Highlander Unraveled (Highland Bound Book 6) (10 page)

1544 was a brutal time, yes, but it was also so simple.

Downstairs I could hear Mrs. MacDonald shuffling around. The sound of voices had my spine stiffening, my pulse skyrocketing. But it was only the television. An old re-run of
Friends
, it sounded like.

For goodness’ sake, Mr. McAlister had me all sorts of freaked out.

No longer as exhausted as I had been after dinner, too intrigued with the mystery, I sat in the window box, tucking my knees up toward my chest, wincing at the ache in my breasts, and waited. I wasn’t sure what it was I was waiting for, but that didn’t matter. I was too freaked out to sleep. My imagination was running wild with the legend of the Ayreshire girls and talk of time jumpers. And spies. And bad guys.

If I even tried to sleep, that was all I was likely to dream about. I shivered, rubbing at the goosebumps on my arms.

I just wanted to go home. To have Saor in my arms, as Logan cradled me in his.

I squinted out the window, trying to be non-conspicuous behind the blinds, as if that was going to help me see better into Mr. McAlister’s car. Was he going to sleep there? Did he think something was going to happen?

Was
something going to happen?

Every time someone walked down the street, I nearly leapt out of my skin. When the nosy neighbor lady came out of her house to put a bag of trash at the roadside, I held my breath, half expecting men clad in black suits to leap from nowhere and grab her.

But what I didn’t expect was the front door to open and Mrs. MacDonald to step outside. I squeezed myself against the wall, straightened out my legs, trying to become one with the house around me as I watched her.

She crept down the few stairs and onto the walkway, looking back and forth. When she glanced up at the house, I ducked further down, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. The blinds were turned in a way she couldn’t, no light was on in the room to show my shadow.

She headed toward her car and opened the passenger door, leaning in and riffling around. When she came out, she held a black box in her hand, maybe the size of a block of cheese. I couldn’t make out more than its shape and color. It could have been anything. Something mundane and boring, or something as wacky and spy-like as the tracker I was certain McAlister had put under her car.

With another glance around, Mrs. MacDonald ran back inside, the door closing with a near inaudible click beneath me. She didn’t want me to know she’d left. That was clear by the way she tiptoed around, and from the blaring of the television.

As soon as she was inside, McAlister climbed from his car and ran back across the street toward the house. He ducked into an alleyway around the side and out of view.

Dammit!
Where was he going?

I tried to imagine what the backyard had looked like when I was out there. Was there a gate in their fence? An alleyway along the side? I couldn’t remember.

Downstairs the television kicked up a notch, but a creak on the stairs had every single hair on my body standing on end.

Had my savior from Steven turned up the television to mask the sound of her approach?

Oh shit
…

Just who was Mrs. MacDonald? Did a name leap centuries? Was she my enemy? Was she one of those, time jumpers that McAlister had warned me about?

As quietly as I could, I climbed down from the window box seat and looked around the room, searching for something, anything, I could use as a weapon.

My eyes lit on a tennis racket in the corner.

Another creak, this time from outside of my room. I crept to the corner, picking up the racket. It was light, but hopefully a good swing would be all I needed to get around the old bat.

The door handle jiggled, the distinct sound rattling louder in my pounding head.

Was she going to kill me? Try to abduct me?

“Mrs. MacDonald?” Speak of the devil… McAlister’s voice floated back up the stairs.

There was a thump on the outside of my door and then the scuffle of footsteps. Groans and grunts.

“What are ye doing here?” Her voice was muffled, angry and further away as though she’d moved back to the top of the stairs.

I couldn’t hear McAlister’s reply, but seconds later there was a loud thumping sound coming from the stairs, muffled curses.

They might just kill each other.

If I’d not been scared out of my damned mind, I might have thought the idea of a fight between two elderly people to be a thing of comedy.

But I was scared, frightened for my life.

I stared at the box window. Perhaps it would be the second window I’d climbed out of today.

Chapter Ten

Logan

Three misery filled days had passed since I’d sent a summons to Rory and Moira.

Every night I’d spent in the glen. As soon as gloaming descended upon the Highlands, I rowed across the loch and marched up the mountainside, bursting into the stone circle as though a dragon waited there for me to slay.

And every time I whirled in a circle wanting to see Emma, or to face off with Fate, I found myself, utterly and undeniably alone.

I had long conversations with the charged air around me. Why had Fate forsaken me? What could I do to prove myself, to bring Emma back?

But the only answer I received was the same mocking silence

I’d fall asleep, staring up at the star-filled sky. Or the cloud covered sky, and I’d endure the rain as it fell upon my head.

