Beyond Time (Highland Secret Series) (14 page)

“I like them feisty,” he said, tugging harder on her hair.

Tears welled in her eyes as she tried to lift her foot to kick him, but the weight and sheer volume of the skirts made injuring the man unlikely.

“Please,” she cried, “let go of me.”

“Not likely,” he said, hooking his right leg behind hers and pushing her backwards onto the bed.

The full weight of his body fell on top of her. She screamed and lifted her hands to his face, clawing her nails down the length of his cheek. He slapped her hard across her face. For a moment the room went black, her head swam and her ear rang from the force of the blow.

Suddenly she could breath and the weight of his body was gone. Grace scrambled up to see the man hovering in mid air, his face white with shock. Robert’s eyes blazed dangerously as he deposited the man on his feet. With one swift turn of his head, Robert smacked the edge of his forehead across the bridge of the man’s nose. The stranger dropped to the floor and within seconds was lying in a pool of his own blood. Robert grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him up. The man swayed unsteadily on his feet.

“No, Robert, leave him,” Grace screamed. Scrambling off the bed she flung herself at Robert, begging him to stop.

“You’ll kill him, Robert. Please, let him go?”

Robert stared at the man for a brief moment before flinging him aside.

“Get out!” he ordered, “Now!”

The dazed man staggered through the door leaving a trail of blood behind him.

“Are you alright?” he asked, looking across at Grace.

She shook fiercely and tears streaked her cheeks but she nodded her head.

“Stay here,” he said, turning to leave the room.

Moments later he returned to find Grace curled up on the bed sobbing. He sat beside her, gently resting his hand on her shoulders.

“I am sorry,” he whispered.

She tried to reply, to tell him it wasn’t his fault, that she didn’t blame him, but the words caught in her throat. She clung to him, sobbing like a child as he held her against him and soothed a lifetime’s pain.

When finally the tears had stopped and her head pounded from the crying, she got to her feet.

“I’m sorry,” she said, rubbing her forehead.

“Sorry for what? You haven’t done anything wrong.” He paused thoughtfully cupping his hands together. “Don’t ever apologize to me again,” he said, turning to leave. “We’re going home.”

“What about your customers?”

“There aren’t any. I’ve closed the doors.”

“Because of me?”

“No! For you.”

“I don’t understand,” she said, quietly.

“This is no place for a lady.”

“But this is your livelihood. You can’t just close the doors.”

“I can and I have.”

“How will you live, Robert?”

“That is not your concern.”

“Please, don’t make me carry the guilt and worry that you will have no money because of me.”

“This is my decision alone to make and not your burden to carry. However, I can assure you, Grace, that if this house never opens again, I will not starve and nor will you.”

It all became too much for her; the loss of her daughter, the pain of her loveless marriage, the belief that she was mentally ill, the bizarre notion that she had travelled through time, his kindness and love, this new and terrifying world. Tears welled in her eyes again, threatening to overspill. Her stomach lurched as if she was going to be sick and her hands shook uncontrollably. Confusion and pain surged inside her until the tears broke free and her body and mind felt numb to the world.

******

CHAPTER 8

He turned and walked toward the fireplace. She watched him as he squatted in front of it and lowered a log gently into the flames. He reached for a thick cloth on the hearth and lifted a pot from above the fire. Cautiously he poured boiling water from the pot into two mugs and returned the cast iron pot to the fire.

“I’ve grown quite fond of your coffee,” he said, handing her a mug and moving to sit on the edge of the bed.

“Have you ever had coffee before?”

“Yes, but it tasted nothing like this.”

“What does it taste like?”

“Bitter.”

She blew gently across the rim of the mug. Steam circled off the liquid and threaded up into the cool air of the room.

“Robert in my time, your post house is owned by one of your brother’s descendents.”

He clasped his hands and pursed his lips thoughtfully. “I have seen him.”

“I know and he has seen you. His name is Harry.”

“Harry?” he smiled broadly, “Well I know which brother he’s from.”

She cocked her head quizzically. “You do?”

“Yes, I do. It’ll be Harry.”

Grace smiled and a gentle laugh escaped her throat. “I didn’t think to ask your brother’s names.”

“No reason why you should.”

“So your sister is Sarah and your brother is Harry. But you have another brother?”

“I do, George.”

“George?” Grace gasped wondering if it could be possible.

“That’s what I said.”

“In my time a George owns this house,” Grace said with a grin.

They sat in a comfortable silence, sipping the warm drink. She closed her eyes and savored its flavor, wondering ruefully what life was going to be like without her jar of instant coffee. It seemed a bizarre thing to muse over and she sighed at her apparent shallowness. A gust of wind howled down the narrow street between the Minster and the house disturbing their calm. Robert moved toward the fire and added another log of wood to the glowing embers.

