No Other Woman (No Other Series)

by Shannon Drake

  "Until what?"

  "I ran away."

  "You ran away?" he inquired. "From Castle Rock?"

  She nodded. "I—I felt I had to leave."

  "Why didn't you stay away?"

  She hesitated, knowing she couldn't bear to tell him the whole truth.

  "Alistair found me."

  "Alistair again."

  "All I did was go to Glasgow. I didn't think that anyone would mind much that I had gone away. But Alistair..."

  "Alistair what?"

  "He eventually convinced me that I had to live on despite the past, that I needed to come home because Craig Rock needed someone to really see to the everyday lives of the people here. He said that aye, he and my uncles and other cousins could easily manage the properties, but that none of them had the heart to keep the character of a Highland village in proper shape and warmth. And I was... I was ill at the time. So I came home again."

  "You were ill? With what?"

  She shrugged, staring at the ground again. "Shock, despair, melancholy—I suppose."

  "Despair?" he queried, a harsh note to his voice.

  "I don't intend to continue insisting that I never meant you any ill. If you don't believe me by now, you have become an embittered madman."

  "M'lady, it's quite a miracle that I'm not a madman—seeing as how I've lived life for another while I lie here charred beyond recognition."

  "I don't know how you came to be where you were!"

  He stared at her a moment, then turned away. He lifted the lid back on top of the coffin, fitting it into place, managing to set each nail more or less back into its slot.

  "You are always questioning me," Shawna said very softly. "And always refusing to answer me when I ask you questions. David, please, I realize now that someone managed to switch your body with that of a convict, but you owe me more. Please, what happened to you?"

  He set down the steel bar he had been working with. Hands upon his hips, he stared at her.

  "I don't know."

  "You don't know?"

  "You woke up that night, next to a corpse. I woke up days later, on board a convict ship with men sentenced to hard labor for murder and other such crimes. I insisted over and over again to the good captain that I was not the murdering bastard he thought me, but by then, news of the 'death' of David Douglas had traveled far and wide and the fool didn't believe a word I said. I worked his ship in chains for two years, and then I broke rocks in a quarry in Australia for nearly another two before I managed to escape, and, with the help of a friend, began to make my way back here. No matter what I said to anyone in all that time, no one believed I was David Douglas, especially not that good captain. But I don't blame him. I supposedly slit the throat of a poor young girl in Glasgow, and apparently I was spared the hangman's noose because I appeared to be good for heavy labor. I imagine the captain of that ship would have killed me if it hadn't been for a friend with whom I escaped."

  "A friend?"

  "Aye," he said dryly, "a fellow who managed to keep me alive by convincing me I might find my revenge against you if I did manage to live long enough to escape."

  "You've had your revenge these last five years and beyond. I will pay for that night until the day I die," she assured him.

  "Will you? Then I can't possibly let you die as quickly as it seems you are trying to do, running about on your own when you know that there is foul play afoot!"

  "I cannot just sit still—"

  "You will sit still in the future. I promise you."

  "Are you quite finished with your corpse?" she demanded as she spun around and hurried to the gate.

  Suddenly David was beside her and his whisper sounded against her ear. "Nay, lady, shush, listen!"

  Shawna held very still. She heard footsteps in the corridor beyond the vaults. Footsteps.

  At least two sets of them.

  And the metallic sounds of swords clanging slightly in their scabbards.

  Then whispers.

  Whispers...

  So hushed she couldn't tell if they were voiced by a male or female. She couldn't hear if they were deeply burred or more Anglicized. She couldn't tell anything about the people who were approaching...

  Except that their intentions were not good.

  David quickly blew out the flame in the lantern he carried, setting it down in silence. He barely mouthed words against Shawna's ear. "Don't move."

  The whisperers began to argue with one another. The sound increased, amplifying and echoing as they entered into the vaults Shawna and David had so recently vacated.

  "Corpses, all."

  "You said—"

  "I said that I heard movement."

