by L. L. Muir
Lippa’s eyes widened. “What is that?”
“It’s a dog that can follow your scent and lead me right to you if you decide to run up into the mountains.” When the girl’s eyes started to tear up, Sam could feel her own façade faltering, so she went in for the kill. “I’ll be brutally honest with you. I plan to love you, Philippa Menzies. In fact, I already do, and there is nothing you can do about it.”
“There isn’t?”
Sam shook her head too hard and some tears got away. And the only way she could figure out to keep the girl from watching her fall apart was to wrap her arms around her little shoulders and hold tight. Thankfully, Lippa hugged her back.
Clyde opened the back door and Roddy ducked in beneath his arm.
“Hold it right there,” she ordered, and they froze. “Check your feet. I won’t have you bringing anything disgusting onto my floors.” She pulled back to look in Lippa’s face. “Would you like to go explain to them how things are going to be from now on?”
The girl grinned, nodded, and hurried after her brothers.
Hamish didn’t look happy.
“What?”
He pointed to the door. “Ye do ken that might have backfired on ye.”
“Then, I guess I would have gone shopping for a blood hound.”
“If she’d been a mite older—”
“I wouldn’t have handled it that way. But she needed me to give her no choice. She wasn’t going to let her worries go unless I forcefully took them out of her hands.”
“And if an hour passes and they never come back?”
She shrugged. “Then it’s a good thing you’ll be around for another day, so we can catch them again.”
He glanced out the window for a minute, then blindly opened his arms to her. She stepped into them quickly, feeling the seconds racing by all around them.
“I will not worry for the bairns,” he murmured. “In fact, I am suffering a bout of jealousy.”
“Jealousy?”
“Jealous that ye will have them to yerself. Jealous that they will be allowed to stay. And jealous…” He cleared his throat and pulled back to face her. “And jealous of the lucky man who will come along and recognize the treasure I will be leaving behind.
He took her head in his hands and kissed her long and hard, like he was already saying goodbye. When he broke the kiss, she gasped to catch her breath while he pressed his forehead to hers.
“And I’m jealous,” he whispered, “that the bairns already have yer love.”
She was just about to correct him when someone banged violently on the front door.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Hamish hurried to the front of the house to open the door. Someone was desperate to get in and the violent pounding surely meant that something was horribly wrong. There was no time to prepare himself before he pushed the door open.
Standing on the wide stoop was the old woman, still garbed in the same ragged dress, her arms raised to pound as long as necessary. Her frantic eyes softened when she saw him. She grabbed him by the shirt and shouted, “A Redcoat!” She fought to catch her breath. “A Redcoat!”
Hamish gripped her arms. “What are ye saying?”
“He ate one of the pies!” She acted as if that explained her panic, but he still didn’t understand.
Samantha appeared beside them. “And by eating a pie?”
“He can see now. He is here, in this time. He’s headed up the hill to find ye! But he’ll be back when he’s realizes I lied.”
Hamish nodded and let her go, then turned to Samantha. “My love, ye must take the bairns and this woman and get to the river, fast as ye can. Take yer auto. Dinna look back. I will lure the bastard up the mountain, well away from the house. And I shall make certain he never darkens yer door, ye ken?”
Samantha squeezed his arm. “Don’t go yet.” She ran into the house. “Hang on!”
Hamish and the old woman exchanged frustrated glances while they waited for the woman to return. Half a minute later, she reappeared with a rifle in one hand and a box of shells in the other.
“An American breakfast, remember? Only there’s no time for coffee.”
The old woman ducked into the house. “I’ll get the children.”
Hamish held out his hands for the weapon. “I’ll be playing the part of the American this morn. Ye get yer sweet arse down the hill. That be yer job now, Samantha. Ye’re no longer in charge. Now, give us a kiss and see if ye can follow orders as well as Lippa.” While he tried to put a lifetime of emotion into the kiss, he slipped the box of ammunition from her hand. There was time for nothing more. “Go!”
She paused and gave him a fierce look. “Come back to me, Hamish Farquharson, or I will come after you.”
~ ~ ~
Sam found the children sitting in the car, waiting for her. Though their expressions were blank, their hands roamed over everything—the seats, the doors, the windows. The two older ones wore clothes from her closet with the pant legs and sleeves rolled up into thick rings. Roddy wore two tee shirts and nothing underneath. But even if they weren’t dressed to go out in public, it no longer mattered.
She looked around the clearing that functioned as her car port. “Where is the old woman?”
Lippa shook her head. “She said to tell ye she’s not allowed to leave. She said ye’d understand.”
“Well, I don’t understand, but I’m not going to fight with her. We have to get you out of here.” She showed Clyde how to fasten his seatbelt, then had him help Roddy. Seated in the front seat, Lippa mimicked what she did. Before she turned the engine over, she paused. “Have you ever seen a car before?”
“Nay,” the girl said. “Where are the horses?”
“We don’t need them. It’s a machine.”
Making them understand would take much longer than just showing them, so she said a little prayer that they wouldn’t freak out and started the car. They all shouted with excitement.
