“Absolutely not,” I said, turning toward the bar.
Having bumped into two tables on my way to talk to Maggie, even I could see my reactions were too far gone to drive.
“Maggie, I need a room for tonight.”
“I don’t have a room open, hen,” she said. “Your man there looks right pished. You be careful.”
There was an edge to her voice. I didn’t believe her about there being no vacancies. She was angry; it was all over her face. Glancing around at the standing room only crowd, I conceded a large group of travelers had indeed arrived in town. Regardless, Maggie wasn’t going to rescue me, having decided to let me lie in the bed I’d made. I looked down the bar, at Jim and Ben, who had their backs to me. I’d have to take care of myself.
Jason pulled on my arm, led me out of the pub.
“I need you to take me home.”
“Your home is uninhabitable right now. Did you forget?”
For some reason I wanted to hide the fact that I was staying in Ben’s cottage and didn’t reply.
I climbed into the passenger’s seat as if going to my execution.
Jason leaned over and pulled my seatbelt around me. “Ell, it will be okay. Relax.”
“No, Jason, to everything about whatever you’re thinking. Take me to Glenbroch. I’m staying in the steading.”
“There’s not a chance I’m taking you to an old stable. Besides, you know you want to come home with me.”
“Take me to Glenbroch. I mean it.”
The icy air mixed with fear, and the concoction woke up my adrenaline. The tone of his voice, his insistence, his calling me Ell. He wasn’t listening.
I reached for the door handle. Locked. Before I could make a move to unlock it, he tore out of the parking lot into the pitch black Highland night. Maybe he was taking me to Glenbroch. He soon turned off on a lane that didn’t lead to my house.
“Stop the car,” I demanded.
“You’re going to stay with me tonight.”
“Jason, stop the car or take me to Glenbroch.”
“I said that’s not going to happen. You need to quit fighting me, Ell, stop fighting what is between us.”
“No, I am not staying with you. This is your last warning. Stop the car and let me out.”
“Warning?” He laughed, his lips curling back over his perfectly shaped, huge mouth of white teeth shining in the light thrown back by the headlights.
I was in trouble. My hand found the lock and pushed it without him noticing. The twisting, single track road was keeping the car’s speed relatively low. I had jeans and a long-sleeved shirt on. I would be all right. Praying the whisky would ease my fall, I opened the door.
My body hit the ground with a jarring thud, knocking the wind from my chest. My body turned over and over, the road digging into my exposed skin. When I stopped moving, I lay still, swirling and disoriented. Where was I?
The brake lights of Jason’s car came into view, casting an eerie red glow over the road. I was half-way in the ditch, and he was walking in my direction.
Get up.
“You always fight me, Ell. Never will give in to what you want. You’re crazy, but it kind of turns me on, if you want to know.”
This wasn’t going to end well. Any thought of his help with Glenbroch was gone. My hand gripped the handle of my bag. Glad for once it held too much stuff, I scrambled to my feet, willing my head to clear its lingering dizziness. Lifting my bag to get a feel for its weight, I was grateful I’d procrastinated about cleaning it out.
“Foreplay is great, Ell, but let’s get back in the car and get to my place. You’re making me hot, but you’re being a drama queen.”
Right now, I needed to stand my ground and fight back. I was stunned for a moment at the clarity: I would rather fight the MacIvers and lose controlling ownership of Glenbroch than lose myself in Jason’s twisted idea of business. The thought of being with him racked my body in a shudder of disgust.
“Ell, sweetheart, let’s go.” He was nearly to me now. “It’s freezing out here, and it’s gonna ruin my mood.”
He reached out to stroke my hair. I tightened my hands around the handle and swung my purse, catching him on the side of the face and knocking him sideways. He tripped over a tree branch, fell onto the road, and rolled over to get up. I picked up the branch, more deadly than the purse, and swung it into his back before he could stand.
“No! I’m not going with you. Get away from me!” I screamed. In spite of the icy air, sweat poured into my eyes.