  "You fool! You heard nothing."

  "Make sure that they are all corpses!"

  Shawna winced as she heard a chilling ripping sound. She could visualize swords slashing into the shelves of shrouded bodies...

  "I should have slit her throat before!"

  "Y'can't! Y'don't ken what must happen!"

  Shawna felt David begin to move forward and heard the sound of his knife being drawn from a sheath at his calf. She grabbed the back of his shirt and started to follow him. He stopped her, his fingers biting into the flesh of her arms.

  "Don't move!" he mouthed against her ear once again.

  "Don't go!" she mouthed back.

  "I must!"

  "They've swords, perhaps guns."

  "I have my knife and the element of surprise, m'lady."

  "David, no!"

  "Shawna, I beg of you, hush!"

  He left her.

  The intruders had ceased to talk.

  There was no sound at all while the seconds ticked by.

  Ticked into minutes.

  Endless minutes...

  Then there was the sound of gunfire.

  A single shot followed by the sounds of a scuffle in the corridor. Despite David's words to her, Shawna could not remain still. She moved through the darkened vault carefully, but as quickly as she could. There was more light in the corridor—the light from the lantern the whisperers had brought. Shawna made her way to the vault's gate just in time to see David racing after a cloaked figure that hurried toward the stairway that led to the cemetery and the night beyond.

  Shawna screamed as a hand suddenly descended upon her shoulder. She turned in time to see a knife rising high in the glow of the lamp. She shrieked again, struggling to wrench free from her attacker.

  She twisted and writhed. She was able to fight her attacker, she realized, because he was bleeding. Blood dripped from the hand that threatened her with the knife. Her attacker had already battled with David, she thought.

  Thank God, for though the knife fell, it passed just inches from her shoulder, striking the stone wall.

  She shrieked in terror as the knife rose once again and she continued to fight the iron-hard fingers winding around her arm.

  She couldn't see the face of her attacker; he wore a cowled cloak, and she didn't dare attempt to dislodge that cowl, lest she allow the knife to fall to her neck.

  Once again, the knife plunged toward her.

  Bearing down... straight for her heart.

  It didn't fall. The hand holding the knife was wrenched cleanly away from her. Just when she thought that death had found her at last in the crypts, David came catapulting against her would-be killer, pulling his knife arm aside, taking him off-balance and bringing him down to the floor. Yet as Shawna gasped for breath, the figure he had been chasing from the tomb returned, tearing back down the corridor. She shrieked out a warning.

  But the figure had determined on flight rather than fight—racing past them along the corridor, it swept up the lantern, swiftly dousing the flame.

  The corridor was plunged into sudden blackness.

  Then shots began to ricochet in the darkness once again and Shawna sank low to the ground, desperately seeking the entrance to one of the vaults.

  She heard footsteps moving wildly down the corridor,
yet she kept her silence, trying not to let out her cries of fear and terror as she crawled along the floor, seeking David.

  A match flared; she gasped despite herself.

  "It's all right; I've got you."

  David!

  "Oh, God, I thought you'd been shot!" she cried hysterically, slipping her arms around him.

  "And I was afraid you were about to be sliced to ribbons."

  "You saved my life again."

  "Aye, that means you owe me doubly. But we can't discuss that now. Find the lantern."

  "But—"

  "Our lantern." He struck another match for her and she found her way back to the vault, swept up the lantern, and lit the lantern just as her fingers began to burn. She discovered then that David had one of the cowled figure on the floor. As she returned with the light, he pulled the cowl up off the man's face.

  David looked from the man to Shawna.

  "Who is he?"

  "I don't know." Shawna had never seen him before in her life.

  The man, obviously badly injured and in pain, somehow managed a mirthless smile anyway. "Nay, a great lady the likes of you wouldn't know me, Shawna MacGinnis. But you'll come to know those of my kind very well!" he taunted. But then he began to cough. Blood spilled from his lips.

