by L. L. Muir
The next morning, the sisters pushed a sausage roll into his hand and shoved him out the door. They handed Ian the keys to their own car, paid him and Percy handsomely for a day’s wages, then sent them on their way. The American would be more at ease if there were two of them, they reasoned. And there would be no need to pay for parking if Percy went in to fetch her while Ian waited in the car.
The sausage roll tried to come back up when he realized he was acting as an accomplice to whatever the sisters had in mind for the American, Sophie Pennel. He only hoped, after meeting her, that he wouldn’t see her name on the news in the following weeks—or on a locker whose contents went unclaimed.
Then again…
If she did disappear, he would have firsthand knowledge of what had happened to her that day. The police could figure out the rest from there—if Loretta and Lorraine didn’t give him what he wanted.
No—not what he wanted. Going home again wasn’t a wish—it was a need.
Trees flashed past his window as they drove the A9 along the southern edge of the Cairngorms, but he noticed little as he contemplated his soul and his standing with God if he completed the mission the Muirs had set out for him.
Maybe they truly had decided to dabble in the tourist industry. Maybe Miss Pennel was the first of many people for whom Lorraine and Loretta—and their brother Wickham—would arrange holidays. Perhaps the strange tea shop was not making enough money and they’d decided to branch out.
Perhaps I should simply ask the woman in the back seat if she’d been assigned a locker in the back room of the tea shop…
In the two hours it took to drive Miss Pennel to the tiny village near the distillery at Dalwhinnie, he’d opened his mouth a hundred times to give her a variety of warnings. But nothing ever came out.
Nothing whatsoever.
He began wondering if the sisters had read his thoughts and had placed some sort of spell on him to keep him from screwing up their plans. The possibility nearly drove him mad. So much so, that when it was time for him to get into the car and leave the woman at her B&B, he decided he had to give it one more go.
“Miss Pennel?”
“Yes?”
“I shall leave ye with the same warning my da offers me…” So far, so good. His tongue hadn’t suddenly glued itself to the roof of his mouth or anything. And he was slightly ashamed he’d considered such a ludicrous possibility. His mind quickly scrambled. Instead of warning her to be wary of nefarious Muirs, he said, “Nothing wrong with watching out for yerself, aye?”
She smiled. “Thank you, Percy. I’ll stay on my toes.”
He nodded approvingly, relieved she’d at least raised her guard a little, then got in the car. While they drove away, he watched her in the side mirror and even wondered if she might wave them back again, to say she’d changed her mind. But by the time they reached the turn, she was still standing beside the white house, content to stick it out, he supposed.
“Godspeed,” he whispered, then he looked to the road ahead. How would he ever be able to blackmail the Muirs if he kept well-wishing their victims?
But since vague warnings and well-wishes weren’t likely to stop the Muirs, he suddenly felt a failure. If something happened to Sophie Pennel…
…it was on his own head.
~ ~ ~
“Did ye say something, then?” Ian shouted over the radio but didn’t bother turning it down. The second they’d left the American at the Bed and Breakfast, he’d turned up the music loud enough to make up for two hours of driving with old woman tunes.
Percy shook his head and laughed. If there was any witchcraft going on inside that car, Ian wouldn’t have been able to listen to that particular band, let alone turn the volume up so loud.
Were they witches, or were the Muir sisters just good at reading faces? Did they kill people, or were Americans simply prone to running away from their dull lives once they got a wee bit of Scotland into their bloodstream?
Was the cash curling up in Percy’s pocket a fine day’s wage for a tiresome duty? Or was it hush-money?
A wee devil yelled from his shoulder, “Ye’re a daft numpty, Percy Gordon, if ye’ve forgotten from what century ye hail!
Magic had delivered him into the modern world, aye. But had the Muirs had aught to do with it?
The wee devil bashed him on the head with a cricket bat, and Percy stopped deluding himself.