He jumped up faster than I thought a human could, grabbed my arm, and dug his nails into my wrist until the branch fell to the ground. “It’s about time I give you what you have coming.” Foam from his spluttering, beer-stagnant mouth landed on my face.
I wiped my face with my free arm. “Don’t threaten me.”
He tried to kiss me, but I jerked away before he could get his mouth on mine. My hand hit him in the throat but not fast enough. He held both my arms, yanked me close. “Ell, you know I don’t threaten.”
He pressed his lips so hard on mine I could taste blood seeping across my tongue. With my arms pinned by his, I couldn’t fend him off.
“Don’t touch me,” I managed to mumble.
He lifted his mouth from mine. “It will be the best you’ve ever had, and you can have it all the time.”
The stale stench of his breath in my face sent waves of nausea through my stomach. “You are the last thing I want. I will tell you one more time: No! Do you hear me? No! Get your hands off me!”
When I didn’t move, he tightened his grip, his fingers digging into my skin. I cursed the cry that ripped itself from my mouth. But my instincts responded, rushed into the fray, whiting out sound, fear, cold, and firing old survival nerves—the gifts of my past. Jason was going to find out what No! meant.
The thick heel of my boot smashed the top of his foot. Surprised, he released my arms. I shoved him, turned to run. He caught my arm, spun me around, his fist glancing off the side of my face, his ring catching above my eye. He pulled me back against him and pressed his lips into mine again, his body hard against my stomach. He was turned on. This wasn’t simply a guy with a big ego. Jason was the worst kind of man. I let my body go limp in hopes he would relax his grip. It worked.
I shoved my knee into his groin and he bent forward. Swinging my shoulder into his chin and ramming him with my body, I sent him hard into the stone wall lining the road. His back smacked against it with a thud and he sank to the ground.
“No means don’t touch me. Ever again. And don’t call me Ell!”
Jason staggered to his feet, but instead of lunging toward me, stormed to his car and swung his body into the driver’s seat. As he accelerated away, he yelled out the window, “You just made the biggest mistake of your life!”
Maybe, but it was the kind of mistake I could live with.
Moonlight fell over the road in the distance, its glow beckoning me forward. I hurried my steps to get out from under the clouds clustered over the spot where I had fought him off.
I had never thought much of Jason, but I’d believed he had more pride than to want someone who had outright rejected him. Yet I knew that wasn’t what this was about. Images darted through my brain of the eagle picking off the lamb, the salmon hanging on Jason’s fingers. Jason always got what he wanted, and what he wanted was to take, dominate, use, and discard whatever was left when he was done. Why would I think for a second this wouldn’t apply to me?
Between him and John, I had managed to end up with two formidable enemies when all I wanted was to claim my inheritance and live a reasonably simple life.
My head told me Ben could not be entirely on my side, but he would never physically hurt me like Jason intended to. Ben would merely do as his father expected; this threatened my home and way of life all the same.
What exactly did his father expect of him? I needed to step back and look at everything with a fresh perspective. More than being driven b
y his inability to stand up to his father, from what I’d seen Ben was driven by trying not to be like John. A damaging weakness, but it supported my gut feeling that Ben would be the least likely co-conspirator with John. Who would be the most likely? That was easy.
I took my gloves out of my purse, the frigid night air reminding me I had forgotten to put them on. My stomach growled, the only sound other than the scuff of my feet on the dirt road. At least I wanted food after what happened, a good sign. The roll from the car had scraped my skin in various places, but my injuries were minor compared to what could have happened.
When I turned onto the MacIvers’ lane, my heart nearly leaped out of my chest to see the distant spot of light shining over the front door of the cottage. I couldn’t have been more happy to catch sight of that house—MacIver property or not.
The rumble of an engine grew louder behind me, and I moved to the edge of the road, waiting for the vehicle to pass. The headlights caught me in their beam and the truck slowed to a stop.
“Ellie, what are you doing out here?” Ben asked.
“Just walking back to the cottage.” Too close to the brink of falling apart, I didn’t dare say any more and hoped my face didn’t look as tear-stained as the rest of me felt.