She would have been happy too, but she was too worried about Hamish. And the rest of her available attention she focused on the winding road. As they neared the bottom of the road, they began passing buildings. In front of a small house, she saw Alison climbing back onto her four-wheeler, so she pulled over and got out.
Alison removed her helmet before she ever got the ATV started. “Coming to the pub, are ye?”
Sam shook her head quickly. “No. I’m in trouble. I need help.”
“What is it?” Alison looked over Sam’s shoulder at the car.
Sam grabbed her arms and forced her to look at her. “First, I need you to look at my car and tell me what you see.”
Alison looked again, and narrowed her eyes. “Are those bairns in yer car?”
She could have jumped for joy. “Yes! Yes, there are children in my car, but… I don’t know how to tell you this without sounding insane.”
“What’s the trouble? Tell me.”
“You know that Redcoat we were talking about this morning?”
“Aye.”
“Well, he’s back. He’s here. And he’s after the children.”
Alison’s eyes flew wide and she covered her open mouth with her fingers. “Not those children.”
She nodded. “The three children in my car. But they’re not ghosts, and he will kill them if he finds them. Now, this is how you can help me…”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Hamish set off with both eyes scanning for the color red and both ears straining for the sound of a car. When he finally heard an engine rumble, he praised God Samantha was clever enough to do as he’d asked.
He was protecting the children and the woman he loved from a Hanoverian with murder on his mind. It was a deed worthy of the quest Soni’d assigned him and a chance for a bit of revenge while he was at it. In fact, when all was said and done, he doubted he would need that meeting with the Prince…
The gun was loaded, the safety mechanism switched off. The rest of the shells he’d poured in his sporran. Fourteen s
hells in all. He hoped he would need only one.
Rain in the night had left the ground primed for footprints, so he began at the cottage and found dozens of boot marks near the small back window. Hamish assumed the soldier had reached inside and stolen a pie, so it was a wonder the old woman had caught him at all. At the side of the house, he found signs of their confrontation. When he widened the circle, the path the blackguard had taken was clear. It led up the incline, away from the houses, then veered to the left a bit, in the direction of Shepard’s Rock.
Too near the house.
Instead of following the tracks, Hamish shot straight up the slope. If he placed himself between Shepard’s Rock and Odin’s Helmet, firing a shot from the gun might lure the man to him. Or so he hoped.
It was interesting, he mused as he hiked, that a man could be so calm in the face of danger when he knew those he loved were safely away. It also didn’t hurt that a mortal wound for him would only mean an early conclusion to his quest, and not the premature end to a long and happy life.
He would have much preferred and long and happy day with Samantha and the children, but he would freely exchange that for their safety.
Blast that old woman’s troublesome pies! If she’d known of their magical properties, why the devil would she leave them lying about? Since no reasonable woman would do so, did that mean, then, that she was not reasonable? Was she not in her right mind? Or had he been wrong to think that the wee pies had been anything more than food?
It was a question he determined to put to Soni when they reunited. And if he was not allowed to see the wee witch again, he would put the question to God Himself.
Knowing where the wee burn lay, it was a temptation to quench his thirst, but he dared not. Instead, he planned to drink his fill when the deed was done and the soldier dispatched to Hell. He estimated where Odin’s Helmet sat, then looked for Shepard’s Rock. Another fifty yards and he would deem it midway.
A low buzzing sound came from below, near the house and cottage. It sounded as if someone was taking a chainsaw to the trees. Had Samantha a chain saw? Could the soldier be trying to lure him or the children back to the house, then?
The buzzing continued with little variations, as if the saw was on, but biting into nothing at all. But he soon realized the sound was growing louder, and quickly so. And it moved slightly to his left. A dirt-bike, perhaps?
Already attuned to the color, his eyes were immediately drawn to a red four-wheeled ATV when it crossed a stretch of open grass. And seated upon it—damn her—was Samantha MacKord!
There was no time to lose. He needed the enemy to come his way before the stubborn woman had the chance to cross the bastard’s path. So, he cocked the rifle, aimed it at the sky, and pulled the trigger. The gun kicked back and the stock slid down his ribs, reminding him how sharp pain could be. But the sting passed quickly and he felt whole again in no time.
He knelt behind a thick hedge of willow and hoped to Heaven that Samantha would not catch sight of him and think to join the fight. His plaid hid him well, but he feared the connection the two of them shared might lead her straight to him. And the bright pink of her shirt would bring the enemy to them both.
Pain lanced through his back as a sharp blade pressed into his skin, then paused.
“Hands in the air, you filthy Jacobite.” The soldier’s voice came from about four feet away. Hamish guessed that the blade at his back was the tip of a bayonet. “I arrest you in the name of King George.”
Hamish deliberated between wresting the man’s weapon away, and possibly dying for it—which would leave the other man alive to go after Samantha and the children—or biding his time and hoping that the sight of a horseless buggy would distract the man enough to leave him vulnerable.
He deemed it foolish not to wait for a better opportunity.
“I assume those devil children are yours?”
“They are.”
“They killed one of my men, you know. One of the king’s men. And I will see them hang for it. I will see that you are hanged afterward, of course, so you do not miss a moment. I don’t imagine they weigh enough for their necks to break, so they’ll strangle…”
“To what king do ye refer?”
