Devil's Highlander (Clan MacAlpin #1)

“I'm sorry,” Cormac told him. “She loved you too much. We all did. We all do.” Aidan looked away, casting his face in shadow. “And the rest of them?”

“Father died, too. At the battle of Dunbar.”

“You'll have to forgive me, brother mine,” he said with a bitter laugh. “My knowledge of Scottish history isn't what it should be.”

“Of course. It was 1650 when Da died. A few years after you'd been taken. The others are alive. Anya is wed, and is with her husband in the west. The rest live in Dunnottar.”

“Dunnottar?” Aidan stopped for a moment in astonishment.

“Aye, in the castle there.”

“You jest. Who exactly did Anya wed to win the family such a prize?” Cormac allowed a grudging smile. “No, 'tis not like that. There's a jest to be found, but it's the castle itself. It was nearly destroyed in the wars and tumbles about our ears. I keep waiting for the villagers to kick us out, but nobody seems to have the heart.”

“Dunnottar,” Aidan mumbled again, and then there was a protracted silence.

Cormac was growing impatient with their act. It was too much to make sense of, too overwhelming. But there was one thing he could wrap his mind around, and it was Marjorie, and his sole desire to help her. Thoughts of his goal focused him.

“What are you doing here?” Cormac nodded back to the Oliphant “Please tell me you have naught to do with those men.”

“I do and I don't,” Aidan said, a snide grin cocking the corner of his mouth. He stopped walking. “And now I'm afraid I'll need to cut this reunion short. I've got business, and my… associates would not take kindly to me having such an extensive parley with a stranger.”

“Wait, Aidan. I need you to stop whatever this business is. For Marjorie.” Hearing her name, a strange look flashed in Aidan's eyes. It wasn't pleasure. “So you finally married that brat, is it?”

“It's not like that.”

“Then how's it like?” Aidan enunciated each word with disdain.

“We're not married. Ree's grown into a good woman.”

Aidan rolled his eyes. “I'll bet she has.”

Cormac stepped close. “You'll mind your tone where Marjorie is concerned.” Aidan exploded into laughter. “Some things never change. Last I saw you, you were in my face about Marjorie. And here you are now, thirteen years later, in my face.”

Cormac panicked. He'd fantasized for years how their reunion might be, and it was not this. He didn't understand why it was going so awry. “Please, Aid. Let's just start this over. Marjorie works with the poor now. With young boys. She felt your kidnap quite keenly. And now she's come unhinged at the thought that more will be stolen from our shores. That Jack you deal with… he's a smuggler of children.” Cormac waited, hoping for an outraged reaction at that last revelation.

“Aye,” Aidan replied instead. “I know it.”

Cormac scowled. He didn't know the extent of what his brother had endured these past years. He thought of all that'd transpired in his own life, knowing he was not one to pass judgment. He could only try to make Aidan understand. And if he refused to understand, Cormac would make certain his brother didn't stand in his way.

“Marjorie wants these men stopped. I plan on being the one to stop them. And I'd ask that you're far from the Oliphant when that comes to pass.”

“Still saving Marjie, eh?” Aidan sneered. “I've my own objectives to attend, Cormac. My own ghosts to chase. And they don't have to do with you, or your Ree, or any of your callow concerns.” Conflicting emotions roiled within Cormac. Reuniting with his brother should've been a joyful event. And yet he couldn't help but feel he wasn't entirely happy to see Aidan, particularly under these circumstances.

Aidan turned, hunched from the cold and with hands in pockets. Cormac watched as his twin walked away from him and back into the night.

Chapter 34

Can't leave the room, he'd said. Marjorie rifled through her wardrobe, digging for her warmest wrapper. She'd leave indeed, and get to the bottom of this affair with Archie. She had saved those boys once; she'd save them again. And no man would stop her — not Cormac, not Archie, not even Jack the poor excuse for a pirate.

She felt Fiona rustling around at her back, setting the room to rights, and it made her angrier. Even her accursed maid had insisted she stay inside.

Locked in. No man told her to lock herself away. She'd been independent for years. She'd be independent long after she exorcised Cormac from her system. And that's precisely what she'd do. Exorcise him like the demon he was.

She tugged the long woolen shawl out with a feline growl, embracing her anger as armor against her heartbreak.

Angry. She'd be angry, not hurt. Later she'd let herself feel the hurt. But first she'd do what needed to be done.

“Your Cormac wilna be pleased,” Fiona said under her breath.

