by Starla Kaye
“Why would someone want me dead? What have I ever done to anyone?” She asked the questions even as she dropped the stick. She couldn’t run away and carry so much. The stick would surely slow her down; all she needed was the knife.
He stopped and seemed to look harder through the trees in his effort to spot her. “I dinna ken the reasons why. And I dinna care. My only concern is getting the rest of the money promised me by Sutherland’s men.”
Sutherland, again. Alastair Sutherland. Clearly he must be a very vile man.
Glancing around once more, she spotted what could possibly be an escape route. There was a slender path through the trees not far from her. Surely Angus with his great bulk would have a difficult time following. Pulse racing, she dashed toward the path, catching him off-guard.
She sped as fast as she could between the skinny trees mixed in with the towering pines. Branches snagged at her breeches, tore a piece off her shirt, and scratched her cheeks. She raced on and on for what seemed like forever. Her breaths came in rapid spurts; her sides hurt. But she couldn’t stop.
The crushing of needles on the forest floor and vivid curses told her Angus was hot in pursuit. It sounded as if he were gaining ground now.
“Ye willna get away, lass,” he bellowed, panting at the same time. “I always get me mon…woman, in this case.”
He was almost on top of her. She wasn’t going to be able to outrun him. Stand and fight. Her mind screamed the words at her. She didn’t want to obey, but what other choice did she really have.
Surprising him, she stopped abruptly, holding her long, sharp knife behind her. She tried to appear helpless and resigned to her fate. “I canna run any further,” she gasped, holding one of her sides with the hand not wielding the knife.
The arrogant fool strode directly in front of her. Even in the near dark she could see the smugness on his beard-stubbled face. His eyes danced with the promise of horrible things she didn’t want to contemplate.
“Ye might enjoy what I plan to do with ye, lass. Doubtful. But ye might be one of those women who likes a bit of pain.” He sneered at her and reached down with one hand to cup himself. “At least ye’ll die having been with a real man.”
She shuddered in disgust. After being made love to by Brodie, she wanted no other man touching her. Especially not this nasty, smelly Scot who would abuse her and then kill her. Still, she might only have one chance to save herself. She had to make him believe she had truly given up all hope.
He stepped even closer, confident that he had intimidated her. “Ye’re such a wee bit of a thing. I doubt ye’ll give me much pleasure.”
Think of Brodie. Think of his child you carry. The thoughts gave her strength. She allowed tears to shine in her eyes, allowed her expression to show her fear—which wasn’t all that hard to do. All the while she held tightly to the knife behind her back.
Angus gave her a snarl of a smile and reached to touch her face.
Annabel called on every bit of her determination to live and whipped the knife from behind her back. His hand had barely touched her cheek when she thrust the blade deep into his gut with all her might.
He gave a fierce howl of outrage threaded with agonizing pain. His eyes fired with hatred and he reached for his own knife in a sheath at his waist. “Ye’ll die for this!”
But she hadn’t released her hold on her knife and managed to twist it, even to drag it upward a few inches.
With his faltering strength, he shoved her away and jerked the knife from his body. Blood poured from the jagged wound. He tried to staunch the flow with one splayed hand and glowered murderously at her. “Ye damn bitch! Ye’ve killed me.”
The smell of blood made her nauseous, knowing she probably had killed him made her tremble with horror. She watched him sink to his knees unable to stop the flow of blood, weakening more with each second.
Then he raised his own knife with a shaking hand and threw it toward her.
She reacted too slowly and the knife passed by the side of her left leg, slicing through the braies and grazing her thigh. She gasped in shock.
As she started to examine her wound, she noted Angus attempting to pick up her knife that he’d thrown to the ground. It clearly was costing him to do so, but he appeared determined.
No! She would not let him kill her! Ignoring the pain in her leg, she grabbed his knife from near her feet. When she looked up, he was still on his knees and preparing to throw her knife but his hand was shaking. Without another thought, she threw his blade at him. This time she struck him near the center of his chest.
