My Heart Stood Still

by Lynn Kurland

  He stared hard at the picture on his fridge. He had no trouble locating the precise point at which he'd begun to wonder if the altitude had fried his brain. It had to have been the lack of oxygen. One didn't hear voices at 27,000 feet, did one?

  Thomas, there's more to life than climbing. Turn around and go home.

  He shook his head at the memory. Five hundred feet from the summit, five hundred feet from conquering the most impossible challenge of his life, and he'd begun to hear voices. It had probably been his late grandmother haunting him. She had never minded a good hike now and then, but she never would have approved of him climbing to the top of the world.

  Of course, he'd ignored the voice and gone on to make the summit, just as he'd planned. Anything else would have been unthinkable. But the rush he'd expected to feel, the feeling of triumph, the bone-deep satisfaction he'd anticipated had been missing.

  There was more to life than climbing?

  He scowled as he turned back to the stove. What the hell was that supposed to mean? That conquering challenges wasn't everything? That there was more to life than achieving goals? That making a fortune, climbing peaks, being the best wasn't all there was?

  He couldn't deny that something along those lines had begun to occur to him as he built his house. When he'd been working on the kitchen, he'd imagined it serving a wife and children, being filled to the brim with family on holidays and birthdays, full of laughter and conversation. When he'd worked on the bedrooms, he'd taken special care to see they were strong and sound, so they would safely shelter children in the future. The master bedroom had been made with a woman's comfort in mind, as a retreat from the rest of the house. The house was full of nooks and crannies just perfect for children to use in playing their games of hide-and-seek. Thomas had three sisters, and he had very fond memories of doing the like with them.

  All of which had very little to do with making millions of dollars or climbing mountains that were capable of killing even the most skilled.

  And it was those kinds of thoughts that had led him to continued speculation during the ensuing months about the adverse effects of altitude on his common sense.

  The phone rang, and he jumped in spite of himself. Maybe he wasn't sleeping enough. Yeah, that was it. He needed more sleep. He'd get some, just as soon as he got off the phone with whoever was calling to make his last day at home hell. It was probably his dad, trying to talk him out of his current obsession, which in light of his usual obsessions, seemed fairly tame.

  His father hadn't done much more than roll his eyes when Thomas had bought the castle. The grumbling had begun when Thomas had sent his sister to investigate the site, and she'd wound up marrying a Brit. The true roaring had ensued when John McKinnon had learned that Thomas, too, intended to cross the Atlantic. Not even assuring his dad it was just a year-long do-it-yourself project had soothed him. His father was convinced he had lost it.

  Thomas wasn't so sure his dad was wrong.

  The phone continued to ring. Thomas turned off the fire under his meal, then grabbed the phone.

  "What?" he demanded.

  "Well," a sultry feminine voice drawled, "isn't that a pleasant greeting."

  Ah, Tiffany Amber Davidson, the beginning of his love life's downfall. Not that it had been much of a love life to begin with, but she'd certainly decimated what there'd been of it.

  Damn, this was all he needed. When compared to what he was certain would be a very unpleasant few minutes with this woman, listening to his dad gripe at him sounded like a vacation. If he'd only known a year ago where a simple smile in Tiffany's very expensive direction would have led him, he would have kept frowning.

  "Tiffany," he said, "I told you—"

  Her sigh was a thing of beauty. Thomas found himself almost in awe of the subtle shades and nuances of disappointment, despair, and guilt-inducing reproach that layered a simple exhalation of breath. A lesser man would have been moved.

  "Thomas, can't we let bygones be bygones?"

  "Sure," he said easily. "It's gone. Let's leave it there."

  "No," she said, sounding as if it was an enormous effort to be patient. "I mean, let's start again."

  "Where? When?" he asked politely. 'Two months ago? On that particular afternoon in June? Should it be before or after I walked in on you displaying your assets to my former friend on his desk during his lunch hour?"

  "You weren't supposed to be back from your stupid trip to that stupid mountain until July!"