“In with you,” he said, turning and pushing open the passenger door.
Of course he wouldn’t let me keep walking, and certainly not if he knew I’d already trekked more than two miles and was nearly frozen. I needed food, the warmth of a fire, and a hot shower to wash off Jason’s contempt and the film of my own betrayal coating my skin. Anger at myself for bringing Jason into my world weighed on me more than anything.
I had always known he was despicable, and I put myself right in his way. Still, Jason was responsible for his behavior. If I hadn’t jumped out of the car and fought him off, he would have done more than attempt to hurt me. My instinct was to turn away from it, separate myself from it, and forget it, because more important in my mind than revenge, or even justice, was my need to save Glenbroch.
Walking around the back of the truck, I swung myself up into the passenger seat, turning away from the dome light that would illuminate the scrape beginning to sting on the side of my face. I felt stupid, ashamed that I’d put myself in that situation. Shouldn’t I have known Jason would go too far? My body shuddered, repulsed, at the thought of him; I breathed and reminded myself of the truth. If anyone should be ashamed, it was Jason.
“Ellie, you weren’t out for a walk. What happened?”
I shook my head, unwilling to speak or meet his firm stare; he would know someone had hurt me, and he would know who. I didn’t want any more trouble around me.
He pulled in front of the cottage and turned my face into the dome light. “What happened to you?”
I didn’t answer, and Ben’s body tensed. A hardness settled into his eyes, and then they grew distant, as if he was already hunting Jason down. Whatever was going through his mind, this man was the last person on earth I would want to encounter if I were Jason Marks.
But anger wasn’t all that burned in Ben MacIver’s eyes. He touched my arm, and I understood: it was time to trust him and let him care for me. Sitting quietly in the truck, I waited until he came around, opened the door, and helped me out.
Within minutes, Ben had a fire blazing in the sitting room’s fireplace. Its flames danced, catching my gaze. The coal chunks glowed, crumbled. The heat slowly thawed my frozen body.
Ben took a blanket from the back of the chair, laid it over me, and handed me a box of tissues for the stream of fluid coming from my nose as I began to warm up.
In the quiet of the cottage, my mind reflected on the disaster Jason would bring down on me. I had crossed him, and I had never seen anyone challenge Jason and still be standing when it was over.
20
As horrible as my encounter with Jason had been, under Ben’s care it had already begun to fade. Hearing Ben’s shuffling in his tiny kitchen also served to calm me. The sounds of his activity reverberated through the compact space: the gas burner clicking on, cupboards opening and shutting, glasses set down on the counter, kettle boiling. I was happy to do as he asked and sit in front of the fire.
He brought in two mugs and handed one to me. I inhaled the cinnamon, let the steam from the spiced cider warm my face, the mug warm my hands. He left the room and returned, laid a first aid box on the floor, kneeled in front of me, placed his hand on my mug, and waited for me to release it. When I did, he set it on the nearby table. My arms recoiled to my chest and folded themselves against my body. He took hold of one, held it still until my resistance quieted, then stretched it out to inspect the cuts and scratches I hadn’t noticed. He took the other arm and did the same.
Ben’s eyes troubled me. Usually full of movement and life, they were too still and far away. My hair pricked up on my arms and neck the same way it did when an unpredictable Oklahoma storm was coming.
Ben moved a wisp from my forehead, dabbed a scrape with a cotton pad dipped in antiseptic, and inspected a scratch that was beginning to sting. His fingers trailed my face and nudged another straggling hair behind my ear.
When he spoke, his voice was strained. “I don’t know what happened tonight, but you’re safe here.”
His barely controlled anger frightened me. I began to see what it looked like when Ben MacIver marked an enemy. There was no doubt that I had never been his enemy . . . and I didn’t ever want to be.
He was right, and I would give no argument. The safest place for me was here, with him. I nodded agreement.
“I need you to make me a promise,” I said.
“What do you need?”
“Don’t go after Jason. Leave it alone. Please.”
His eyes flared hot with anger as he studied mine. Minutes passed before his breathing eased into a deep sigh and the storm in his eyes calmed. “Aye. You have my word.”
