“Good luck, Iain,” Maddie said.
“Thank ye,” he answered, then turned at a series of shouts from the spectators. “What the hell?” he asked, trying to calm Blaven, who started to dance.
Maddie and Anne turned to see what everyone was looking at, and when Maddie followed their gaze, her heart froze. From the top of the hill, where the castle was, tall plumes of dark smoke rose into the sky.
“Fire!” someone shouted.
“Dear God, it’s Duntober!” Anne cried.
Maddie turned to Iain, but he was staring up at the fire.
“No!” he cried.
“Iain,” she said, putting a hand on his leg.
“Get out of the way, Maddie,” he said, looking down at her with a fierce expression. “Get back, love,” he said and pulled Blaven back.
She took a step backward, trying to avoid the horse behind her. All the horses were moving restlessly now, and she realized she and Anne needed to get off the road. She took Anne’s arm, then turned at a movement next to her.
Iain leaned over Blaven’s neck and called to him, digging his heel into the big chestnut’s side. The thoroughbred responded at once, breaking away from the other horses with a leap, and Maddie watched in horror as Iain and Blaven thundered down the road. Toward Duntober.
“No!” she screamed, but her voice was lost in the roar from the crowd.
Maddie didn’t remember moving, didn’t remember starting to run, but she had to stop to catch her breath at the foot of the hill below the castle. She held on to the gate, shaking it in frustration when she realized it was locked. As if that had helped, she thought, looking up through the trees where the clouds of smoke had thickened. She could see the flames now, greedy tongues of fire licking at the roofs, then climbing in triumph to the sky.
“Iain!” She screamed his name as she clambered over the fence, then turned to see the men behind her tearing the gate from its hinges.
“Hurry!” she shouted at them, then continued up the hill.
This is where I heard him before, she thought, as she ran up the path through the trees, certain now that it had been Alan Loomis skulking away in the bushes that first day she’d come here.
“Iain!” Her call was lost in the crackle of the fire, and her throat constricted as the acrid smoke reached her. She raced around the foundation, then stood on the terrace, her hands clasped at her throat as she looked up to the Great Hall. The stairs so recently built, the same ones that Magnus had fallen down, were in flames, the Great Hall an inferno above it. The ceiling, that beautiful hammered wood ceiling, was burning. She couldn’t get through here; she ran past the men who had gathered around her to the other side of the castle, past the cellar where men were handing blueprints and the renderings from one pair of hands to the next. Blaven stood nervously at the base of the stairs to the Hall, reins dangling from his bridle. He trotted away, then came back to look up the stairs again. Behind him was a white Range Rover with a dented front grill. She put a foot on the first step, then turned at a shout.
Derek put his hand on her arm and pointed at the Great Hall. “Ye’ll not get through, Maddie!”
“Iain’s in there! Let me go!”
“No!” He pulled her back to stand with him on the driveway, and pointed to the top of the keep. “He’s up there! Look! With Loomis!”
She stopped struggling as the two figures came into sight. She couldn’t tell who was who at first as they battled, their bodies entwined as one man pushed the other back against the stone battlements. The back of a blond head leaned over the parapet, Loomis’s hand pushing his chin back. They both disappeared as Iain kicked Loomis off him. Maddie held her breath, then turned to see Keith come to stand next to her. He raised a pistol and aimed at the top of the castle, but no one was there. The smoke shifted away from the castle, a sudden change in the wind pulling the smoke out to sea, and Maddie saw a flash of white in the window of a third-floor room.
“There,” she screamed. The two men passed before the opening, Iain’s face drawn into a savage snarl as he reached for his opponent. Smoke billowed from the spiral stairs, the column acting as a chimney, and that drew her attention for a second before she looked back to see the window empty. She began to pray.
Long minutes passed and they waited, a tiny zone of quiet in the madness around them. Men tried to go up the stairs to the Hall, but backed down as the smoke and flames blocked them. Others threw ropes up into the windows where the men had been, the ends trailing down the outside of the structure like long strands of hair. Maddie pressed her hands to her mouth.