Her knife slid from his hand and he gaped down in horror at the knife only inches below his neck. He gasped, choked, and collapsed to the ground as he tried to pull out the knife. This time he couldn’t find the strength. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. His eyes looked directly at her in hatred once more, and then dimmed.
Dead. Finally dead. Even as she thought it, she wretched up what little she’d eaten in the last day. She shivered with the horrors of what had happened, of what she’d been forced to do.
A few minutes later she managed to tear off a strip of her shirt and tied it around the wound on her leg. Fortunately it had only been a scrape. Still, infection could set in if she didn’t find some kind of herbs to tend it with. But she couldn’t stay here any longer. She needed to somehow find her way toward Urquhart. She had the uneasy feeling that Angus wasn’t the only one looking for her. And he’d mentioned getting the rest of his money for killing her from Sutherland’s men. Even now they could be searching for her as well.
She grabbed up both knives, wiping the blood away on Angus’ shirt. She wished she could find his horse, for she was certain he would not have been on foot all this time. But, horse or not, she had to get out of here.
* * *
By the time the Campbells had been buried, Brodie’s frustration level had reached its highest point. With this many horses and men moving around, any possible tracks were long gone. They had wasted too much valuable time and now this. He shoved furiously at the side of Annabel’s wagon, which he’d been standing next to.
“We will find her,” Rose said calmly. She walked up from where she’d been talking to her husband. “I ken in my heart we will find our Roseanna…your Annabel.”
He reached up to run a hand through his too-long hair and blew out a breath. “I pray we will. ‘Tis my fault she’s in this trouble.” He swore and curled his hands into fists. “Tracking her is going to be impossible. Same with Gordon.”
The MacKay strode up next to Rose and put an arm around her waist. “We will send men out in every direction. But ye and I will go where yer gut tells ye. I trust in ye, even if ye dunna.”
“I barely ken who I am, who ye are. How can I trust my instincts? How can ye?”
He didn’t wait for a response and instead walked to the middle of the camp and began issuing orders. Within minutes the men were divided into groups and told in which direction to search. Some of the men were instructed to take the two wagons back to Urquhart. And he’d tried futilely to send Rose back to Urquhart with a guard. She only proved to be every bit as stubborn as her daughter.
Riding through this part of the forest proved to be impossible. Yet something—the gut instinct he was reluctant to trust—told Brodie this was the way Annabel had gone. And the way Gordon had followed after her. He dismounted, the others riding with him did as well. Then they went on foot to search and pulled their horses with them. It was slow going.
The sun was high above them and creeping through the treetops by the time one of the men called out with a find. “’Tis Gordon, my laird. Dead.”
Brodie dropped the reins to his horse and hurried as best he could through the thick branches. He heard heavy rushed footsteps coming behind him and knew The MacKay and probably Rose trailed him. He’d rather have seen Gordon’s dead body alone, but it wasn’t going to happen. His heart pounded with dread. If Gordon was dead, was Annabel lying somewhere around her
e dead as well?
He found the murdering knight lying in a bloody lump near the base of a large pine. He had clearly been stabbed twice with a knife. The wound near his heart would have been the killing blow, but the one in his gut would have killed him eventually. Brodie’s regret was that he hadn’t had the chance to kill the man himself.
Rose gasped and turned away behind her husband’s back. “Who…who would have killed him?”
“Annabel? Any signs of her?” The MacKay demanded. He studied the body of the dead man. “Let the scavengers have him. No burial.”
Brodie couldn’t agree more. The dozen men who walked closer had clearly heard The MacKay and had no problem with what he’d said. “Agreed. Spread apart and search for anything to tell us Annabel has been here.”
Only a few minutes later Brodie found the scrap of fabric from a shirt. He knew instinctively that it belonged to Annabel and it carried her scent. Tucking it into the sporran he wore at his waist, he bent down and was certain the footprints he found in the crushed undergrowth belonged to Annabel, too.
