

"I am sorry. I told you I was all right. You had no need to check on me. I am fine. Go back to what you were doing," she said to Dougald, his gaze steady on hers, judging her sincerity, she felt.

Dougald nodded to the others, but as they left the room and shut the door, he didn't leave. She noted her brother hadn't either. He was waiting, observing Dougald as if he would fight him to the death if he so much as touched Alana. As if her brother could truly do anything about it. On top of that, it was
his
fault Dougald was here in the first place.

"You didna see a rat." Dougald sat down on the bed beside her.

She looked at her brother. He was
too
a rat. How could he invade her privacy and keep scaring her to death if he wasn't? He could knock…well, she guessed he couldn't. But still…

"Alana," Dougald said, drawing her attention. "Did you see who murdered your da?"

Her eyes widened. Oh God, he had heard her speaking the words to her brother. Had Dougald been crouching in front of her the whole time? Only she had seen her brother instead of Dougald?

"I…I dinna know what you mean."

"You said they were on the hunt. Your da and the others, and that you were with them. That you had hidden beneath the fallen leaves. It had been near winter when your da and his men had been attacked. Did you see any of the men who murdered them?"

She shook her head. For all she knew, they could have been some of the MacNeill. That Dougald and the others had not taken part, but had arrived late to discover the carnage. Would the word spread through his clan that she'd witnessed the murders?

When she didn't answer, Dougald asked, "Who were you talking to?"

She opened her mouth, paused, then said, "I…I wasna talking to anyone." Then it sounded like she knew just when he meant and that wouldn't do. "You mean, before you reached the room?"

"At the camp. I came to wake you, but you were already awake and talking to someone."

He couldn't have heard everything she'd said then. "I was asleep."

"You were looking straight at me."

"I was asleep," she insisted, a lot more vehemently.

"You called me…or
him
, rather, Connell. Your brother? The one who died a while ago?"

She felt as though all the blood had drained from her face.

Connell clapped his hands. She heard him, though no one else could, but it earned a glower from her just the same.