Then a long, agonized scream, a howl of terror that continued for several moments, then trailed off into silence, came from the tower, and everyone gasped. No! Dear God, no! Not Iain! Please, don’t let that be Iain! Please, dear God, let him still be alive. Spare him and I’ll do anything, anything. She blinked her tears back and looked at the empty window again. Was that a sleeve she saw? A patch of white against the gray stone? But no, it was nothing, and she covered her face.
“Maddie! Maddie!” Keith pointed to the side of the tower, where a man in a white shirt was slowly climbing down one of the ropes. “It’s Iain!”
Iain moved awkwardly down the rope, his movements stiff. The wind changed direction, and the smoke, which had been blown away from him, now surged around the tower again, driving the rescuers back. She ran to stand below him with the men who waited to catch him. At fifteen feet above the ground he fell, and the men surged forward, catching him and laying him gently on the ground.
His eyes were closed, his breathing ragged, but he was alive. Soot streaked his face, his clothing was torn, and he had some nasty lacerations on his arms. She could see nothing more serious, but he might have internal damage from the smoke or the fall. She covered his face with kisses and murmured his name. He turned his head, then opened his eyes.
“Iain! Oh, thank God,” she cried.
“Maddie.” His voice was a croak, but he smiled through cracked lips. “Maddie.” He put his hand on her arm. “Will ye marry me?”
“Oh, yes and yes and yes!”
The men around them exchanged looks and began to laugh.
“Damnedest proposal I ever heard,” Derek said.
Alan Loomis’s identity was confirmed, and the inquest absolved Iain of any blame. Joanie, who had given a terrified account of her relationship with Loomis, testified that he had been the vandal. The legal details were still being sorted out, but Maddie would leave that to Magnus. It was over.
The castle was gutted now, its walls blackened by the fire, the beautiful ceiling, all the wooden floors in the tower, gone to ashes. It had been the floor on the third story, rotten from the years of exposure to the elements, that had given away under Loomis. As the two men had struggled across the room, he fell through, dangling in air for a few fateful moments, then plunging through the burning lower floors to his death. Only a quick leap and the grace of God had saved Iain from the same fate.
Magnus hosted a dinner the night that Iain came home from the hospital. It had rained all day, which made the long drive back to the Trotternish tedious, but Maddie didn’t mind. Iain was alive. He’d had some injuries to his back and to his lungs, and a bad burn on his leg, but he would recover in time. The sun had come out as they’d turned into the hotel’s driveway, turning Anne’s hydrangeas vibrant pink and blue against their green leaves, and she’d decided it was an omen that their life together would be as beautiful.
At dinner Maddie held Iain’s hand and accepted Magnus’s good wishes for their future together, then laughed as Derek’s mother asked him when he would be marrying. Afterward she and Iain sat on the terrace with Sara and Keith and Derek, enjoying the clear air and the light breeze.
“Ye look mighty cheerful for a woman who lost her job,” Iain said to Maddie, and she smiled.
“I didn’t lose my job,” she reminded him. “Larry called three times and begged me to come back. But I won’t. I’m going to marry a r
ich man and live in a castle in Scotland.”
“Not for quite a while, princess.”
She laughed. “It doesn’t matter. I have captured my golden prince.”
“Ugh,” said Derek on her left, rolling his eyes, but Iain just grinned.
“Come on, Maddie,” Iain said, pulling her to her feet. “We have to leave before we’re thrown out.”
He held her hand as they walked back to his cottage, his hair catching the evening sunlight. Golden man, she thought. Alive, thank God, and with her.
“Maddie,” he said as he opened the door and pulled her inside with him. “Maddie,” he said again, and she went into his arms. He swung the door shut.