I nodded, relief easing through my body. I needed Ben to stay safe.
“I’ll run you a bath and you can make yourself comfortable in the room you stayed in before. I’m here if you want to talk. If not, no bother.”
Exhaustion seeped through my cells, leaving me with no desire to talk further, but I didn’t want to be alone.
I climbed the stairs, closed the door of the bathroom, and began filling the tub. Lying in the steaming bath was heaven. I wanted to stay there, but the cooling water motivated me to get out and dry off. He had left a pair of sweatpants and a long-sleeve thermal, along with a stack of fresh towels, on a chair. I rolled the sweatpants at the ankles and folded the waist a few times to snug it up. I didn’t mind the large size. They were soft and comforting—and his.
Ben delivered a fresh mug of cider, a couple of books—“in case you can’t sleep”—and a fuzzy hot water bottle to my room.
Thirty minutes later, as much as I’d tried and as threadbare as I felt, no sleep came.
“Ben?” I called out.
“Down here.”
The creak of the stairs told me he was coming up to see what I needed. I scurried under the covers of the old, white-painted iron bed.
He appeared in the doorway, a silhouette against the hall light. “Everything okay?”
“Yes, I just . . .” I rolled my eyes at my own silliness. “Never mind.”
“No bother. Any requests for breakfast while I’m here?”
Managing a hoarse laugh, I said, “You’re killing me with kindness.”
“It’s selfish. I’m going to fix breakfast anyway, but I can’t decide what. Might as well make it easy on me and give me an idea. Otherwise, I’ll stand in the larder staring at the shelves. You wouldn’t want that, would you? Might not get any breakfast until midday.”
“No, we wouldn’t want that,” I said, giving him a serious look. “How about porridge?”
“Ah, now porridge I’m quite good at, another wee speciality, if I do say so.”
“Well, I can’t wait, then.”
“Anything else?”
“Let me think for a second,” I said, needing courage.
The lighthearted banter couldn’t fully chase back the fear sitting solid and immovable in my chest. My mind had made the decision that brought Jason here. It was time to let my heart take the helm. It couldn’t do worse.
I swallowed down the sadness and regret piggybacking on my fear and pushed myself to sitting. The scared child hidden away within me craved comfort, refused to be silent. Being vulnerable did not appeal to my mind, which tossed out the usual warnings. But my heart couldn’t ignore the needs of the child who seldom asked for anything.
“Ben?”
“Yes?”
His voice fell soft in the space between us, and my sliver of courage pulled itself as tall as it could.
“Would it be too awful a bother if you . . .” My courage skittered back into the shadows and took the rest of my words with it.
Ben sat down on the edge of the bed. “Ellie, tell me what you need.”
The beating of my heart drowned out the sound of my own voice as I summoned my words from the shadows. “Would you hold me? I mean, until I fall asleep?”
He stood up without taking his eyes off mine, then walked around the bed, slid under the covers, and pulled me back against him.
“Aye, I will hold you until the last of the dark leaves you.”
I turned into him, snugged myself against his chest, not able to hold all the hurt inside, not wanting to. Old wounds and new burst open, the sorrow soaking his shirt and leaving my body heaving and shuddering from the sheer volume. Ben held me feather light within his strength, sheltering my body with his until the last of my tears had fallen against the curve of his neck. I turned back over, spent and relieved, spooning my body close against him. His arms surrounded me, the hairs on his forearm brushing the curve of my mouth and face, his steady breath warming me. Mine slowed to his rhythm.
As my body quieted he began to sing—soft, slow. The sounds of the words told me they were Scottish Gaelic, although I had never heard these specific words and didn’t know their meaning. The rise and fall and melody of his accent, the cadence of the old language, proved more powerful than ancient pipes of war against what haunted me. The dark retreated, then turned back around and lunged at me again, stealing my breath. Ben pulled me closer, singing barely above a whisper, and the dark finally took flight. I sank back into his arms, certain that if anything ever happened to him, then I would truly know what it meant to be shattered.
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