by Holly Bush
“He is not family!” Muireall shouted, red-faced.
“He will be when he marries her,” Kirsty said, seemingly unfazed by Muireall’s clenched fists and shouts.
“Kirsty!” Elspeth said. “Please!”
“What? Look at him. Just look at him. He’s taken with you and has been for some time, if I’m not mistaken,” Kirsty said.
“Get out!” Muireall said to Alexander and pointed to the door. “You do not belong here. You are not a Thompson.”
He looked at Elspeth and smiled gently. “What do you want me to do? Shall I stay, or shall I go? It’s in your hands.”
Elspeth felt like she was at a precipice, looking down into a deep and vast canyon, into the unknown, but as if her answer might set a course for her entire life—and indeed, it very well might. She stared at Alexander. She was connected to him in some strange and unknown fashion, and there was no denying he calmed her. She looked up at him with red-rimmed, tear-filled eyes. She needed him.
“Please stay.”
He supposed it was at that moment that he knew that he’d fallen in love with her. And what he would say in the next several ticks of the mantel clock would undoubtedly mean that she might never return his feelings. But he had decided to follow his father’s advice. He needed to be truthful with her and with her family, and that included the boxer who was clenching his fists and dancing on his toes. He would be lucky if he made it out of this house with only a broken heart.
“Would you like to sit down, Miss Thompson?” He touched her elbow.
“Yes, Mr. Pendergast,” she whispered.
Alexander guided her to an unoccupied settee and sat down beside her.
She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders, addressing her family. “I guess that’s all I really have to tell you other than when I got home, I checked all the doors and window locks and told Mrs. McClintok and the boys because I wanted everyone to stay inside until we could all talk.”
“We can’t continue our meeting with him in the room,” the oldest sister, Muireall, said.
Muireall rose to leave, indicating their meeting had ended. The younger brother, Payden, jumped to his feet, and Alexander could see the housekeeper hurrying away when Mrs. Murdoch called for tea and coffee.
“I think you should all wait and hear what I have to say,” Alexander said and took a hard look at James.
“You have nothing to say to us, Mr. Pendergast,” Muireall said.
“Actually, I do, and it concerns the men who followed Miss Thompson.”
Muireall Thompson reseated herself, and Payden dropped down on the arm of his sister’s chair.
“You know them?” James asked.
“Not personally, but I know of them.”
“Start talking, Pendergast.”
He took a deep breath and risked a glance at Elspeth. She was looking worried and unsure, and he had nothing to say to console her—in fact, everything he would say next would do the opposite of consoling her. He would disgust her. “Promise me when we are done here, you will allow me to talk to you and explain things that I worry will not be clear in this telling,” he whispered.
She nodded slowly.
Alexander looked at the Thompson family and plunged into to the story.
“Not long after Miss Thompson and I met the first time, Mr. Schmitt, the city councilman I work for, called me into his office after he’d had a meeting with three men. He asked me to check on a person, on Miss Thompson her siblings.”
“What did you say, boy?” Mrs. Murdoch asked over the gasps from the women in the room.
“I said no, that I would not do it, especially as he would not tell me why. Schmitt,” Alexander said and took a deep breath, “Schmitt also pressured me with a family secret I was unaware of that he threatened to reveal.”
“What secret?” Muireall asked.
“It is not mine to tell,” he said.
“You could be lying. You could be making this all up to insinuate yourself into our family,” Muireall said in a stern, cold voice.
“He is not lying,” Elspeth said at his side. “He told me the day he was told. He was upset, and rightfully so. It was not the thing anyone would want gossiped about. You may think he is lying, but I am sure he is not. And—” Elspeth stopped Muireall from speaking with an outstretched hand. “I believe he was telling me the truth at the time and now as well.”
“When the subject was brought up again by Mr. Schmitt, he threatened to reveal my family’s secret, but I refused.”
“And Schmitt accepted that?” James asked.
“I hinted at what I knew about his son’s dissolute habits and that the woman his son was courting was a close friend of the Pendergasts.”
“You threatened him back,” James said.
“I did.”
“Good,” James said.
“Did he ever say what he wanted to know?” Kirsty asked.
“Yes. He told me in the second meeting that he wanted to know what year your family emigrated from Scotland and if your name was always Thompson.”
Muireall surged to her feet, eyes wild, hands over her mouth. “Get out!” she said and pointed to the door. “Out!”
“Muireall!” both sisters said quickly. But Alexander noticed that James was saying nothing. Just staring at Mrs. Murdoch, a grim look on their faces.
“There is more to this story that all of you should hear,” Alexander said and watched Mrs. Murdoch pull Muireall down onto the seat beside her. Both women were white-faced. “Of course you know that we were followed on the night of the boxing match. I believe the men who followed us into that alley are the same men who met with Mr. Schmitt and visited him again just a week ago. I was not in his office with him for either visit, but I did overhear some of the second. Mostly, I heard Schmitt’s body slam into the wall. When I did speak to him about it, he was desperate for information—and scared, which is unusual for Schmitt.”
“Knocked him around, did they?” James asked.
Alexander nodded. “He begged me to find anything I could about your family through Miss Thompson. I told him I would.”
