by Jessi Gage
Cover Copy
For Melanie, "Be careful what you wish for" becomes "Be careful what you wish on."
While examining Andrew Carnegie’s lucky rosewood box, single-and-pregnant museum worker Melanie makes a tongue in cheek wish on the artifact–for a Highland warrior to help her forget about her cheating ex. Suddenly transported to the middle of a clan skirmish in sixteenth-century Scotland, she realizes she should have been a tad more specific.
Darcy, laird in waiting, should be the most eligible bachelor in Ackergill, but a cruel prank played on him in his teenage years has led him to believe he is too large under his kilt to ever join with a woman. He has committed himself to a life of bachelorhood, running his deceased father's windmills and keeping up the family manor house...alone.
Darcy's uncle, Laird Steafan welcomes the strangely dressed woman into his clan, immediately marrying her to Darcy in hopes of an heir. But when Steafan learns of her magic box and brands her a witch, Darcy must do what any good husband would–protect his wife, even if it means forsaking his clan.
WARNING: A hot sixteenth-century Scot, pregnant time traveler, and a meddlesome wishing box.
Highlight
“Ye never answered my first question,” he said. “Who are you? And where are ye from if ye’re no’ English?”
“Ugh. I don’t know. Is there an answer that won’t get me burned at the stake or locked up in a ward for the hopelessly insane?”
Like most things out of her mouth, that had been a peculiar answer. “Ye could try the truth,” he offered, slowing his pace since he heard Archie’s voice not far off.
“No,” she said flatly. “I couldn’t. At least not the whole truth. How about we just go with my name, Melanie, and with the honest fact that I’m a long way from home and I have no idea how to get back.” Her green eyes pierced his. “I’m afraid you might be stuck with me, Darcy Keith.”
Wishing for a Highlander
By Jessi Gage
Dedication
To Shane, who reads everything I write and doesn’t squirm too much. Thanks for being my best friend and supporting my dream.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to my dear friend, Laura Lee Nutt, who cheered for this book from day one. I wouldn’t be here without her honest critique, support, and friendship. Thanks also to the ladies of the Cupcake Crew, Amy Raby and Julie Brannagh. I would have lost my sanity long ago without my weekly infusions of espresso, frosting, and snark. Thanks to my mom for hours upon hours of babysitting so I could seek said infusions–and for occasionally letting me borrow her car. Thanks to my husband, Shane, for humoring me and loving me. Lastly, thanks to Piper Denna, who gave this book a shot and taught me so much with her editing prowess.
Chapter 1
The first bite of her sandwich transported Melanie to another dimension–she could swear food tasted better in pregnancy, at least now that the first-trimester nausea had passed. Her lunch break at the cramped but tidy Old Charleston Tea House got even better as she reached the first spicy part in her paperback. The combined pleasures of Golden Monkey tea, perfectly-seasoned egg salad, and a succulent make-out scene between a librarian and a rugged Scot had her moaning in rapture before she could stop herself.
“No wonder she’s pregnant without a ring on her finger,” one of the elderly women at a nearby table said behind her hand. “Look at the trash she reads.”
The woman’s blue-haired companion snuck a glance at her from behind oversized glasses. “Little slut. Probably counts on her big chest to rope ’em in and then doesn’t have the brains to keep ’em.”
Melanie plunked her tea down so hard it sloshed and stained the lacy tablecloth. Every Friday, she tuned out the constant complaining generated by these two women, but she’d never been the subject of their biting criticisms before. She glared at the pair over the top of her book. Both of them suddenly found the view of Meeting Street out the large plate glass window exceedingly fascinating.
“I’m sorry,” she said with mock sweetness, “did you have something to say to me?”
Two pairs of watery eyes blinked innocently at her. “What was that, dear?” One of the biddies cupped a wrinkled hand around her ear. The other adjusted her hearing aid.
Gretchen, her favorite server, wedged herself between the tables, interrupting her view of the biddies. “She said, ‘How did you like the tea?’ Will that be all for you ladies?” Gretchen scooped up the leather check holder with a placating look over her shoulder.