Of course the Muirs had something to do with it. When anyone whispered of the tunnel, the Muirs were always mentioned. When anyone cursed the Muir sisters, in or out of their hearing, they were often referring to the curses of the past. And didn’t Jules and Jillian carry those mind-reading, premonition genes?
Aye, they did. Only their talents for such things only showed themselves when the two were together. On her own, Jules didn’t seem any better at understanding Percy than Quinn did, though the man tried hard enough.
Since Christmas last, however, Percy hadn’t been interested in anyone understanding him. They’d get the message loud and clear once he was gone.
CHAPTER THREE
Percy wiggled his foot to make certain his wee notebook was still stuffed in his stocking. The slight weight shifted. All was well.
Ian pulled off the A9. They’d be at Wickham Muir’s farm in a few minutes, so he had to clear his head of all suspicions. There was nothing mysterious going on. He was simply going to stay the night in the man’s home and tend to his wee laddies the next day. Happy to help. Always happy to help.
And if he noted the man’s comings and goings in his notebook, it was simply a way to pass the time.
He would have to shy away from passing fancies—like wondering if he were enabling the man to commit some crime against the American lass. Like wondering if he should have warned Sophie the moment he met her, to get back onto the plane and pretend she’d never heard of The Enchanted Tea Cup, or Scotland for that matter.
That he hadn’t done so made him an accomplice. But it boiled down to one thing…
He had his own rescue to think about.
That’s right. My own rescue. A child hostage cannot be expected to save the world, can he?
And there was something else, something that made his chest hurt, a memory of a conversation that he pretended to misunderstand but feared he hadn’t—there had once been something wrong with him. When, he had no ken. And for the time being, he was all right. Quinn and Jules trusted him—but only until that something went wrong with him again.
There was no pretending it might be a malady of some sort. He’d been taken to the doctor only a handful of times that he could remember, since they’d “adopted” him. And each time, he was pronounced hale and healthy. So it couldn’t be medical, it couldn’t be physical.
That left mental.
He assumed it had something to do with what happened when Jules had found him. Perhaps he’d lost his wits and had regained them again, and they worried he might lose them again?
He’d been worried, since that overheard conversation. And now he hoped that, if he could get back home, he would be all right once he got there. So there were plenty of things to worry over, and therefore, plenty of reasons why he had to force the Muirs’ hands.
And to shine a more noble light upon his blackmail plans, he hoped that by pointing out their sins, they might be persuaded to leave the Americans alone. Whatever they were doing, for whatever reasons, they could surely find an honorable alternative.
Ian turned the car down the long drive and Percy already felt much better. It was a good thing he was doing—rehabilitating criminals.
He only hoped Sophie Pennel remembered to stay on her toes…
Movement beyond the barn caught his attention. Wickham was bringing horses from the field with the help of a black and white collie. The sight of the man reminded Percy that there was a fourth Muir he had to consider.
Soncerae.
Soncerae was niece to Wickham and the sisters. Percy liked Wickham just fine, but Soncerae he
liked even better. She was two years his senior, and when he’d first been brought into the Ross clan, Soncerae had been kind to him, helping him, answering questions before he dared ask them. She’d explained electricity, telephones—plumbing. And she’d done so without embarrassing him to death. She’d known, somehow, the workings of Gordon Keep and had pointed out the new ways to doing things. She never said they were better, just new. He never felt belittled, just informed.
And he couldn’t help but love her for it.
Percy got out of the car and collected his backpack. Wickham waved him closer and he set his thoughts to helping with the horses, then milking the cow while the man took his youngest to look for chicken eggs. Physical work was a blessing. It gave him reason to concentrate on breathing in and out, watching where he stepped, not watching what he thought about.
~ ~ ~
When they sat down to supper, Percy felt like a worm.
Wickham shook his head at him. “Auch, now, Percy. Ye’ve earned yer supper, tell me ye haven’t.”