“Would you stop that infernal muttering. The Lord preserve me, girl. Say your piece, or shut your mouth.” Marjorie slammed the door to her wardrobe. “And he's not my Cormac.” Fiona gaped at her.

Marjorie haphazardly wrapped herself in the shawl, regretting for a moment that she'd snapped so at her poor maid. But then a thought followed fast on its heels. That poor maid had endured more hardship at the hands of a bully father than Marjorie would know in a lifetime. Crossing her arms at her chest, she considered Fiona anew.

“Well,” she said firmly, “you could come with me.”

And the speed with which Fiona had them whisked down a back staircase and out the door was startling.

Saint Machar glowed yellow in the bright moonlight. Skeletons of trees destroyed in the wars still hovered about the church, casting eerie shadows on the facade.

“Criwens.” Fiona clung to her arm. “It looks a frightful place at night.”

“Nonsense.” Marjorie tugged her maid along. “It's a place of the Lord, whatever time of day.”

“That doesn't mean it don't make my skin crawl. Like a goose over my grave, mum.”

“I am not your mum,” she spat, pulling her arm free. “Would you please call me Marjorie?” Fiona gave her a weak smile. “All right then, Marjie.”

“Marjorie.” Remembering her anger, she pressed on, striding down Chanonry Road toward Westhall. “The boys will be asleep, up there,” Marjorie said, nodding to the triangular upper story. “But Archie” — she grimaced — “stays for a time before the fire, in the library. It's where he sees his patients during the day.”

“May I ask you a question, mum… Marj… Marjorie?”

“It seems you just did,” she retorted, and then shook her head at her own cheek. She couldn't let impatience get the better of her. The truth was, the night had unsettled her, and she was happy to have her maid's company. “My apologies, Fiona. Please, what is your question?”

“Why are you so angry with Archie? He seems a good man. A caring man.”

“They all do, don't they?” Cormac had also seemed a good and caring man. Flustered, she scrambled for an explanation, then said simply, “It remains to be seen what our Archie is about.” She gave Fiona a sharp look. “I have a question for you, though. What was Archie doing visiting you at your home?” Fiona inhaled sharply,

and Marjorie would swear that, if it were daylight, she'd see a blush on her maid's cheeks.

“He helped me once,” she began tentatively. She raised her left hand, holding her index finger to catch the moon's light. “He'd come to your uncle's to pay you a visit. I'd cut myself in the kitchens, badly. Archie saw me just after it happened. He told me if I didn't let him dress the wound, I'd lose my finger.” The maid shrugged, looking nervous. “He said you wouldn't mind if he came to the vennel to check on it. He needed to put on a clean bandage. He said it wasn't wrong of me to let him come.” She cast her eyes down. “But still, I never told you, and I'm sorry for that.”

“Goodness, Fiona.” Marjorie grabbed the girl's hand to study it. Sure enough, a thin scar wound around the top of her finger, white as a cobweb in the moonlight. “What do you think of me? Imagining I might begrudge you a finger, for goodness' sake.” She dropped Fiona's hand. “Of course it's fine that he came to see you. It's just… I wonder that… why did he visit again?”

“We talk. Sometimes. When he comes to see you or your uncle.” Fiona looked away, her cheeks decidedly flushed, visible even in the moonlight. “He said he'd heard about some trouble down by the docks. Said he was… concerned.”

“Mm-hm.” Marjorie eyed her maid thoughtfully. She was a pretty thing, if a mite peculiar, with a wide and open face, full bosom, and blushes that betrayed her every whim. Pretty enough to explain Archie's visit? She wondered.

The housekeeper let the women in and showed them to the library. They found Archie where Marjorie had predicted, sitting on an armchair before the fire, reading.

He nearly jumped from his seat, startled. “How did you get in? You didn't bring that MacAlpin fellow, did you?” He spotted Fiona behind her, and face softening, he sprang to meet them. “Is aught the matter?”

“What indeed,” Marjorie snapped. “The question is, what have you done with the boys you took?” Fiona gravitated toward him, giving him a warm smile. “I told her they were safe in your care, Arch.” Marjorie shot her a look, raising a sharp brow at the nickname. Suddenly it wasn't just the boys' safety that concerned her.

“The boys?” His gaze was locked on Fiona, and there was something charged in his eyes. Stepping closer, he began to reach out, but then hesitated, and quickly clasped his hands behind his back instead. “They're all tucked upstairs.”