Malcolm flicked the turn signal on. They were headed off an exit and into a small town; Jacob hadn’t caught the name, but he would make note of it before they left.
“Rhiannon and I were walking down the street in Edinburgh, when three men in a van dashed out and threw us inside,” Malcolm said. “That’s how it started.”
Beside him, Malcolm’s wife listened. Jacob had the opinion she had heard the story of his kidnapping before. Isabel was listening as intently as Jacob was.
“I remember being furious,” Malcolm continued quietly. “I fought with the attacker, but I was knocked out, and then I don’t remember anything else until I woke up in the dark. I didn’t know where my sister was, or even if she was still alive.”
His voice cracked. “Days passed like this. When one of them came into the room, I fought him. Every time I fought, I was either knocked out again or left in the dark with nothing to eat.” He made a soft snort. “All I did by fighting was make things worse.”
He continued driving. Jacob noted that they were headed down a main street. They’d passed what looked like a town center; now they were headed into a small patch of woods.
Jacob felt in his pocket and withdrew the small notebook he’d started. He glanced at street names and sketched a rough map. For a while, no one spoke.
“That’s strange,” Malcolm murmured. He’d stopped the car, and they were parked in what looked to Jacob like an abandoned parking lot in the middle of an open field.
“What?” Isabel asked. “Are we lost?”
“No. It’s true I haven’t been here since...then,” Malcolm said. “But I’d sworn I would never forget it. After we were rescued, I burned this place into my brain.”
“There’s nothing here,” Jacob said.
Isabel shifted in her seat to glance behind them. “Why don’t we ask someone in the pub back in the village?”
Malcolm turned the car around, doing as Isabel had suggested. They drove back to the pub and parked in a space out front. Jacob carried his notebook with him as he followed Malcolm inside the small, quaint tavern.
“That place,” a woman working behind the counter told them, “was taken down years ago. Board by board, carted away.”
Malcolm nodded and thanked her for her time. Jacob knew without being told that John Sage had ordered it done.
Jacob took a seat at a table beside Malcolm while the two women visited the ladies’ room. “What do you make of that bit of information?” Jacob asked him.
Malcolm shook his head. “Did Isabel tell you that our uncle never paid the kidnappers their ransom demand?”
“No,” he said, surprised. “I don’t think she even knows.”
“She probably doesn’t.” Malcolm sighed, and then held up his hand to the barmaid to signal four drinks be poured. Cokes, he ordered them, and she brought them right away.
“Put this down in your book,” Malcolm said to Jacob. “Because I think it goes a long way toward explaining why my uncle is the way he is today. When Rhiannon and I were taken, the kidnappers phoned a ransom demand to him. But Uncle didn’t have the money back then. Sage Family Products was in its infancy, and though it may have seemed profitable to outsiders because of some media interviews my uncle had given, in reality, it was a private company, and privately, it was bleeding red. So John felt he had no choice but to bring in the police, against the kidnappers’ demands.”
Malcolm paused to drink, while Jacob transcribed with his pen.
“All I know,” Malcolm continued, “is that we were kept several days too long, longer than the kidnappers had planned, because as each day went by, they became more and more irritable. I heard them screaming at each other by the end. When the rescue did come, it was barely daybreak, and I was asleep out of pure exhaustion. I remember a torchlight shining on me and then being grabbed and hustled out of there by a policeman who deliberately kept my eyes covered.”
Malcolm shook his head. “I didn’t see anything. I just felt the hard pounding of him running with me, pressed against his shoulder. Bouncing and jostling, you know. Darkness everywhere, except for the beams of light from the cars. Hearing the shouts and the...”
Gunfire, Jacob silently added. But he said nothing.
Malcolm poked at the ice in his cola with a straw. “Before the whole thing had started I’d been a ten-year-old boy, too old to be picked up and carried like that, but by the time it was over, I felt diminished, stripped of all sense of safety. You know, the state of the world that most people take for granted.”
Jacob nodded shortly. He understood exactly what Malcolm was saying. In the course of his training, he’d read about such things from survivors of violent acts.
In a sense, Jacob had felt the same when he’d been shot, too. Even though he’d prepared for the possibility, Jacob had been stunned by the feeling of...emotional unsettlement that came in the shooting’s wake. Even now, weeks later, those feelings persisted.
“After that,” Malcolm said, “I was taken in an ambulance to hospital. I asked how Rhiannon was, I called and called for her, but nobody told me anything.” He stared into his drink. “I only heard later from my parents that the kidnappers all died, plus...”
“My father,” Jacob finished.
“Aye.” Malcolm sighed. “Though I have to tell you, even I was confused about that. There was a television movie made, you see, and in it, they changed your father into a policewoman. So, even that was a lie to me.” He turned to Jacob. “What was your father’s name?”
“Donald Ross,” Jacob murmured.
Malcolm nodded. “Donald Ross. I won’t forget that name.”
The two of them sat, saying nothing. Jacob felt physically ill. Maybe the exhaustion and jet lag were catching up. He closed the book and laid down his pen, needing a rest.