  Shawna shivered violently. "Where is Sabrina Connor?"

  "Ye're anxious to join her, eh, m'lady? Perhaps it will happen soon enough."

  David gripped the man by the collar of his cloak. "Is she alive?" he demanded, shaking the man. "Is she alive!"

  "Mercy!" the man cried. "She lives!" He inhaled on a rattling breath. "Mercy..."

  David eased his hold on the man. "You're dying," David said flatly. "Tell us where Sabrina is, and perhaps God will look more kindly upon your hell-bent soul."

  "God!" The man exclaimed, and started to laugh again. He stared at Shawna in a way that chilled her to the bone. "I don't seek God. Hell-bent, indeed! Life and death are close, eh? The living do lie among the dead, do they not, Lady Shawna!" he breathed. Once again, he choked.

  "Where is Sabrina?" she cried.

  But he didn't reply. He stared at her with sightless eyes.

  "Where—" Shawna tried again.

  "He's dead," David said flatly.

  Then he stood, reaching down for the dead man, hiking him over his shoulder, and heading back into a vault.

  "David, what are you doing now?" Shawna demanded.

  David returned to the hallway. "A rather instant burial. I don't want him found dead as yet."

  "But David, we should call the constable—"

  "The constable isn't going to help us. We've got to solve this ourselves." He reached out a hand to her. "We've got to get out of here. I don't know how many are involved in this conspiracy, nor have I fathomed who is at its core. You're truly a fool if you haven't realized the danger you're in by now. You shouldn't have been down here tonight. If you would just learn to behave—"

  She had wanted his hand so badly. Just to be touched by him. She had been absolutely terrified that he might have been killed.

  Now, he was yelling at her again, as if everything that happened here was her fault.

  Shawna shook free of his touch and hurried along the corridor, climbing the stairs to the cemetery outside the castle at a swift pace. Yet when she reached the gateway to the night beyond, he drew her back. She thought he meant to apologize; to speak some words that might be gentle or tender.

  He had no such intention.

  "Hold, damn it, m'lady. Let's assure ourselves no one waits beyond to fire a shot made clear by the moonlight!"

  He left her where she stood, opening the gateway himself, slipping out for several seconds before returning for her. "It appears safe."

  She ignored him, shaking off his touch. She went out into the moonlight, amazed to see that it remained the middle of the night; very little time had actually elapsed since she had first entered the crypts.

  It had seemed like a lifetime.

  Perhaps because she'd been surrounded by the dead and her own life had so nearly ended in the time that had elapsed therein.

  She glanced down at her arms, at her clothing. Cobwebs shrouded her in a coating of white nearly as opaque as the shrouds on the dead. Dust...

  Bone dust, perhaps?

  Death.

  Caked over her.

  "Oh, God! Oh, God!" she breathed.

  She started to run.

  "Shawna?"

  He followed behind her, but she did not stop. Her flight was born of a wild panic that went far beyond any rational fear. She was covered in death, suffocating in it, and she could bear it no more.

  She ran from the cemetery at an amazing, reckless, haphazard speed, David shouting her name at her heels. She reached the Druid Stones, and she did not pause. He caught hold of her arm, stopping at last, drawing her back to him.

  "Shawna!"

  "No, no, let me go!"

  "Shawna, listen—"

  "No! I've got to get—clean!"

  "Aye, aye, lass, we will—"

  "Now!"

  His hold upon her eased. She wrenched free with a wild strength. She ran farther, farther... heedless of the chill of the night, barely aware of the rugged terrain beneath her feet.

  "Shawna! Have you gone mad!"

  He was directly behind her, but her strength and speed were indeed born of sheer madness. She ran until she reached the loch, and she didn't stop there. She walked until the water came to her knees, then she plunged down into it.

  Chapter 16

  She was dragged back to the surface, gasping for air, staring furiously at David. He was soaked now, too, staring at her in amazement as they stood shoulder deep in the water.