His kiss was not gentle as he pulled her against him. He deepened the kiss, and when she opened her mouth to him he groaned, tightening his arms. When at last he withdrew from her, sighed, then leaned back.
“Champagne,” he said.
“Perfect.”
She watched him open the bottle and pour her a glass. She lifted her mouth to meet his kiss, then raised her glass in a toast.
“To Duntober.”
He touched his glass to hers. “To us, Maddie.”
“To our castle in the Skye.”
“To castles and dreams,” he said and kissed her again.
“Do you love me, Iain?”
“Do I love ye? Beyond words, Maddie. Beyond reason. Until we’re four hundred years old.”
She laughed. “Longer. I want forever.”
“Ye’ll get whatever ye want, love. Just stay with nie. Forever.”
“Forever.”
He kissed her again.
“You know we’ll have a lot more work at Duntober now,” she said, but he laughed and shook his head.
“We’ll have less. Now we don’t have to tear the floors out. And I’m thinking that when we’re finished with Duntober, we’ll buy Kilgannon and restore that. I still owe ye a trip there, ye remember. I don’t know what we’ll do after that. Move to New York and start an advertising agency and put Larry out of business. Anything ye want.”
She put her hand on his cheek. “I’m sorry you never got to race Blaven.”
He shrugged. “I did race him, right past ye, lassie. No, I don’t mind. My competing days are over; I’ve already won the prize of my choice.” He gave her a wide grin, his eyes twinkling. “Frankly, Maddie, I don’t give a damn.”
She laughed and reached to pull him close. His kiss tasted like champagne. A good start, she thought.
KATHLEEN GIVENS
There is a spot on the northeastern coast of the Trotternish Peninsula of the Isle of Skye that belongs to me. Not literally, but to my soul. It is there that “Castle in the Skye” is set, on that amazing island off the west coast of Scotland. Skye is home to legends, myths, and incredible history; astonishing topography; distinctive hotels and evocatively ruined castles. I have taken the liberty of adding Trotternish House and Duntober Castle to the list of Skye’s attractions. Although neither of them actually exists, the scenery is very real—and breathtakingly unforgettable. The blues are bluer than is possible, the Outer Hebrides fade into the western horizon, and the mountains of the mainland draw your gaze to the east. It is the kind of place where even the artistically challenged want to pick up a sketchpad or paintbrush—and I swear there is the faintest hint of bagpipe music coming from the very air. (This without any whisky or the fine local ale.) What could be more wonderful than to have some artistic talent and visit Skye? Well, to be there with a man you love. And he should wear a kilt, right? Why not?
I became fascinated with Scottish history while researching my first two books, Kilgannon and The Wild Rode of Kilgannon, and will return to the west of Scotland again for my next two historicals, The Legend and The Destiny, to be published by Warner Books in 2002. I can’t think of a better place for a wild romance than the Highlands and Islands, where the men are manly and the views are glorious!
Slip away to Scotland…
in four sparkling love stories by the leading lasses of romantic fiction
Connie Brockway
Lassie Go Home, by award-winning and New York Times extended list bestselling author Brockway, tells the story of an American woman who flies to Scotland to collect a champion Border collie… and lands in a dogfight with the sexy laird who claims he’s the pooch’s rightful owner.
Patti Berg
Sinfully Scottish, by bestselling novelist Berg, pits a handsome connoisseur of fine whisky — and willing women — against a cookbook author seeking scenic photo sites for her decadent desserts… and finding an altogether different kind of sensuous feast!
Debra Dier
The Maddening Highlander, by the incomparable Dier, features an absentminded American professor who discovers that she has a lot to learn on the trail for a hidden Scottish treasure. And Iain Matheson is just the man to do the teaching!
Kathleen Givens
Castle in the Skye, by acclaimed tale-spinner Givens, introduces us to Maddie Breen, a thoroughly modern American about to collide with a Highlander whose romantic ideals are as ancient as the castle he’s restoring… where Maddie may just be able to find a home for her heart.
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