“Will I meet your family?”

“When you feel ready.”

“What if they don’t like me?”

She sounded truly anxious. He hadn’t anticipated her reaction and it threw him momentarily.

“You care what my family thinks?”

“Of course I care. They’re your family.”

He weighed her words, considering carefully his own feelings on the subject. Would it matter to him if his family didn’t accept her? Yes, he concluded, it would matter, but it mattered more what she thought of them.

He took a deep breath, contemplating the complexities that had become his life. A loyal servant to the king, he had fought as a Cavalier in the civil war, travelled the continent with his master and returned with the restoration. But in all that time he had never considered marriage.

Of course there had been women. Life with the king, even in exile, had included an almost constant trail of female characters of loose morals and flighty manners. They had come and gone with the movements of the entourage and never had one remained more than briefly in his memory.

Resting his elbows on his thighs and stretching his arms out in front of him he clasped his hands thoughtfully. His eyes stared at the flames as they danced and leapt around the brickwork of the fireplace. This was how it had all began, he thought. Idle eyes staring dimly at a flame, a blurred image materializing within the flame.

Had he the slightest belief in sorcery and magic he would almost certainly have killed this woman on sight. But he had never paid attention to the ramblings of the witch hunters. Magic was simply unexplained events and sorcery didn’t exist.

He mused over the irony of his conviction. In his readiness to dismiss her as a master of evil magic he had allowed her to enchant him.

As if aware of his musings she shuffled across the bed. She sat cross legged beside him, her hand resting lightly on his thigh.

“Do people in the future move through time often?”

She looked startled. “No. Time travel isn’t possible.”

“Not impossible,” he replied.

“No, I suppose not, but it’s deemed to be.”

“Yet you are here.”

“I guess so.”

“Do you believe in witches?”

“No, that’s daft. Witches aren’t real. They exist for the purpose of children’s tales and adult fantasy. They are no more real than magic is.”

“If magic is isn’t real and witches are fantasy and time travel is impossible, how do you explain how you got here?”

His words hit her with the force of a physical blow. She stared at his face, the color draining from hers.

“I can’t.”

He watched her, his dark eyes blazed dangerously. She met his look and held it as fear ripped through her. His eyes demanded the truth but she had none to give.

“I know,” he said, eventually. “There’s no reason why I should trust you, but I do.”

He got up from the bed and moved to close the shutter. The flame from a single candle glowed against the white-washed wall behind her bedside table. She watched anxiously as he stoked the fire and the flames grew up around the fresh logs.

“Did you love your husband?” he asked, replacing the poker on its stand.

“I thought I did... once.”

“And now?”

“No,” she whispered quietly.

He lifted her backpack and handbag and set them on the bed beside her.

“Tomorrow we will go through this. These things must be destroyed.”

“No, Robert you can’t.”

“I can and I will,” he said, sternly. “If you are ever seen using any of these things you will face trial for witchcraft.”

He was right and Grace understood the risks. But she had no intention of letting him destroy anything she had brought with her.

Fumbling with the zip she opened the backpack and emptied its content onto the bed.

He stood on the opposite side of the bed watching her as she reached for a small square box.

“See these?” she said, holding the box up for him to see.

He nodded silently.

“These are called painkillers. They do what their name suggests. They kill pain and fever. Robert, they save lives.”

“Grace, you were not listening to me. The usefulness of these things is not in question. Your survival is.”

“We can hide them. No one need ever know.”

“And where would you have me hide these things?”

Flustered her eyes flicked frantically around the room, settling on the oak wardrobe that would remain in this room for nearly four hundred years.

“In the wardrobe,” she said, excitedly.

A loud laugh bellowed from him, breaking the tension of the room.

“So no one is going to find them in there?”

“No... No, they won’t. Not if you add a false bottom to it.”

He pursed his lips, pondered her suggestion for a few minutes.

“Alright, I’ll do it,” he said, suddenly.

“You will?”

“I will,” he said, letting a broad smile cross his lips.

A soft glow from the embers of the fire lit the room. He reached out and touched her gently with his hand as she turned restlessly away from him. She rolled onto her back and her eyes sprang open. The beamed ceiling glared down on her. Her mind twisted and in fits of confusion, her heart pounded and her stomach churned.

“I saw her,” she whispered.

“Saw who?”

“Jenny.”

“Your daughter?”

She sat bolt upright, her hand fumbling for the photograph on her bedside table.

“Yes,” she breathed, clutching the picture to her breast, “my daughter.”

“Tell me what happened?”

She stared at him blankly, her mind fighting to recover the dying images of her dream.