Shipwrecked (23 page)

Murdock was
suddenly ashamed that he had been so misled by Arbor, and now saw him for what
he really was…a cowardly power hungry man who would stop at nothing to get what
he wanted.

Relenting,
Jonathan untied Anna harshly, being rough with the ropes that encircled her
hands, causing her to wince as the rough sisal sliced her wrists.

“Treat her like a
lady,
”
Murdock hissed, refusing to accept Jonathan’s petty mistreatment of the
innocent woman.

Anna stood next to
the tree wrists and ankles now unbound, completely frozen in front of the
crowd.  Despite Murdock’s insistence, not a soul had moved; this spectacle was
simply too good not to watch. 

Anna had prepared
herself to die bound to that tree, to burn before this crowd for sins that she
had not committed, and now that she was free, the shock of her escape left her
dumbfounded.

Murdock stepped
towards her, and extended his hand.  Cautiously, she took it, unsure of what
had caused his sudden change of heart, and believing that he had some other
trick up his sleeve.   With his head held regally, Murdock led Anna away from
the silent crowd, his soul feeling just a little bit lighter.

***

“Rowan!” Anna screamed
as she bolted through the door of Murdock’s town home and saw her husband
splayed out on the settee.  He was still unconscious, his face gray and ashen,
and beads of sweat dotted his brow.

Kneeling down next
to Rowan, Anna ran her hand over his forehead, terrified to discover that the
first grips of a fever had already taken hold.  Her fingers slid down his neck
and felt his pulse, steady and strong, giving her a glimmer of hope.

“I’m here now, I
think we’re alright,” she whispered in his ear, glancing nervously over her
shoulder at Murdock, who stood in the doorway.

“We need a
Doctor…look what you’ve done to him!” Anna ranted; glaring heavily at Murdock
before turning her eyes back to Rowan’s mutilated back. 

His flesh rose in
angry welts next to the lashings of where the whip had split his skin.  The
blood was beginning to clot now, crusting to the skin that had not been
brutalized by Murdock’s whip.  When Anna looked at Rowan’s back, she felt an
anger unlike anything that she had ever experienced rise up within her. 

She stood
abruptly, and marched over to Murdock. She slapped him hard, right across the
face, causing him to recoil from the force of her unexpected blow.

“May you burn in
Hell, Meriwether Murdock,” she said, full of hatred before she used her other
hand to slap the other side of his face with all of the strength that she could
muster.

                                                                        ***

“I thought I’d
lost you,” Rowan’s voice croaked into the pitch blackness of the bedroom,
startling Anna awake from the chair in which she slept next to his bed.

She nearly pounced
on him, being so happy to hear his voice.

“You’re awake!”
she exclaimed, joy evident in her voice.  “I thought I’d lost you!”

“It would take a
lot more than that,” Rowan chuckled, and then groaned in the same breath; even
Anna’s slight weight on the bed had jostled his back, shooting fire through his
nerves.  He in took a swift breath, clenching his teeth to hold onto
consciousness, fighting the pain with every thread in his being.

“Oh, love, I’m
sorry,” Anna said, realizing that her hasty action had caused her husband’s
pain.  She jumped up from the bed in an effort to make things better, but her
quick movement elicited another groan of pain from Rowan.  Tears stained her
cheeks as she watched Rowan struggle in the darkness, fighting the unbearable
pain.

He exhaled slowly,
driving the stars that threatened to send him back into unconsciousness out of
his line of vision.  Collecting himself and being very careful not to move he
began shakily, “There’s nothing that I want more than tae hold ye, tae hear how
it is that we are both alive right now, but I canna bear for ye tae…” his words
trailed off with the effort that it took to fight for consciousness.

“I won’t touch
you, Rowan,” Anna whispered, tears still streaming down her face.  There was
nothing that she wanted to do more than to hold him, to run her fingers over
every inch of his body, to make sure that he was really going to be alright. 
She wanted to kiss him, to assure herself that he was really in front of her, whole
and alive. 

More than
anything, she wanted to make love to her husband, but she knew that that was
impossible.

 “Don’t talk,
love…you need to rest,” she whispered.

“What happened?”
he asked, jaw clenched with the effort of fighting his pain.  His last memory
was seeing Anna crying, tied to the tree with a look of horror on her face as
she watched Murdock whip him.