“King George, you fool, not your Pretender across the water.”
“Britain has no king, only a queen. Ye have landed yerself three hundred years in the future and ye have yet to realize it.”
“Keep spouting such things and you’ll be tortured without mercy. You’ll beg for the noose—”
“Can ye not hear it? The machine is coming.”
“Machine?”
“Aye. Listen.”
The sound of the four-wheeler moved closer and closer, and though Hamish dared not turn to see the soldier’s expression, he could hear his short, shallow breaths. He was listening all right.
Samantha and her machine broke out of the trees below, but she didn’t seem to see them. He glanced quickly over his shoulder and found the soldier had removed his red coat, and his stained shirt was none too bright. The lass would be upon them before she realized it!
“Ye see? She rides upon the machine.”
“Is this your woman?”
“Aye, she is my woman.” It gave him a great thrill to say the words and believe them. For a while still, she would believe them too.
“Send her for the children. Tell her she either brings them to me, or you die a slow and painful death right here.”
Hamish shook his head slowly. There wasn’t much time left. She was nearly upon them. “There are two fine canons on the back of the machine, and she will turn them on ye. You must flee before she sees ye.
It was too late for them both. Samantha spurred the ATV up the hill, her gaze scanning all around and landing on him. She immediately slowed, then her eyes widened when she looked behind him.
Hamish shook his head. She gave a knowing nod, and accelerated once again, flying past them with enough speed to make her a difficult target, even if the soldier had dared move his weapon away from Hamish’s back.
“Tell her to come, do you hear? Tell her!”
“Ye can hear for yerself that the machine is far too loud. She is gone. And our children are out of yer reach forever.”
“No!” The blade pulled away from his back and he turned just as the stock of the gun came down and glanced off the side of his head, just behind his ear. Though it was far less effective than the blow from Lippa’s stone, he pretended it was and fell forward onto his face. Unless he heard the cock of a hammer, or felt the blade again, he decided that lying still would entice the soldier to relax his guard a bit.
A boot lifted his leg and tried to shove it to the side. He let it fall limp. Footsteps stomped around him in a circle, shuffling through the grass, then stopping too far away for him to lunge effectively. He needed the man to step closer.
“I suppose it will not be too difficult to carry your head down the mountain, eh?”
Still, Hamish never moved. He barely breathed. If the other man was watching for the rise and fall of his chest, he would be disappointed.
The engine of the ATV cut off suddenly, instead of fading away.
The bastard chuckled. “A handsome brute like you—your woman will no doubt do whatever I ask in exchange for leniency. I shall truss you up and leave you for the wolves. Then I’ll go see what that witch on the machine might offer to get you back.”
Hands pulled Hamish’s boots together, then froze. The piercing notes of a violin cut through the sun-warmed air and grew louder with every phrase.
“I shall kill her! Do you hear that? It is not my imagination, or the ghost of that Jacobite! It is your bloody woman who has been driving me mad with her playing!” He cleared his throat and spit. “And just like the other, I know how to make certain she never plays another note.” He gave Hamish’s ribs a powerful kick. “Your children will just have to hang without you.”
Hamish braced himself to attack, but before he made his move,
the soldier’s footsteps moved away. He rolled and saw only a glimpse of the man’s back and the red coat in his hand as he ran up into the trees that lay between himself and Odin’s Helmet.
Between himself and Samantha!
He tried to jump to his feet, but landed awkwardly again. His bootlaces were knotted together.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Sam propped the trap door open, snatched up her violin, and began playing while she moved to the front edge of the path so her music could be heard by Hamish and the Redcoat down the hill. Since she’d turned off the four-wheeler, her ears had been straining for the sound of gunshots. It made her sick to think Hamish might already be hurt.
Should she have stopped?
No, she was certain she’d read the message in his eyes. Go!
Maybe, if she hadn’t stopped for the violin…
She shook the doubts away. It had been a reasonable theory, that the man who had been lured around the mountain by the sounds of Willa’s playing might be lured again, if only out of curiosity. Now, she hoped it lured him away from Hamish, who had already been on his knees with his hands in the air.
He can’t be dead. He’s a ghost. He can’t be dead.
She paused for a few seconds, heard movement below, and started playing again. Unless Hamish had some James Bond moves, it wouldn’t be him coming up the mountain. And if it was the soldier, she had two weapons she could use against him. All she had to do was keep him busy…
She saw a flash of red between trees and her bow skittered across the strings. To calm herself and slip into performance mode, she forgot the bow and plucked the strings, tuning it. As each string came in tune, her breathing calmed, her heart slowed.
We’re ready.
The soldier that stepped clear of the trees had long blond hair tied at the back of his neck. He paused for half a second to look at her, sneer, then veer in her direction. She was caught off guard by his uniform. His boots were slick and shiny with clean white pants tucked into them. His shirt was stained with sweat, though, which looked even worse with his bright white tie hanging against it. The flash of red had been from the coat he carried in one hand. The gold buttons on it were as shiny as his boots, and the whole thing was decorated with garish yellow trim.