  He had to admire her ability to completely ignore the bigger issue. "I suppose I should apologize for that," he said dryly.

  "I'll forgive you," she said magnanimously. "Now, should I catch a flight up tomorrow?"

  "I won't be home."

  He could feel her eyes narrowing over the phone.

  "You won't?"

  "I won't."

  "Some other stupid quest?" she asked acidly.

  "Something like that." He wasn't about to tell her where he was going. The last thing he needed was Tiffany haunting him in England while he was trying to remodel.

  "When are you coming back?"

  "Next year, probably."

  "What?" she screeched. "Thomas, you can't go anywhere. I love you. No one will ever love you like I do."

  Heaven help him.

  "Good-bye, Tiffany."

  "I'll do anything!" she said, sounding decidedly frantic all of a sudden.

  "Good-bye, Tiffany."

  "But my ring!"

  Thomas smiled grimly as he clicked off the phone. Her name was appropriate, as all she had ever seemed to be interested in had been trips to that particular jeweler. It had cost him a bundle. That might have left him permanently grinding his teeth had Tiffany not done him the favor of taking his ring off along with her clothes to accommodate his former friend Robby Saunders. Thomas had picked up the ring, nodded politely to the two, then taken a cab to Tiffany's, where he'd sold the ring back at a substantial loss. He didn't care. The ring and Tiffany were out of his life.

  As were a very long string of women who just weren't right for him. Thomas didn't consider himself a failure, but when it came to women, he suspected he needed to start.

  Ten minutes and a cube of butter deposited on all food surfaces later, he was walking into his den with a roll of paper towels tucked under his arm, a pop in his other hand, and nothing more complicated on his mind than watching some preseason football. He frowned at his couch, covered as it was with last-minute gear to stuff in his suitcase, then settled for an uncomfortable straight-backed chair that Tiffany had insisted he buy. He sat down gingerly, balanced his plate on one knee, the can of pop in his lap, then reached for the remote. He had almost made thumb contact with the On button when he heard something behind him. Well, perhaps heard wasn't the right term for it. He felt something behind him. Damning every Scottish ancestor he could think of for passing on such unpleasant flashes of intuition in the gene pool, he turned his head as slowly as he could and looked behind him.

  And then all hell broke loose.

  Out of thin air, a pair of mouse ears materialized, sitting prominently upon the head of a flame-haired, ruddy-complected Scot in full battle dress.

  And then the phone not six inches from his left leg started to ring.

  Thomas jumped, apparently hard enough that the back right leg of the chair gave way. He wondered absently as he was falling if Tiffany had been at the damned thing with a nail file for just such an occasion as this. He landed flat on his back with egg literally on his face, and pop sloshing all over his jeans and a very expensive Aubusson rug. He rolled to his feet, then whipped around to gape at the apparition behind him.

  Which was, he found as he managed to remove grease and fried egg from his eyes, no longer there.

  And still the phone continued to ring. Great, more distress from his former fiancée. Couldn't she just leave him alone? Thomas dragged his sleeve across his face and grabbed the receiver.

  "What?" he snapped.

 
; "What? It's your father calling, that's what."

  "Oh, sorry, Dad," Thomas said. "I'm a little indisposed at the moment."

  Thomas could feel his father's frown traveling through the airwaves as if it possessed a life of its own. "I don't approve of these premarital relations going on—"

  "I'm not in the middle of sleeping with Tiffany, Dad," Thomas said in exasperation. "I just fell out of that damned chair she made me buy, and now I'm wearing what was supposed to be my last decent meal!"

  His father grunted. "Then you'd best whip up something else. I'm the first one to tell you that that inn of your sister's will ruin your appetite."

  "Megan said the place was wonderful."

  "Your sister's opinion in these matters is not to be trusted."

  Thomas pondered just what that might mean for his immediate future. Given that he'd based his plans for that future on Megan's judgment, that could spell serious trouble for him. At the time, she'd seemed like the logical choice to do his castle reconnaissance. She'd been between jobs the year before—which unfortunately for her always seemed to be the case—and, with time on her hands, had been happy to do his investigating for him. The results of her journey had been the acquisition by some means he still wasn't clear on of a reportedly lovely little inn down the way from his castle. She'd taken a couple of pictures of both his castle and the Boar's Head Inn, then up and married some big-shot CEO who'd been vacationing at the inn with her.