He shrugged. “I suppose.” Then he concentrated on the positive. Good food. Warm home. Nice family. The simple things. And slowly, Wickham’s attention wandered away from him.
Of course Percy would be ungrateful if he ended up threatening the man to get what he needed from him. But as he watched Wickham interacting with Ivy and his boys, he found himself growing angry.
How could a man act so normal while keeping dark secrets from the ones he loved?
Percy saw someone watching from the other side of the room and tilted to the side for a better look. There was a mirror on the sideboard. The face looking back at him was his own, and two things struck him at once.
First of all, he needed to do a better job of hiding his thoughts. Letting the man know Percy suspected him would be foolish. Maybe dangerous.
Secondly, he realized the Percy in that mirror was not so different than the man at the head of the table. Hadn’t he been trying to act normal himself, since last Christmas? Pretending he wasn’t keeping dark secrets from his supposed loved ones?
Maybe he would be better off staying neutral—until it was time to show his cards.
Ivy and J.W. cleared the dishes away while Wickham was charged with keeping the two-year-old out of the dishwashing machine. He was handed a book for the sake of distraction, but the bairn took the book away and sat on the floor to read to himself.
Wickham leaned his elbows on the table and turned his attention on Percy. “So, how goes school?”
“Fine. Fine.”
“All current, are ye?”
“Aye. As current as the rest. My marks are nay worse than other lads my age, though I miss a question now and again, when I dinna ken what the teacher is talking about.”
“For instance?”
Percy shrugged. “No one told me that it had once been popular to keep a rock as a pet.” He rolled his eyes. “Ye’d have to be daft—”
Wickham’s laughter interrupted, but the man quickly sobered when his wife came back in the room. It was then that Percy finally understood—Ivy Muir was unaware of Percy’s history. He doubted she knew that most of Wickham’s family had spent time in the past. And since she was rarely at family gatherings, he wondered how much the woman knew about the man she’d married.
She knew about the tea shop, so she had to know that her sisters-in-law claimed to be fortune tellers. But did she know they could read minds?
Wickham sent a frown his way, then shook his head sharply, answering Percy’s silent question. And in the doing, he verified that he did, in fact, own his sisters’ talents. No question, then.
We do not speak of these things to my wife.
Percy choked and took a quick drink of his water before handing the glass over to Ivy. Only when she’d gone back to the kitchen, did he look at Wickham.
“Ye can speak in my mind?”
The man rolled his eyes. Convince me ye’re at all surprised.
His chest constricted and it took effort to swallow the dread rising in his throat. Holy, holy crap!
Wickham laughed again. “Sounds as if ye’ve been spending time with yer aunt Jillian.”
Percy nodded stiffly, hoping that if he sat verra still, the man wouldn’t be able to read anything else.
Wickham held up his hands. “Ye’re old enough for some privacy, lad. From now on, I promise not to listen in unless ye invite me to. Fair?”
Percy let slip his intense relief with a loud sigh, which made them both chuckle.
Then Wickham suddenly narrowed his eyes. “Unless… Is there something ye shouldnae be keeping from me?” Percy couldn’t hide his panic. Wickham laughed again. “I’m only teasing.”
But there was something quiet and calculating in those dark eyes that belied that claim. And despite the man’s promise, Percy knew it was more important than ever to keep his mind clear.
Hopefully, he could keep his dreams dull as well.
CHAPTER FOUR
Percy was given the guest bedroom behind the kitchen and a free ticket to the icebox if he got hungry.
Wickham ruffled his hair on his way to the stairs. “Young Percy here is a growing laddie. If he gets hungry in the night, Ivy, ye might wake to find that blue blanket missing, and his pillow besides.” He winked and followed his wife, pushing wee Gavin up the stairs between them.
~ ~ ~
Percy was careful to sandwich his head and his thoughts between two heavy pillows that night. It seemed he’d only just gone to sleep when Wickham shook him awake. He dragged himself out of bed and arrived at the kitchen table with his eyes only half open.