I waited for Emma to fill my dreams, but every morning I woke having not seen her, a fact that made me extremely fearful for her safety.

Shona had been hard at work pouring over books in the library and fleshing out old wives tales that might have had anything even the least bit to deal with magic.

Nothing had yet worked.

Not even a sign.

Nor a glimmer of hope.

Even Saor seemed to notice that his mama was gone. The bairn had grown quiet, his cries not as forceful. The nursemaid said he was eating well and sleeping, but the fact that he’d grown so quiet worried me. He stared vigilantly at the world around him, as if hoping he might just catch the sound of his mother on the wind.

I paced the courtyard, still wet from my swim. I rarely went inside. Each morning when I trudged dejectedly back down the mountain, I dove into the loch, plunging deep and searching the bottom, just in case it wasn’t Fate that had taken her.

Emma would never have taken her own life, but that didn’t mean one of my enemies wouldn’t.

Thank the saints I came up empty-handed each time.

I studied the sky, searching out even the smallest hint of a breeze that might show me she was coming back, or that Fate had something more in store for us.

“My laird, can I bring ye something to break your fast?”

I looked at the servant who approached, possibly the one to have drawn the shortest straw. A different one came to me at each meal during the day. Their eyes were also shifty, their steps too close together, bodies taught as if prepared to run.

I grunted. “Whisky.”

I found a dram of whisky every morning helped to settle the fears charging through my brain enough to get my mind thinking. I’d have liked to barricade myself on the battlements where I could see far and wide with a barrel of whisky to numb the pain. But being inebriated wasn’t going to help me find my wife, and likely it would make me feel worse than I already did.

The servant nodded and hurried away. I continued my pacing, glaring up at the clear blue sky. When Emma had been brought to my time the sun had not been shining. A massive storm she’d said had been taking place—but that was on her end of the timeline. My end had been a decent Highland day. Much like this one.

“Good morning,” Shona murmured.

I’d not heard her approach. She held out a cup of whisky and a bannock cake. Guess the servant had passed off the task to someone less likely to get their head chewed off.

“Breakfast,” she said.

I nodded, swigging down the whisky and biting into the cake.

“Am I really so terrifying?” I asked.

Shona laughed, the joyful sounded twinged with loss. “Nay. Not to me.” She cleared her throat, standing beside me both of us looking toward the gate. “Will Moira be arriving today?” she asked, an edge to her voice.

I got the sense she’d been working her way to asking me. Perhaps, I was terrifying. “I pray ’tis so.” I tried to say it softly, to put her and myself at ease. But it didn’t work. The tension inside me only seemed to grow.

“I have an idea, and I’m not sure you’re going to be open to it,” she said, crossing and then uncrossing her arms.

“I’ll be the judge of that. Tell me.”

Shona fiddled with her belt. Tightening it even though it was already tight. “The glen has magical powers, especially when one is giving themselves over to… passion.”

I’d told her about the dream, about seeing Emma and that it was real. That it wasn’t the first time our spirits had made love. Shona hadn’t flinched. Emma had told her about the magical powers of the glen, and she’d taken Ewan up to the top. That was how they’d been able to conceive a child when all else seemed to have failed.

“I’ve gone to the glen every night since the first one,” I said. “But I’ve not seen her again.”

“I’m thinking, that if all five of us are there. Me and Ewan, Moira and Rory, ye, that we might be able to make a bigger, more powerful impact on the glen’s magic.”

What she said, hinted at, suddenly dawned on me. “Ye’re talking about a massive… Saints, what’s the word…?”

Shona’s face flamed red and she nearly choked when she uttered, “Orgy.”

“Ah, aye, an orgy.” I’d participated in many and I knew Ewan was fond of them also. But that was before we’d both fallen in love.

“Yes, well, I think that we should try it,” she hurried on. “None of the other things I’ve been trying have been working. Nor, pardon my saying so, have your attempts.”

“Does that mean I’ll be…?” I pointed between her and myself. “And with Ewan and Rory…”

“Oh!” Shona’s face glowed even redder than it already was, if that was possible. “No, no, no. We’d all be making love to each other, but separately.” She frowned. “Me with Ewan. Rory with Moira, and you, summoning Emma.”

“Good.” That could cause a host of issues. I found Moira and Shona attractive, but not in a way other than a genuine observance. Emma was the only woman for me. Besides, if we were all to participate in something like that, it would likely put an awkward wedge in our tight bond.

“And what if we all end up in modern day?” I asked, terrified of the unknown, the loudness. All the contraptions and rules I didn’t understand.