Melanie huffed and folded her arms, but she couldn’t bring herself to hold a grudge, since Gretchen was the one whose tips would suffer if she chased away some of her best customers.
The jingling bell over the door heralded the bitch brigade’s exit, but she still couldn’t get back into her novel. Giving it up as a lost cause, she stuffed the paperback into her messenger bag and scarfed down her lunch without tasting it. Leaving her twelve dollars on the table, she waved goodbye to Gretchen and slipped out into the January chill.
Normally she tried to be a words-can-never-hurt-me kind of girl, but those words had cut right through her tissue-thin, pregnancy-enhanced emotions. It wasn’t the remark about her chest that hurt–she was used to being judged by her blond-haired, D-cup cover. It was the assumption that she couldn’t hang on to a man. That had hit a little too close to home.
Kyle’s last words to her circled in her mind as she reached the bike rack and strapped on her helmet. “What do you want from me, Mel? I’m not going to change my life because you forgot your pill one day. Don’t all you independent career women want to be single moms, anyway?”
“Bastard,” she seethed as she hiked up her knee-length skirt to hop on her trusty antique Schwinn. It wasn’t like she’d expected Kyle to propose or anything. Just a little responsibility. A little support. That’s all she’d asked for, and she thought she’d earned it, since they’d been together for almost a year.
But no, all Kyle had for her was blame and a view of his cowardly behind as he ran away from what they had created together. A new life, vulnerable and precious, even more so because she hadn’t missed a pill like Kyle insisted. The life inside her was a beautiful miracle who existed despite the minor obstacle of a little manufactured hormone.
All she’d wanted from Kyle was for him to be a father to his child. But all Kyle had wanted was to marry a girl named Becky, whom he’d apparently been cheating with for some time. Now, Kyle was a happily married sperm-donor, and she was left to face a monumental and wonderful challenge all by her lonesome.
As she pedaled up Meeting Street, back to the Charleston Museum, she gave thoughts of Kyle and bitter old ladies the heave-ho, choosing instead to think about what made her happy: her loving and supportive parents, her friends, chocolate cream pie, the escape of a good romance novel, and her work organizing the Scottish immigrants exhibit opening next Friday.
Eeek! Friday!
That was only seven days away! And there was still so much to do, including finding a new keynote speaker for the grand opening, since Professor Calderwood, a distant relative of famous Scottish immigrant Andrew Carnegie, had cancelled. Her brain whirring away with her to-do list, she shoved her bike into the rack behind the museum and got to work.
Hours later, with several disappointing phone calls and much eye-straining proof-reading under her belt, she finally laid her eager hands on the package Dr. Calderwood had Fed-Exed. A phone message indicated he’d sent several artifacts from his personal collection for her to include in the exhibit, and she’d looked forward to opening the package as her reward for an afternoon of hard work.
Inside were five carefully-wrapped items: a journal kept by a Scottish relative who had settled in Charleston in the
1890’s, a flintlock pistol, an antique rosewood box whose rich, dark finish reminded her of her grandmother’s prized hope chest, which had been in their family since the old days, and two gleaming sgian dubhs.
She appreciated one of the sgian dubhs first, running her gloved fingers over the flat of the blade and the intricately-woven leather-wrapped hilt. To think, some nineteenth-century warrior had carried this knife in his jacket or tucked in the top of his hose. A thrill of connection went through her until Alan’s voice at her office door made her jump.
“It’s nearly seven, Mel. Go home for God’s sake.”
She lifted her magnifying glasses to her head and smiled at her boss. “This is better than home. You need to see this stuff Dr. Calderwood sent.”
He shook his head. “I’ll take a look on Monday. Promise. Sam’s got a recital at school and I’m running late. I mean it. Go home. You need your rest.” He nodded at the barely noticeable swell of her belly.