“I told you all,” Muireall said. “I told you not to trust him.”
Everyone in the room was staring at him, and he dared a glance at Elspeth. Tears pooled in her eyes, bewilderment as evident as the tremor in the hand covering her mouth. He shook his head.
“I never said anything. I just wanted to buy time to talk to you and see if there was a reason for all of it,” he said. “The only thing I ever told Schmitt was that your family came from Scotland, but that is not a secret, is it?”
Elspeth shook her head slowly, looking at him as if he’d stabbed her with a knife, betrayed and unsure of someone she’d wanted to trust.
Alexander looked at James. “I’ve told my father to add additional security around my mother and sister. I am concerned their safety could be used to compel me to do or say something. I would advise you to do the same.”
“What aren’t you telling us, Pendergast?” James asked.
“It does not bear repeating in front of ladies,” Alexander said. “We can speak of it later.”
“You will tell us right now, young man. We are not delicate flowers,” Mrs. Murdoch said. “And move your knee away from my niece’s skirts.”
Alexander shifted quickly from Elspeth. “If you’re sure, ma’am.”
“I’m sure. Now tell us the rest of what these criminals have done.”
He proceeded to tell them of the visit by the police.
“A woman died?” Muireall asked.
He nodded. “Yes, and Schmitt had . . . visited her on the night of her death.”
“Did she trip and fall or eat some bad fish?” Kirsty asked. “Surely it isn’t something diabolical.”
“She was strangled to death, and her body was mutilated,” Alexander said and looked directly at James. The brother stared back, grim-faced.
He heard the gasps from the females in the room and a mutter
ed swear word from the younger brother. James continued to stare at him until Mrs. Murdoch cleared her throat.
“We’ve got to tell them, Muireall,” she said, tapping her cane on the floor.
“Tell us what?” Kirsty asked.
“No! No! It is not safe!” Muireall shouted.
James pushed away from the mantel. He dropped to one knee in front of his sister. “It is time. They’re adults, and they can’t protect themselves unless they understand everything.”
Chapter 12
Silent tears streamed down Muireall’s face, and she would not look at James or Elspeth, even though she sat directly across from her. Elspeth could tell Muireall was far, far away.
“It was the last thing I promised them,” she said finally. “Aunt was there. She will tell you. It was the last thing.”
“It was, Muireall,” Aunt Murdoch said quietly. “The very last thing after they told you that they loved you and all of your siblings . . . and James too.”
“James too?” Kirsty said.
“Tell them,” James said.
Muireall took a deep breath and looked at Alexander. He rose quickly and nodded.
“Thank you for hearing me out today,” he said and looked at James. “I wanted to make sure that you knew how dire the threat was.”
James stood and shook Alexander’s hand.
“Holy Mother of Jesus,” Kirsty whispered. “James is shaking his hand.”
“I think he should stay,” Aunt Murdoch said.
James glanced at her and back at Alexander. “He should stay, Muireall.”
“I run this family. I have run this family for thirteen years. I have no intention of allowing an outsider to hear personal family matters. The subject is too large, too dangerous to have just anyone off the street privy to information they could use against us.”
“We know you run the family,” James said. “Rightfully so. But you are not thinking clearly. He has guarded the girls and has come here and told us about Schmitt and the men after him, knowing it may jeopardize his personal wishes.”
“Can you not see?” Aunt Murdoch said. “Kirsty is right. He is fond of Elspeth, maybe more than fond. I don’t believe he would put her at risk.”
“What happens when he moves on to the next pretty young girl in his orbit? What happens then? Would he bandy about the Thompson story over a tumbler of brandy?”
Alexander looked at Muireall. “You may dislike me for whatever reason you wish, but it is not fair for you to label me unworthy and without character. If something is told to me in confidence, then in confidence it will stay. I do appreciate that you’ll want to discuss this family matter privately, though. I’ll be on my way. Miss Thompson? Will you walk me to the door?”
Elspeth led him down the hallway and handed him his hat and coat. “Thank you for telling us what you know.”
He nodded and then put a finger under her chin to bring her eyes to his. “I never told him anything. I’m only slightly acquainted with your family and really didn’t have anything to say, but even still, I wouldn’t have done it.”
“What if Mr. Schmitt had told you why? You said ‘especially as he would not tell me why.’ What if he had told you everything, Mr. Pendergast? What if he had?”
He shook his head. “I would never put you in danger. I couldn’t.”
“But why? We barely know each other. Our families could not be more different.” She looked away. “And that day at the market. You hurried away from me as if the hounds of hell were on your heels. Maybe you were embarrassed by my cart full of canned goods.”
Alexander laced his fingers with hers and brought their hands up between them. “No. That was never it. I . . . I was worried that if I got to know you better, you would tell me something that I would be tempted to tell Schmitt if he threatened my family. I thought it best to remove the temptation.”
“But you have changed your mind? Won’t the temptation be too great?”
“No,” he whispered and touched her cheek with his hand. “I can’t think of anything that would make me put you in any danger.”