“If you’re with Emma would it matter?” Shona asked, turning to look me in the eye for the first time since handing me my breakfast.

I nodded. “Aye… My son…”

Shona’s eyes went downcast. “There is a chance that we will all end up time traveling and not simply bringing Emma back. But I strongly believe that we were all meant to be in this time. Why else would we all be here? Think about it, me, Moira, Emma, Ewan, we aren’t from this time. We’re not even all from the
same
time. If we ended up in the modern era, Fate will see us brought back.”

“I’m not sure that’s something I can risk. Not with a son left behind who needs protection. Ye recall how many want my head? They will leap at the chance to see my son buried in my absence.”

“Hide him away while we go up to the glen. Tell whoever it is watching him that if ye dinna return that they are to claim him as their own, to find another clan and to never ever say who Saor really is.”

The thought of losing my son tore at my gut. How could I even contemplate the possibility? And then there was Emma… She would murder me if she knew I even thought about it.

But life without Emma… It wasn’t worth living for me, and if there was a chance I could bring her back, to save her from whatever Fate had tossed at her, then I wanted to. I’d just have to pray my son was safe. Ballocks, but this was a hard decision.

“I will do it,” I ground out.

Shona bit her lip. “I pray the others agree. The moon will be full tonight giving us the highest chances for the magic to work.”

“And that makes a difference…” I’d heard mention of it before. “It wasn’t full the night she disappeared.”

“Sometimes, people simply disappear for no reason other than Fate has taken a chance.” She hurried to add. “I know it isn’t fair, Logan. I know it doesn’t make sense.”

I nodded solemnly. “And we need to take a chance then to get her back. Fate wants to see us chance as much as she has.”

“Maybe Fate is testing you. To see how deep your love goes. Emma or Saor.”

“That is not a choice I’m willing to make.”

“Theoretically, no, but perhaps in this instance, yes?”

“I will go to the glen. To see if the magic can bring Emma back to us, but I do not want to leave my son.”

Shona let out a deep sigh. I could tell she was frustrated with me, with my line of thought. I was frustrated that I even had to contemplate it.

But there did not appear to be any other way. Through gritted teeth, I laid out the plan that she’d suggested. “I will see that he and his nursemaid are tucked away with a guard, that if I should not come back, they are to leave Grant lands under the guise they are a family.”

“We will find her, and the three of you will be reunited.” Her words, spoken in a stronger tone, would have left me with hope, but they weren’t strong, they were laced with doubt, the same doubt that assaulted me every minute of every day for the past three days.

The guards on the battlements shouted a warning, and voices could be heard from the other side. For a split second hope soared that it was Emma, returned from wherever she’d been. But then I heard our friends call out from the other side of the wall.

“Rory and Moira are here,” I said.

The gates were opened; the portcullis raised and in rode the two of them with a dozen guards at their backs.

Rory dismounted, helping his wife down, who ran to her twin sister.

I approached Rory, holding out my arm and he shook it. Then I pulled Moira to me, kissing her cheek.

“We’re here to help,” she said.

“My thanks,” I replied. “Shona has a theory that she thinks could work.”

Ewan jogged down the gate tower stairs and approached us. He clapped Rory on the back and embraced Moira.

“Did she tell ye?” Ewan eyed me warily.

I nodded. “We will go tonight.”

“Where?” Rory asked.

“Shona believes that if all of us go to the glen on a night like tonight, where there is a full moon, and we engage in passionate acts, that the power of it will break open whatever capsule of magic is needed to bring Emma back,” I explained.

“Passionate acts?” Rory raised a brow.

“These acts of passion…” Ewan said, glancing at me. “Did she explain that we’d be…?” Ewan cleared his throat.

Shona gasped. “I did. It’s not going to be
that
type of orgy…”

Rory looked confused. “What type?”

Moira leaned up and whispered in his ear. His eyes widened.

Shona giggled, then elbowed Ewan. “’Haps I should call upon Hildie and a few of her lassies to come help, eh, Ewan?”

I grunted a laugh. Ewan had often engaged in passionate acts with more than one woman at a time before he’d met Shona.

Ewan stroked a hand over Shona’s belly. “’Haps a night of lovemaking will entice our young bairn to join the world.”

Watching the two loving couples made my heart seize. I couldn’t take it.

Rory cut into the affectionate display. “There is the possibility we will end up in the future.”

“I know it,” I said through gritted teeth. “Though I’m not happy over it. I just want her back. Go and settle in. I need some air. I’ll meet ye at the gates tonight.”

They eyed me oddly, for I was already outside, but I ignored them, charging off through the gates, reckless and uncaring that my enemies often waited for such a chance.