The two women came back to the table and joined them. Isabel smiled tentatively at Jacob. He realized that he wished she’d been there during his and Malcolm’s talk. She should have been there. Another loose end that he needed to fix before he left.
And yet, today wasn’t what he’d envisioned when he’d first set out for Scotland. He wasn’t feeling that composure and self-control he’d expected. The calmness required for doing his job and protecting other people wasn’t there anymore.
He needed to think more like Special Agent Ross again. Open the notebook. Observe the situation. Ask questions and obtain the answers he needed, because this was the best opportunity he would ever have.
“Are we going back to that lot?” Kristin asked Malcolm.
Malcolm glanced at Jacob. “Do you want to?”
“No.” Jacob shook his head. From an investigative sense, there was no point. What was there for him to draw but wide-open fields? “I’d like to talk with Rhiannon,” Jacob said quietly.
“No,” Malcolm said.
Everyone glanced into their drinks. Isabel was looking at Jacob nervously. Maybe she was wondering what she’d gotten herself into.
“Actually,” Kristin murmured, “I think it’s a good idea.”
“What?” Malcolm asked her. “How can you say that? You know I’m supposed to protect her.”
“I think it will be good for Rhiannon, which will protect her even more in the long run,” Kristin said. “Really.”
Malcolm and Kristin looked at each other for a long time. Isabel touched Jacob’s arm and motioned him away from them. He got up and followed her to a window.
“You saw how Rhiannon is,” Isabel murmured. “Do you really think she can help you?”
“I’ll take extra care not to upset her,” he said.
She still looked worried, so Jacob took her hands. “You know I have to pursue this. I don’t have a choice, even though I don’t like the thought of Rhiannon hurt again, either.”
She blinked, gazing up at
him. “I want you to be satisfied that you understand as much about what happened to your father as possible, Jacob.”
“Isabel—”
But she was heading back to Malcolm and Kristin, and all he could do was follow her. Her pain was breaking him in two. He didn’t see how he could stand it.
This was much too personal. He felt too much for Isabel. He wanted to see her happy, and he well understood what she wanted from him. He couldn’t give that to her because something else drove him beyond the surface motions of the investigation. It was something building more and more steam the deeper he dug into the story of this... ghost that had been the father he’d never known anything about, other than he’d been a police officer and he’d abandoned them.
Jacob felt a sudden rush of compassion for the child he’d been, traumatized by the silence and sadness and pain. In a sense, he was much like Malcolm.
Jacob shook it off and went over to join the other three.
“It will be good for Rhiannon,” Kristin was saying to Malcolm. “I really think she’s ready.”
“I agree,” Isabel said quietly. “It will be best for all of us to finally begin to talk about this, including Rhiannon.”
“Fine,” Malcolm said. “We’ll go.”
But he turned to Jacob, and Jacob could see that he meant business. “If anything happens to her, I hold you responsible.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
THEY DROVE FOR over an hour. Jacob kept track of their progress, staring out the window and watching the route signs change and the scenery transform into rolling hills with mountains in the distance. Technically, he supposed they were in the Highlands.
“I love it here,” Isabel murmured reverently, with the accent she didn’t try to hide strong in her voice.
It just made Jacob realize even more that he could never take her away from her home. But he pushed that thought aside. “Tell me exactly where we’re going.”
“To the castle,” Kristin answered. “It’s near Inverness, where Malcolm and Rhiannon grew up.”
Jacob opened his notebook and jotted down his observations. They certainly seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. Since they’d left the main motorway, they’d traveled on a meandering, narrow road, wide enough for a single car. If another vehicle wanted to pass them, one or the other would have to find an open field or a farmer’s driveway to pull off in.
“I spent so long in the city,” Isabel remarked, “I’d forgotten how rural we are here.”
From a security standpoint, a home this remote would be more easily defended. If Jacob had a vulnerable charge that he wished to protect, he couldn’t think of a more ideal location.
They came upon the castle all at once. On the outside, it was ancient-looking. A mystical fog seemed to envelop the turret. Jacob wouldn’t have been surprised to see a lonely piper step out to play a haunting song. He felt himself holding his breath as the BMW slowed and made the hairpin turn.
The castle was situated in a hollow beneath the road, which seemed odd to Jacob. A wall stood guard over the grounds in a huge ring. To descend to the castle, they needed to stop at a small guardhouse.
A white-haired man poked his head outside. He saw Malcolm driving the vehicle, and a wide smile split his face. He waved them through the gate.
“Who was that?” Jacob asked.
“Jamie. He’s been with us forever,” Malcolm replied.
The driveway was made of gravel, and the tires crunched beneath them. Jacob studied the castle as they approached it.
Later, he intended to sketch everything he remembered; to take photos seemed disrespectful. This was not a crime scene. He felt driven to remember it, though, but for himself, not for any official investigation.
He noted that the exterior of the castle was made of gray stone and had at least two wings to the back and to one side. A small wooden drawbridge was slung over what might have once been a moat; now it appeared to be a dry ditch.
By habit—even more of a habit since the bullet he’d taken in the line of duty—Jacob scanned the windows. He saw nothing; no shadows, no people. Automatically, he felt the tension in his neck relaxing.