“I’m pregnant, not an invalid, Al.” She gave him a wink to soften the rebuke as she lovingly set the first sgian dubhs aside and began fondling the other. “I’ll go home in a few. I just want to put these artifacts in the safe.”
“Uh-huh. Just make sure you wipe all the drool off before you do.” He gave a wink of his own before leaving.
“Mmm, finally, it’s just the two of us,” she said to the knife. “Well,” she amended as a stray finger caressed the other sgian dubh, “just the three of us.” The journal, pistol, and box suddenly looked sullen on her workbench. “Oh. Sorry. Just the six of us, then.”
She wished she could spend her evening giving each artifact the attention it deserved, but Alan was right. She could use some rest. And she had a frozen pizza and half a chocolate cream pie beckoning her to her apartment. “Monday,” she promised the artifacts as she placed them on a felt-lined tray for the safe.
As she gathered up the packaging materials to toss in the trash, she caught sight of a sheet of paper tucked in the bottom of the box. She pulled it out and gave it a quick scan. It was a letter from Dr. Calderwood in which he repeated his regret that he would miss the exhibit’s grand opening and offered a brief description of each item.
She couldn’t resist reading the letter in full. The couple of paragraphs about the box were especially interesting.
Rosewood box: Owned by Mr. Andrew Carnegie and bought at auction by yours truly October 1985.
Originating in the Scottish Highlands, as the inscription indicates, the box has an intricate opening mechanism that few have reportedly mastered. With no obvious latch on the outside, it is assumed that a series of pressure points when touched the right way releases an inner spring, which opens the lid. I personally have never been able to open it, and three separate antique dealers have inspected the box and concluded that whatever mechanism opens it is likely frozen with age.
In my research on Mr. Carnegie, I have uncovered an interesting story. In private, he would sometimes joke that his immense fortune was “due to nine-tenths hard work and one-tenth the luck of the Scotia rosewoods.”–Personal letter penned by Ryan Helmsford, close friend to Mr. Carnegie in his later years, 1901.–This may have been a reference to the rosewood box. Perhaps Mr. Carnegie had figured out how to open the beguilingly beautiful contraption and was granted his wish for prosperity.
Smiling at Dr. Calderwood’s tongue-in-cheek supposition, she put down the letter and lifted the artifact from the tray. About the size of a small jewelry box and with gracefully rounded edges and inlaid patterns of Celtic knotwork in white gold, it had more heft to it than expected. As the letter indicated, there was no visible latch anywhere along its seam.
Trusting the assessment of Dr. Calderwood’s antique dealers, she didn’t bother trying to open it, but carefully turned it over to inspect the bottom. The inscription of the maker was still visible, though barely, after several centuries. The cursive writing, aged to a deep brown in the lighter reddish-brown finish read MacLeod, 1542. Beneath was the place of manufacture, Inverness. The name MacLeod didn’t ring any bells, but then she specialized in Colonial artifacts of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, so she wasn’t surprised.
She turned the box upright to set it on the tray again, but a sudden playful urge gripped her. Lifting the box to eye level, she said, “If you’re in the mood to grant a wish, here’s mine: I’d like a sexy Highlander to sweep me off my feet like in the romance novels. Please,” she added as an afterthought.
Scoffing at herself, she rolled her eyes. “As if,” she muttered, swiveling on her stool to set the box on the tray. As she turned, the balance of the piece shifted. It felt like something inside rotated and slipped from one end of the box to the other. The box made a series of soft clinks and groans like an old cuckoo clock about to engage. The lid sprang open.
She gasped in surprise. Eager wonder coursed through her. No one had been able to open this box in who knew how long, and she’d done it accidentally. How lucky for her! She’d be the first to see inside since perhaps Andrew Carnegie himself.
She felt proud. She felt giddy.
She felt dizzy.
Really dizzy. As if the seat of her stool were spinning increasingly faster, like the Tilt-a-Whirl ride at Six Flags. Only at the amusement park, her vision had never clouded to black and she’d never tumbled backward off a ride.
The sensations of spinning and falling fed off each other, disorienting her and dousing her with nausea. She released the box to cushion her womb.