  Thomas's father, having stayed at the inn for the wedding, had been less than impressed by the little hotel, but would say no more than the place gave him the willies. Thomas's mother had told him that he would really find it interesting, and she'd said it with a wicked twinkle in her eye that left him wondering if he might have been better off to accept his father's conclusion. The inn could be draped with cobwebs, lack basic necessities like running water and toilets, but if Megan had heard rumors of a love story having happened there, she would have called it fabulous. All of which led him to wonder how reliable her opinion of his castle was.

  Needs a little work could mean so many things.

  "... Your mother thinks you'll enjoy it," his father was saying with a grumble. "I think she's wrong."

  "Primitive?" Thomas asked, not for the first time.

  "That isn't the half of it," his father said, also not for the first time.

  "Come on, Dad. If there's something I should know, don't you think you should tell me now?"

  His father was silent.

  "That bad?" Thomas asked finally.

  "You wouldn't believe me if I told you, so there's no point in discussing it. Just don't be surprised by anything that goes bump in the night."

  Thomas laughed uneasily. Immediately the memory of a Scot in his living room came to mind. He looked over his shoulder, sincerely hoping he wouldn't see anything there. "Ghosts?" he asked absently.

  "All I can say is that I know what you'll find at the inn. Heaven only knows what you'll find up at that pile of stones you threw your money away on."

  "I doubt I'll be seeing anything unusual." Other than mouse ears stalking me, Thomas added silently, turning his back on the rest of the room.

  "Don't say I didn't warn you. And another thing: Don't plan on staying over there permanently. We fought a perfectly good war two hundred years ago so I didn't have to cross the Atlantic to see my grandchildren."

  "I'm not moving there. I'm just taking a little time off for a fix-up project."

  "There are plenty of ramshackle ruins over here on American soil."

  "I know," Thomas said with a sigh. "It's just—"

  "It's just that damned MacLeod blood you get from your mother," his father groused. "She gets these kind of harebrained schemes as well."

  "Thanks, Dad," Thomas said dryly. "I'll think of you fondly while I'm remodeling."

  His father made a few gruff noises, then cleared his throat. "Well, I just called to say good-bye. And, well" —more throat clearing ensued— "call me if you need help."

  "I will."

  "Your mother's already bought tickets for Christmas. She's planning some kind of damned Dickens celebration."

  "Dickens celebration?" Thomas asked suspiciously. This didn't sound good.

  His father grunted. "I'll probably have to wear some damned costume."

  Thomas had very vivid memories of his sisters coercing him into all manner of costumes in his youth. "Put your foot down, Dad," he said with feeling. "Save yourself if you can."

  "I intend to. See you soon."

  His father disconnected. Dickens would mean cravats, and Thomas was going to avoid any kind of neckwear at all costs. Maybe he could come in Scottish dress and avoid the whole tie issue. Either that or maybe he could find himself called away for a last-minute bit of skiing in the Alps and be regrettably unable to dress up for the holidays. On the whole, that might be the safest course of action.

  He put down the phone and looked at the ruins of his final meal spread out in glorious disarray on his floor. The sausages could be washed off and nuked, but the eggs were past redemption. He looked at the carpet and wondered what it might look like in a year if he didn't do a good job of cleaning it now. Then again, Mrs. Murtaugh would be coming in to clean in a day or two. Maybe he could scrape a bit, then leave the rest for her. He'd hired her to come in once a week and air out the house, anyway. He'd give her a bonus for this last little bit of dirty work and call it good.

  He rescued what could be eaten, then headed toward the kitchen. He cooked up more eggs, then stood at the counter and ate them. The kitchen floor was far easier to clean up than the carpet in the den, and who knew what else he might see that afternoon?