  "Are you trying to drown yourself?"

  "Of course not! I'm trying to, I'm trying to..." She couldn't speak suddenly. Her teeth were chattering.

  "Let me go!" she demanded, struggling to free herself.

  He wouldn't let her go. He drew her hard against him, heedless of her wild struggling, until she became so exhausted that she just lay flat against him.

  "I just want to cleanse myself of the dust, the cobwebs, the dead people!" she gasped.

  "All right, all right!"

  He eased his hold on her. She rubbed her arm with her fingers, then grew frantic again, stripping off her torn and dirtied robe and gown. She heard his words, soothing her, felt his fingers, moving in her hair.

  Finally, Shawna felt as if she'd scrubbed herself enough. By then, she could barely stand, she was so exhausted. She lay still against him, and began to shiver.

  "We'll freeze here," he said softly, urging her forward.

  "Aye!" she cried, pulling free from him to hurry from the water.

  "Shawna!"

  She ignored his voice, shivering and anxious to leave the loch. She staggered from the depths of the loch to the embankment, falling against the damp grasses there.

  They would freeze. As she lay there exhausted, breathing hard, she realized just how cold the night was, and how wet she was.

  Wet—and bare.

  Only then did it occur to her that she couldn't go walking back into the castle as naked as a newborn.

  She was shaking violently when David drew up beside her, naked as she, but holding his rinsed clothing in his arms.

  "M'lady, if you run from me again, I swear I'll find a leash—or put you in the dungeon in truth."

  "You said—"

  "Come on, quickly," he told her.

  "Where?"

  "Well, back into the water for a moment."

  "Nay, I am not going back into that water!"

  "You were the one most eager to reach it."

  "And I did reach it."

  "And went running out, refusing to listen."

  "One can only leave the water by walking out of it."

  "Not true, m'lady. Come with me, now. Quickly, because I am indeed freezing myself!"

  He drew her to her feet. "Into the water!" he commanded,
lifting her chin.

  "No."

  "We must."

  "Why?"

  " 'Tis the only way to reach a selkie's lair."

  She protested when he drew her back from the embankment to the lapping shore. "I can't; it's freezing."

  "Ah, m'lady, you should have thought of that in your madness. This is the only entry when the tide is high."

  "The only entrance... I cannot go!"

  "You've a better suggestion?"

  "Aye, surely—"

  "Lady, we cannot stand here longer! We might be seen."

  She gasped as he swept her up off her feet, carrying her into the loch despite her protests. She gasped when he let her fall into the depths, but she then found herself swimming after him, and swimming strenuously to stave off the cold that gripped her so viciously, heading into what appeared to be solid rock on a cliff wall.

  "Catch your breath!" David commanded her then. "At this time, there's about a twenty-foot stretch beneath the rock. You're all right with it?"

  A fine time to ask her, she thought.

  "Aye!" she snapped out, treading water.

  She dived beneath the surface with him. They swam below the rock and stone and the distance did not seem unbearably great. They emerged into a cavern within the cliff. As she stumbled to the rocky shoreline there, Shawna realized that this was where David had come when he had first returned; where he kept his clothing, where he came for refuge when he was not with her, or haunting the secret passageways within the castle.

  He rose from the water first, casting his soaked clothing down upon the earth and sweeping up a blanket from the ground to throw around her shoulders as she emerged from the water. From the top of a traveling trunk he picked up a length of folded tartan, expertly kilting it around himself.

  Cloaked in her blanket, Shawna just stood shivering and staring at the water's edge.

  David ignored her and went about the task of building a fire within a pit he had obviously used for a similar purpose many times before. Smooth, level rock surrounded it. David warmed his hands at his freshly made fire, then looked to Shawna with impatience. "Come. Sit. Get warm."

  She managed to move, coming to take a seat before the fire with the blanket wrapped around her. She set her hands before it, letting the warmth radiate throughout her body.

  "That was horrible," she told him.