I’m not supposed to fall. It could hurt the baby.
She landed on her back. The hardwood floor of her office didn’t knock the wind out of her like she’d expected it to. It felt like…springy grass?
When the black spots cleared, she stared up at a drab-gray sky. Distantly, the sounds of clanging swords and hollering men pierced the damp air. Rolling her head gingerly to the right, she saw a large, flat stone looming like an oversized domino on the verge of falling. Beyond it rose a grassy hill dotted with smaller rocks and scrubby brush. To her left, a path wound around the hill, and in the distance the edge of a sparse, mist-shrouded forest looked like a nice place to meet a ghost or get murdered. She’d narrowly missed landing in a muddy puddle.
Which was strange since she didn’t remember her cramped little office having grass, boulders, or puddles. Definitely no gray sky.
She blinked a few times to bring her office back into focus, but her brain wouldn’t cooperate. The scenery stayed put.
A blur of black motion out of the corner of her eye made her think Alan might have heard her fall and hurried back to see if she was okay. But it wasn’t Alan with his calf-length wool coat. It was a bulky, shirtless man in a…was that a kilt?–running past her little nook of insanity. He did a double take and altered his trajectory when he saw her sprawled on the ground. In two heartbeats he was crouching at her side.
The man had wild black hair and a matted beard. Up close, she could see the dark-gray wool of his shoulder-wrapped great kilt was coarsely mottled with lighter gray to give an effect much closer to camouflage than plaid. In one hand he gripped a utilitarian sixteenth-century dirk with fresh bloodstains on the blade.
Great. She’d had a doozy of a pregnancy-related dizzy spell and hit her head. Hard. While her body lay unconscious on the floor of her office in Charleston, her brain thought it might be fun to dump her into an illusion based on her romance novel.
Could this be the hero who would rock her sexually deprived world and tempt her to forsake her friends, family, job, and all she held dear, in favor of steamy nights in his hay-stuffed bed and a significantly shortened life span due to lack of modern medicine and a diet heavy in salt and low in vegetation?
She narrowed her eyes in appraisal. He certainly had the biceps for it. The boulder beside her had nothing on the man’s massive chest. And his eyes were an intense shade of blue that might be appealing if he weren’t sneering at her. But he was a little on the hairy side for a romantic hero. Weren’t they usually wa
xed to show off their washboard abs? And she could do without the smears of dirt covering every inch of his exposed skin. And in the books she loved so much, the hero was always taller. But she was short, so why not conjure up a five-foot-eight hero for her five-foot-two self?
The dirk went to her throat and pressed lightly, not breaking the skin but threatening to if she made a wrong move.
She rolled her eyes. “Hello, melodrama, anyone? Like little old me could possibly be a threat to a big, strong warrior like you. Puh-lease. Can we get to the romance, already? I’d hate to waste a perfectly good concussion on the whole build-up of sexual tension thing. What if I wake up before the good part? Although, maybe we could go to your place and have ourselves a little bath first. And maybe comb out that hair. How would you feel about shaving?”
The man bared his teeth. “An addled Sassenach spy,” he said in a rocky Highland burr. “And oddly dressed.” He grunted. “Only one thing English lasses are good for, and since skirmishes always give me a wicked cockstand–” With the hand not holding the dirk, he pushed up the hem of her skirt, clumsily, as though he weren’t used to dealing with such a snug-fitting garment.
“Really?” she said with another roll of her eyes. “You’re going to ‘take me’ right here?” She made little quotes in the air. “Come on. Just because I want to get to the good part doesn’t mean I don’t need a little warming up. Ever hear of preheating the oven? Sheesh, Kyle had more romance in his little finger than you’ve got in your whole body, and that’s not saying much. That bastard.”
The man gave up on lifting her skirt and simply ripped his dirk through the thick material, tearing a line up one thigh.
“Hey! That was a nice skirt!” And the movement had been too quick to be careful. He could have cut her as easily as not.