  Not that he was planning on anything else. He'd seen enough already.

  Once he was finished, he found himself prowling around his kitchen again. He tried to avoid the pictures on the fridge, but time and time again he found himself standing in front of them. Everest he could put behind him. He'd conquered it, no matter how unsatisfying it had been.

  The castle was another matter entirely. Just looking at it sent chills down his spine. The minute he'd touched the envelope his sister had sent him, the chills had begun. He remembered vividly sliding the photographs out and feeling himself go still.

  He had, after all, dreamed of the castle.

  With perfect clarity.

  A year before he'd ever seen the piece in the Times.

  He stood there, frozen again, and wondered if he truly was losing his mind. Was it stress? Poor diet? Too much time on his hands? Permanent brain damage from his trip to Everest?

  He didn't believe in ghosts. He didn't much believe in a sixth sense, though in all honesty, he had to admit to possessing more of it than was good for him. He didn't want to believe in a Fate that sent a poor hapless human careening inexorably toward a destiny he never imagined. He didn't want to think that something chaotic was tinkering with his life plans.

  So why did he feel as if the roller coaster ride had just left the gate, and there was no getting off now?

  He sighed. Much as he liked to find some kind of order in the universe, perhaps there was little to be found of rational thinking in his current actions. The best he could do was to keep things as simple as possible and duck—to escape any stray arrows Fate might be winging his way, of course.

  There was, actually, a very logical reason for his compulsion to get to northern England. Though his ancestors had been Scottish, it was conceivable that they could have scattered themselves all over Britain at some point. The castle had seemed like the perfect place to really start tracing the branches of his family tree. Restoring a castle might bring all sorts of people out to see what he was doing, and who knew whom he might meet because of it? He didn't like to delve too deeply into why he felt such sudden compulsion to dig around for his roots. He suspected it was perhaps the same reason he'd built his house: so he'd have something to leave behind him, something that showed evidence of his passing.

  He shook as
ide his thoughts; they didn't serve him. Fresh air, a little remodeling, and possibly finding a few cousins he didn't know about was what he needed. So it wasn't glamorous. He'd had enough of glamour. He'd also had enough of pushing himself past the limits of his physical endurance, swimming with the sharks in Manhattan's business pools, and negotiating the minefield of a social life where the women were more concerned about the size and quantity of his assets than they were about him. Fixing up a castle. What could be more pleasant for a fall project?

  Just the same, he reached out, took the castle picture, and turned it so it faced the fridge. No sense in rattling his nerves unnecessarily.

  He opened the French doors off his kitchen and walked out onto his deck. He stared out over the ocean and felt the endless ebb and flow of the waves begin to ease the tension from him. Maybe he was crazy to leave his house. The castle was completely landlocked. He felt sorry for the people who'd lived in it over the years. Although he'd grown up in the Midwest, he'd always loved vacations on the beach. When the chance to buy land on the coast of Maine had come his way, he'd leaped at it without hesitation. As sappy as it might have sounded, the home behind him had become the home of his heart.

  He grasped the railing and let out his breath slowly. He would stay in England for a year and get whatever was in his system out of it. Then he would come home and make a conscious effort to date the right kind of women. Hearth and home were sounding better all the time. But first the castle.

  He hesitated. If he was seeing mouse ears in his den, what would he see in an eight-hundred-year-old pile of stones?

  He went inside to look for a sponge to clean up his carpet before he could give that any more thought.

  Chapter 2

  THE BOAR'S HEAD INN, ENGLAND

  Ambrose MacLeod stood at the end of the drive and looked up at the inn nestled so cozily against a small hill. The house had been built during the Tudor era and boasted the original leaded glass windows and timbered beams. Ancient vines of wisteria and rose clung to the sides of the house with admirable tenacity. The shadows of twilight lay softly upon the grand variety of late-summer flowers that covered every available bit of earth in the gardens, and a soft rain blanketed it all. Ambrose closed his eyes and sniffed deeply. He wished, with a brief flash of regret, that he actually could have enjoyed the fragrance.