Malcolm parked and took out his phone. “I didn’t think of it until now, but we should’ve called Rhiannon to warn her we were coming.”
“Maybe it’s better if we meet her inside,” Kristin said.
“She’ll be upset,” Malcolm insisted. “There are too many of us.”
“I’ll go.” Isabel reached for her door handle and climbed out. She turned to smile at Jacob before she shut the door behind her.
Gamely, he smiled back. He knew what she was doing for him, knew what this had cost her, emotionally and professionally with her uncle. But Jacob was forcing himself not to think ahead where she was concerned.
He’d compartmentalized his life again. Now was for the mission. When an agent was on the job, he kept his professionalism.
He would not falter.
Jacob got out and stretched his legs. Minutes ticked past, but he was used to waiting. This was normal for him, and he’d trained his emotions to endure it.
After a time, Isabel returned, and she looked shaken. “Rhiannon already knows we’re here. The guard called her when we passed through the gate. Then she watched us through a security camera.”
Malcolm made a short laugh. “Why am I not surprised?”
“There’s more.” Isabel looked nervously at Malcolm. “She saw us all at the wedding, as well.” She turned to Jacob. “You, too. She knows who you are.”
That unnerved him. He couldn’t pick Rhiannon out of a lineup, and yet he was the professional. “She recognized me as your wedding date?”
“More than that.” Isabel looked helplessly at Malcolm again. “I told her Jacob’s full name and why we’re here, and she said that she wants to talk to him alone.”
“But that’s ridiculous.” Malcolm got out of the car, shutting the door. “My sister doesn’t talk to strangers. She doesn’t even talk to her cousins. Everyone knows this.” He gestured to Isabel. “You know this!”
“Yes, but...something seems different about her this time,” Isabel said. “We had a long conversation.” She put her hand to her chest. “I don’t remember the last time we exchanged so many words.” She honestly looked astonished.
Jacob was getting a strange, itchy feeling. He grabbed his notebook. This would be the best chance he’d ever have to talk with an eyewitness; he could feel it.
John Sage would never tell Jacob anything about what had happened. Malcolm had relayed what little he could, and it hadn’t been enough. But Rhiannon—she’d surely seen more.
“You don’t have to worry about me,” Jacob said to Malcolm. “I’m trained. I know how to talk to vics—to people who’ve been through traumatic situations.”
Malcolm grunted; he didn’t look convinced. Shaking his head, he turned to Kristin. “What do you think?” he asked quietly. “Honestly?”
“I think,” Kristin said slowly, “that if Rhiannon says she wants to see someone, then she should see that person. She’s a grown woman, and who are we to stop her?”
Kristin was right. It was Rhiannon’s home; Jacob could just walk in. This was more than he’d hoped for—he could finally speak with an actual witness to his father’s last tactical operation.
But still Malcolm paused. To Jacob, he seemed wary. He’d spent a lifetime worrying about his sister.
“Did I mention that I’m trained?” Jacob asked again. “Even more—I’ve just survived a trauma of my own.” He pulled back his collar and showed Malcolm the bandage. “I know how it feels, Malcolm.”
Malcolm let out a breath. Finally, he looked Jacob in the eye. “Let’s go.”
Jacob nodded and let Malcolm lead the way. He stayed close to Isabel, looking all around them and taki
ng note of their surroundings as they entered the building.
The interior of the castle was cool, though there was a blazing fire burning in a great stone fireplace in the entry hall. The ceiling was enormously high. Though the castle was decorated for Christmas, traditional hangings also adorned the stone walls: medieval swords, muskets and other such battle weapons. Colorful tartan carpeting was spread over the floors and up the stone stairway.
At the top of the stairs, a tall woman with long dark hair the color of Malcolm’s stood waiting with hands clasped.
She wasn’t what Jacob expected. Yes, he’d seen a glimpse of her on the monitor at the wedding, but based on what Isabel had told him about her agoraphobia, he’d expected someone frail, possibly even beautiful, like a proverbial Sleeping Beauty hidden away in her remote tower. But Rhiannon Sage looked robust, in good health, and though she might have been considered pretty by other men, she couldn’t compete with the beauty he saw in Isabel.
Rhiannon was...quirky. Maybe even artistic, now that he knew she was a painter. Her fingertips were smeared with green and she was wearing a smock, as if they’d interrupted her work.
Jacob stopped two steps below her. Isabel continued to the top and smiled. “This is Jacob.” Turning to him, she said, “Jacob, this is my cousin Rhiannon.”
In a dignified manner, and yet with a dimple showing in her cheek, Rhiannon held out her hand. “I’m pleased to meet you, finally.”
Finally? What the hell was she talking about?
His hand fell to his side. But he gathered his wits and continued up the two steps to greet her.
Her hand was warm. He glanced over to Isabel, and saw that she was smiling at him. But her lips were trembling, and he knew she was trying to make him feel at ease, though neither of them were.
Somehow, though, he was drawn forward, propelled to follow Rhiannon.
Scotland for Christmas (Harlequin Superromance) Page 25