Standing, he pointed. “She went this way.” God, please let her be alive. “We go on foot for now.”
Again he didn’t wait for anyone’s response and strode in the direction he had pointed.
* * *
She’d been right. Other men had been after her.
“Hard to believe a wee lass like ye killed a skilled mercenary like Gordon,” a tall man with a face full of pockmarks said with a smirk. “At least we willna have to pay him.”
“More money fer us,” the balding man said on a greedy chuckle. He waved one of her knives in the air a few feet from her. He looked at the other man. “Lets jist kill the bitch. We can cut off her head and take it to Sutherland. He will pay us then.”
Annabel cringed and pressed backward against the tree to which they had tied her. She had foolishly taken a chance and decided to catch a bit of sleep before going any further. She hadn’t had any sleep at all the night before and needed rest. She was paying dearly now for that mistake. With her life and with the life of the babe she knew in her heart she carried. She just prayed they would kill her quickly, that they wouldn’t decide to rape her first.
“Mayhap we can have a bit of fun with her before we slit her throat.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when a dirk sliced into the side of his neck. He gurgled for a second, lifting a hand helplessly to his throat as blood gushed, and then he crumpled in a dead heap.
Before the other man could even react another knife sailed into the middle of his back. He, too, fell dead to the forest floor.
Annabel screamed, tears streaming down her face, shaking as much as she could within her bindings. What horrors now awaited her? Had Alastair Sutherland caught up with them? Had he decided to save his money and kill the men he’d sent after her? Oh, God, have mercy!
And then Brodie raced toward her out of the forest behind the other men. She’d never seen such a welcome sight, except that his expression was one of fury. Still, she was enormously pleased to see him. He could turn her over his knee right here and burn her bottom and she wouldn’t care.
“Brodie,” she said breathlessly. “Oh, Brodie, I was so scared.” She struggled within her bindings, longing to go to him.
“Ye shoulda been! Ye’re lucky to be alive. Lucky to have naught been…” He didn’t finish the thought, but she knew in his fearful expression what he’d meant.
She shook her head. “No one touched me in that way.”
“They would have.” They held gazes for a second and she could see that the idea of what the men could have—would have—done had shaken him to his soul.
“But they didn’t,” she insisted, desperate to convince him she was all right.
He continued to hold himself stiffly rather than come to cut her free. She could see torment in his eyes. In that moment she knew he was fighting personal demons. He wanted to free her, to pull her into his arms, probably do so much more…but he could do no more than free her. She ached for the impossible position they were both in.
Then a man of middle age, still powerfully built, and clearly used to being in charge stepped out of the forest as well as into this small clearing. He had a head full of thick, brown hair interwoven with gray. A few days’ worth of beard covered his handsome face. He didn’t even seem to notice Brodie and instead focused entirely on her. Tears glistened in his eyes and she watched him swallow hard.
An instant later a small and delicate woman, wearing a gown that clearly had once been elegant and now was stained and gravely wrinkled hurried next to the strange, regal man. Her face was streaked with tears; her skin pale as she, too, seemed to study Annabel.
“Brodie?” Annabel questioned uneasily. “Please.” She didn’t like being tied up, nor did she like being so thoroughly examined by these strangers. Strangers that were making her very uncomfortable with the way they seemed to devour just the sight of her.
As if finally realizing he hadn’t gone to her, Brodie hurried over. He cut her loose without saying a word. His gaze met hers and she, again, saw the tension he felt, the misery. But he didn’t touch her, didn’t speak, and took a step back.
Her arms ached from having been bound so tightly for several hours. She rubbed at them and shuddered at all that she’d gone through this day. Then she needed to touch him and stepped toward him. Her weakened leg threatened to crumple and she whimpered in pain.
“She’s been hurt!” the woman cried and scurried closer. “Braden, our daughter is hurt. Do something!”
Daughter? Their daughter? Annabel’s eyes widened, her heart raced, and she inched backward to the tree. She looked in confusion at Brodie. “Who…who are these people?”