Alexander was staring at her mouth and moved his thumb to touch her lower lip. Her insides were racing, her heart pounding, and her breaths coming quickly. He leaned his face closer and closer until their noses touched, their lips barely apart. She looked into his eyes, and he was looking back at her, his blue eyes open and focused.
And then he leaned the last inch or so until his lips met hers. She sighed, the long wait finally over to touch him in an intimate way. How soft his lips were, his breath minty and clean, and his breathing as erratic as hers. She had found him, found the person that some never found, that she believed she would never find, the one who fit her, the one who was her mate.
A throat was cleared near the parlor door, and Alexander stepped back. She smiled at him and felt suddenly shy. He was a handsome, independent man from a well-to-do family, wealthy beyond anything she was accustomed to. He had kissed her, and she nearly swooned with the rightness and the tension and the romance of it all. Goodness, she was acting like a ninny. She could feel a blush climb her cheeks.
“Miss Thompson, may I call on you later this week?” he said with a smile and a glance down the hallway.
“Yes, yes, you may,” she said, barely hearing her own words.
“You are so beautiful,” he whispered.
A throat cleared again.
Alexander nodded and left through the front door. Elspeth stood still, very still, touching her lips and thinking about Alexander’s blue eyes and the kiss that may have just changed her life.
“Elspeth!” Kirsty said. “Get in here. We’re all waiting, and everyone knows you were out here kissing Mr. Pendergast.”
Elspeth hurried down the hall, checking her hair as she went. Surely no one would know that she’d been kissed and her world had been turned upside down. She hurried to the settee, not looking at anyone else in the room.
Aunt Murdoch turned to Muireall. “It’s time. Rory and Cullodena couldn’t have meant forever. A destiny can’t be a secret, you know. A destiny is a pronouncement all on its own. They knew that this family would fight for its rightful place and that someday the battle lines would be drawn. That day has arrived, Muireall. Take up the charge, girl. Take up the charge and let your soldiers know what they fight for. Your father would expect no less of you, of any of you,” Aunt said and looked around the room at each of them.
“Mrs. McClintok? Come into the room and bring Robbie too,” Muireall said. “You are our cousin, after all.”
“Cousin?” the housekeeper said.
“Your mother was sister to Rory, their father, although there was an argument of some kind, and your mother and father moved far away as soon as they were married,” Aunt said. “Rory kept track of his siblings, and that included your mother, even though they did not communicate for twenty years. When he found it necessary to move his family to America, he discovered you, his niece, had come here with your husband and son and that your husband had been killed in a coal mine not long after you arrived. He contacted the minister where you were living and asked him to recommend that you apply as a housekeeper for the newly arrived Thompson family.”
Everyone in the room was silent, all staring at Mrs. McClintok as she held her hand to her chest, her face pale. “Yes. The reverend came to my home and told me that a family from Scotland would be arriving and would need a housekeeper. We are Thompsons, then? Robbie and I?”
“You are MacTavishes. From your mother’s side. She was the next child after Rory in his family. Did she ever tell you her maiden name?”
“She said it was Daniels. She said her surname was Daniels.”
“That was her and Rory’s father’s middle name.”
“Sit down, Mrs. McClintok, please. You are white as a ghost,” Kirsty said. “Robert, Payden, get some brandy for Mrs. McClintok and carry in the tea tray.”
“We are cousins, then? Robbie and I?” Payden asked as he went to the
door. “Excellent!”
Elspeth sat quietly, as did James and Kirsty. Mrs. McClintok was asking Aunt some particulars about relatives, but Elspeth was not listening. Her stomach was roiling now, and she knew with some certainty that her world would shift in the next hour or so. Would it shift so much that Mr. Pendergast, Alexander, would continue to be part of it? She hoped. She certainly hoped so.
Robbie and Payden brought in the tea cart and sat side by side on the floor while Kirsty passed the tea and the brandy to Mrs. McClintok and James. Elspeth looked expectantly at Muireall.
She took her time looking each of her siblings in the eye. She was grim-faced but determined, it seemed to Elspeth.
“What I am about to tell you must never be told outside our family. The reason is that our brother’s life will be in considerable danger, and we will never risk him.”
“James can take care of himself,” Payden said. “How ridiculous of you to think he is some poor defenseless sap.”
Elspeth had seen Payden get under Muireall’s skin on many occasions. He was the age where he was no longer a boy and yet not quite a man, and he had the sharp mind and tongue to be a nuisance—a loved nuisance, but trying all the same. But Muireall did not look disturbed at all. She looked at him with love and tenderness.
“But it is not James who we are concerned with. It is you, Payden.”
He shrugged. “Why would you be concerned with me? Other than when I don’t do my studies to your satisfaction. I do my chores, I—”
James knelt in front of him. “You are the only son. You are the heir.”
“That can’t be,” Payden said. “You’re my older brother!”
“I’m a cousin, like Robbie here. My parents died when their ship sank near Edinburgh while they were traveling down the coast of Scotland. My mother was the youngest sister of Rory, your father. I was only a year old when it happened, and your father and mother took me in and raised me as a son, and I will always call them Mother and Papa. But I am not their son, I am their nephew. You are the only son of Rory and Cullodena MacTavish. You are the rightful heir, Payden, and we aim to keep you safe.”