Over a breakfast of muesli and re-heated sausages, Ivy gave him instructions for taking care of their still-sleeping boys, then the couple hurried out the door.
Percy watched out the front window as their large pickup truck headed up the lane toward the road, a horse trailer bumping along behind. The night before, he’d asked Wickham if the American woman could sit a horse.
“She’ll have no choice,” he’d said. “For I cannot take her to Inverbrae without one.”
As the truck drove out of sight, Percy hoped that Sophie Pennel had lived her life well away from horses. Perhaps she would take one look at the beasts and call her adventure off. For he had never, in his briefly modern life, ever heard of a place called Inverbrae.
~ ~ ~
It was half-four in the afternoon when Wickham and Ivy returned. Percy took the laddies out to the barn to watch their da unload the horses. Gavin happily toddled into the calf catcher, a small cage that currently rested on the barn floor and allowed the laddie to play in the fresh air without finding trouble. With the serious face of a working man, wee J.W. helped his da open the trailer.
There was only one horse inside, and the lad noticed. “Da! What happened to Dicken?”
“I lent him to a lass, J.W. She needed him more than we did.”
The boy was horror stricken, but tried to hide it. “Then… Then what will Gavin ride, when he is learning?”
Wickham pulled off his gloves and came over to squat down in front of his son. “Perhaps we’ll buy a wee pony for the pair of ye. What would ye think of that?”
The lad sniffed. “I think I would rather have Dicken back.”
His father showed the first sign of a guilty conscience then. “Auch, J.W. I hadnae thought how ye’d feel about losing Dicken. If there is any way to get the horse back, I will do it. It would not be soon, aye? And it may not happen at all. But I shall do my best.”
The laddie forgave his father with a tight squeeze around his neck. Wickham quickly stood and allowed his son to dangle from him like a necklace, only reaching for the six-year-old when the little hands could hold no longer.
He taught Percy how to detach the trailer, then looked on while he did it. “Were the lads well-behaved? Or should I withhold their suppers?”
J.W. gasped.
Percy chuckled. “Alas, they were good all the long day, sir.”
Wickha
m rewarded both his boys with a good tickling, until they all needed to catch their breath. “I’ll give them over to their mother, then I’ll take ye on home. Yer mum’s likely to be missing ye by now.”
Percy collected his backpack from the house and climbed into the truck to wait. And as soon as he felt the comforting barrier of glass and steel around his thoughts, he finally allowed himself to confront his nagging conscience.
How could a man who cared so much for his family steal an innocent woman away from her own?
The idea made him want to hold his belly and bend in half. Had he been wrong about Wickham? Had he been wrong about Loretta and Lorraine? Were they not disposing of Americans in some wicked way?
Surely, a man who could feel so forlorn over disappointing his wee ‘un could not lead a woman to her death with no remorse. Surely!
The Muirs were an odd lot. Aye. Just the fact that Wickham and the sisters were siblings was hard to believe. The sisters, in their fifties, sometimes talked and toddled like they were twice their age, while Wickham, their supposed brother, was closer to thirty years. Then, there was Soncerae, who called Wickham her great uncle, claimed Wickham’s late twin was her grandfather.
Of course none of them would have shared such strange family histories if they didn’t consider him family as well. Lorraine was supposed to be an aunt to Jules and her own twin, Jillian. But that meant Walter, the only missing sibling, had to be father to them as well, did it not?
So why were Jules and Jillian neither mother nor aunt to Soncerae?
A piece of the puzzle was missing. A large, important piece that no one spoke about. And Percy was certain it had something to do with Wickham’s wife, Ivy. Was she truly the only innocent in a den of killers?
Wickham frowned like the devil himself when he came down the wide front steps and stormed to the passenger’s side door. Percy wanted to blend in with the upholstery and get out of the man’s way, but it was impossible to disappear when Wickham wrenched the door open, grabbed the lapels of his denim jacket, and pulled him from the vehicle.