He stared at the wound on her leg and his expression grew fearsome. He ignored her question and bent down to examine her injury. “How did this happen? Did Gordon do this?” he said on a growl.
Annabel flinched from his touch, even though it was gentle. “Did you find him? Gordon?”
The woman shoved her way down beside Brodie and studied Annabel with tears in her eyes. “After all these years. I had given up hope.” She reached to cup Annabel’s cheek. “My babe, all grown up.”
“Brodie?” Annabel asked again, hearing the worried sound in her voice. It couldn’t be. She wasn’t sure she wanted it to be the truth. She had loved the Hendersons. They were the only parents she’d known, would always be the “parents” she loved.
He finally met her gaze, regret and apology swirling in his eyes. “I wasna sure when I sent word to the MacKays.”
She brushed his hand away from her leg, feeling hurt and confused. “Sent word to the MacKays?” She didn’t understand. “When? How? Why?”
He tried to examine her leg again. She once more brushed his hand away. “Explain,” she demanded. She looked to the silently crying woman and the very still man watching her. “You think these people are my real parents? You thought they might be and did not tell me?”
“We are yer parents, Roseanna. I have nay doubt aboot it,” The MacKay stated firmly. He pulled his wife to her feet to stand beside him.
Roseanna? She decided to ignore that piece of information for now and dismissed him. She focused on Brodie, who looked angry and uncomfortable. “I am waiting, Brodie Durward.”
“Show the man respect, daughter.” The MacKay didn’t look at all pleased with her. “The laird of Urquhart has come a long way to find ye, as have we all. He has jist killed two men fer ye.”
Brodie stepped into the tension-filled moment. “Annabel has a right to be upset with me.” He pinned her with a stern look. “Even if I did take the lives of two men fer ye.”
Annabel raised her chin and couldn’t respond to that. He had done so, and she was extremely grateful that he had.
He blew out a breath and all sense of anger disappeared, replaced by regret. “I had seen ye suffer greatly at the loss of Dougal Henderson. I heard yer pain at finding Katherine’s note and rea
ding her admission that she couldna have children.”
He glanced at the older man and back to her. “The name ‘Braden’ jogged my memory…or what little there is of it. I somehow ken a mon named Braden MacKay. He had been a guid friend of my father’s, at least I believed so. And I seemed to remember that he and his wife had had a baby stolen from them many years ago. Ye would be aboot the right age.”
Again he looked toward MacKay. “I seemed to recall that Braden had the look of ye. Rose as well. So I sent word to them in case they wished to come see ye, to find out fer themselves. I dinna wish to keep a secret from ye, more I wished to protect ye. What if I had been wrong? I couldna see ye hurt so agin.”
She listened to him, heard the wariness in his voice. In her heart, she knew he wouldn’t have wanted to see her hurt by this, not when he was already hurting her by not being able to marry her.
“They dinna answer the message I had sent. So I thought I had been wrong. That is the only reason I let ye leave Urquhart without knowing aboot this.” Now he glowered at the older man. “And then they showed up a day after ye left.”
So much to take in, so much to accept. She slumped against the tree, putting a hand to her throbbing leg. “I will have to think about all of this.”
“There is naught to think aboot,” The MacKay said in a way not to be argued with. “Ye are our long lost daughter. Anyone can see that. We will take ye back to our home where ye belong.”
Rose looked in annoyance up at her husband and sighed. “In all these years, husband, ye have learned little diplomacy. Ye canna order a person to have feelings fer ye. Ye canna jist expect Roseanna…Annabel to accept what ye say.”
He shifted awkwardly, clearly not liking being chastised and yet understanding the right of what she’d said. “I dinna mean to be harsh with ye, lass. It has jist been difficult.”
Annabel’s heart softened toward the demanding man. “It is a complicated situation and will take time.” The strain of the day finally took its toll on her and she looked at Brodie. “My wagon?”