“All that matters
is that we’re alive…Murdock stepped in,” Anna said cautiously, not wanting to
burden Rowan further with the memories of Mairi that would surface when she
explained the whole truth of what had happened.  “I think that having to face
you again is what changed his heart.  I think that he had pushed what he had
done to Mairi into the back of his mind, hidden it away, and that seeing you,
facing you was what gnawed at his conscious.”

Rowan smirked
slightly, surprising Anna with his reaction.

“Mayhap she
intervened,” he whispered, glancing swiftly heavenward and sending a silent
prayer up to Mairi.

“Maybe she did,”
Anna whispered, patting Rowan’s leg gently.

“Murdock plans tae
let us go then?” Rowan asked, green eyes searching her face in the darkness.

“Yes, we’re safe,”
she whispered, a slight smile lighting her face at the truth that rung in her
words.  “We can go home,” she whispered, her voice breaking with the joy of her
statement.

“Aye?”

“Yes, we can go
home now…as soon as you’re up to it,” Anna said, smiling down at her husband,
aching to touch him, to brush the strand of hair that had fallen in his face
away, to kiss his lips so that she knew he was really alive.

“Kiss me,” Rowan
whispered as if reading Anna’s mind.  “Verra softly, so that I…”

Anna knelt beside
his bed, and leaning forward ever so cautiously, she traced a single finger
across his jaw line, savoring the feeling of his warm flesh against her skin. 
His skin shown silvery in the darkness, and his eyes were cloudy from the
medicine that the Doctor had administered for pain. 

Broken and
bleeding, he had never been more beautiful to Anna.  She pressed her lips carefully
against his and felt a glorious light spread within her body.  Her pulse
hammered in her veins and she fought the nearly irresistible desire to enclose
Rowan in her arms.

“I love you,” she
whispered against his lips, before she gently touched her lips to his, feather
light in her touch, being careful not to unsettle his wounds. 

“I love ye too,
Anna,” he whispered, lips hovering just above hers.

His words tore at
her heart, and she smiled against his lips.  Oh how she loved him.

The door to the
bedroom flew open, startling them both.  Rowan let out a muffled cry, pain
shooting through his veins as he flinched, jostling his wounds. 

Quinn and Malcolm
burst into the room, breathing heavily from the exertion of bounding up the
stairs two at a time.

“Ye could have
knocked!” Rowan winced as her scolded his brothers.

“Jesus, Rowan!” 
Look at ye…what happened?” Quinn asked as he closed the distance between them.

“Anna!” Malcolm
beamed as he rushed into the room and pulled his sister-in-law into an enormous
bear hug.  “Oh my God!  We’ve been sae worrit… we couldna find ye and…”

“We’re fine now,
it’s alright Malcolm,” Anna said, giggling as she wriggled out of his crushing
embrace.  She held him at arms length now and reached up to brush his
disheveled hair out of his face.

“We were just sae worrit,
and we thought they might have brought ye back here,” he explained, breathing
returning to normal as he collected himself.

Anna reached up
and kissed Malcolm on the cheek, then squeezed his arms in reassurance.  His
genuine concern for her warmed her heart.

“We’re fine now,
really,” she went on, stressing her words as her heart swelled with love for
her new family.

“We’ll explain
everything on the way home,” Rowan interjected as he slowly and painfully
pushed himself up from the bed.

“Rowan!” You
shouldn’t move…don’t get up!” Anna scolded, brushing past Malcolm and rushing
to her husband’s side.

Rowan put out a
hand in an effort to stop her.  She heeded his warning and stopped in her
tracks, stopping just short of touching him.

His eyes were
closed in concentration as he fought to remain standing and not black out.  “I canna
stay here another minute,” he greeted through clenched teeth, steadying himself
by holding onto the post of the bed.  “Let’s go home, Anna,” he whispered,
opening his eyes and holding her concerned gaze.

Understanding the
look of torment in his eyes, the utter need to be away from Murdock and leave
this chapter of their lives behind, Anna nodded in agreement and carefully took
Rowan’s hand.

“Let’s go home,”
she whispered approvingly, smiling up at her brave husband.

Home
. 

Oh how sweet it
sounded.  Home with Rowan, home with the Murray brothers. 

They were together
now, together forever.  And together, they would make their way in this brave
New World.