Rogue with a Brogue (29 page)

“Help me up,” Arran muttered, and Peter grabbed a hand and hauled him to his feet. “We didnae do anything,” he said, then bent over with his hands on his knees. “Ye can see it there fer yerself. The front axle and the reach snapped.”

“Aye,” Peter agreed, dividing his attention between Arran and Howard. “Looks like the reach dug into the road. We're lucky we went over sideways and nae end over end.”

“It was fine when I gave it over to you.”

“Nonsense,” Mary snapped, furious that anyone would be arguing with a man who'd just nearly died. “It's been creaking and groaning for the past thr—”

With a moan Arran went down on his knees and vomited up the remains of his breakfast. “Nae to alarm anyone, but I think I'm going to pass oot again.”

Peter caught him by the shoulders as he went limp. “Let's get 'im off the road, lass. Howard! Get yer arse over here.”

The two men carried him to the grass at one side of the road and carefully set him down again. Mary sat where she could cradle his head in her lap. “Peter, see to Duffy and Juno, will you?”

“Aye. I can do that.”

“Howard, the team is still harnessed together. When I cut the traces they went up the road. See if you can find them. Take Juno if you need to.”

“I drive horses, my lady. I do not ride them.”

“I'll look fer the team, Lady Mary,” Peter said, leading the skittish mounts to the side of the road and tying Juno off to a low-hanging branch. “I'll take Duffy, though. I've ridden 'im before.”

She nodded. “Very well. Howard, please move the luggage off the road, and find a blanket for Arran. I don't want him getting chilled.”

The two men did as she asked. Trying to gather her thoughts back in, she brushed the hair from Arran's temple. The cut there was deep and still bleeding freely. Mary pulled a kerchief from her pocket, folded it, and carefully pressed it against the wound.

She knew Arran would say that they should hire another vehicle and resume the journey north as soon as possible. She also knew that he desperately needed a good night's sleep and a day or two of not being jarred about in a coach or on horseback. What they didn't have was the time for any of that.

At this moment her father and Charles Calder could be as close as six or seven hours behind them. With every moment they weren't moving, her clan drew closer. And she did not want them any nearer than they already were.

Except for a few cottages scattered here and there, they hadn't passed any place where they could take shelter. The smelly fellow from this morning had said there was another inn just south of Manchester, but they'd turned farther west to avoid the town altogether. When she'd mentioned that she had relations close by, Arran hadn't wanted to risk her being recognized on the very slight chance that their pursuers didn't know precisely which road they were on.

She had relations nearby
. Including an aunt who was as unpopular with the rest of the Campbells as she was likely to be if they survived this. An aunt she'd never met.

“Now this is a view I can tolerate,” Arran said groggily, looking up at her with slightly crossed eyes.

“Hush,” she said gently, and pressed down on his shoulder when he would have sat up again. “And stay still.”

“We cannae stay here by the side of the road, Mary.”

“Peter's tracking down the team.”

He reached up and grabbed her arm. “Ye have to be safe, my lass. Take Peter and go find an inn where ye can hire another coach.” With his free hand he dug into a pocket of his coat. “Have 'em send the bill here,” he instructed, giving her a piece of paper as she tried to overlook the dismaying way his hand shook. “If ye cannae get a coach, purchase a seat on the mail stage. Keep traveling north. Peter will help ye get to yer
seanair.
”

She stroked his forehead. “I believe it was just yesterday that we decided we were staying together, no matter what.”

“That was before a coach fell on my head. Mary, dunnae—”

“You'll just have to trust me, Arran,” she said, more sharply than she meant to. “I seem to be in command of this little expedition now.”

From his expression he wanted to say something about that, but instead he closed his eyes and nodded. “I do trust ye, lass. Just keep yerself safe.”

She would keep all of them safe. How, she had no idea, but nothing would keep her from a future with Arran. Nothing.

“Howard, do you have a map?” she asked.

The driver straightened from dragging the last of the trunks over beside her. “That, I do,” he said, producing one from his pocket. “I've never been outside London until this past week.”

Mary unfolded it across Arran's chest. “Where are we, precisely?”

“Dunnae be sticking pins in me,” Arran rumbled, but kept his eyes closed.

“Precisely, I ain't certain. I was asleep when his lordship rolled us over, if you'll recall.”

“It wasn't Arran's fault,” she insisted. “Now show me where you think we are.”

Grumbling under his breath, he squatted down beside her. “Here,” he said after a moment, jabbing a finger into the map.

The road they traveled was so faint she could barely follow it even with her eyes. If Howard's estimation was correct, they were west and just north of Manchester. Trying to remember every half-heard mention of her aunt and the Sasannach banker she'd married, Mary traced her finger along a narrow country lane to where it dead-ended.

“We need to go here,” she said.

Howard squinted his one eye. “In the coach that would take us an hour. On foot, two hours. Dragging Lord Arran, past sunset. If at all.”

“I can walk,” Arran said. “But unless that's an inn ye're aiming for, this isnae a wise idea. Ye need to keep heading north.”

“Hush,” she said again, putting her fingers gently across his sensuous mouth. “You're delirious. It's my turn to rescue you.”

Hopefully she sounded confident. Inside she shook like a leaf on a windy day. But he'd saved her, and she was not about to let her family—her clan—hurt him or separate them. So she supposed she was about to discover just what it was she was capable of.

 

Chapter Fifteen

Either he was having a nightmare, or events had gone badly sideways, Arran decided.

He opened his eyes to see clouds and treetops, and for a moment thought he was still lying on his back by the road. But the trees were passing by, or he was passing by them, to an accompanying sound of wood scraping against dirt and stone. Moving his head slowly to be certain his aching skull didn't fall off and roll away, he looked sideways.

“Don't move,” Mary said, leaning over from Juno's back to look down at him, clear worry on her face. “Are you going to be ill again?”

“I dunnae believe so,” he returned, his voice dry and raspy. “Where the devil are we? What am I riding on?”

“One of the coach doors. Peter found the team, and they're much happier pulling you than they were the entire coach.”

“I'm not much happier,” Howard put in from somewhere behind—or rather in front of—him.

“I said you would be recompensed, Howard. Just keep them moving at an easy pace. No bumping.”

Arran closed his eyes again, trying to gather a mush of thoughts back into something coherent. “We cannae travel to Scotland like this. And we're leaving a damned obvious trail, I'd wager.”

“Nae,” Peter said from beyond his feet. “I've got a bundle of branches Duffy's dragging. I dunnae think even that Daniel Boone lad from America could track us.”

“Was that yer idea, lass?” Arran asked.

“I thought it might help obscure the marks the door is leaving.”

He knew she had wits, but that was damned clever. When he shifted a little he felt a portmanteau beneath his knees, so evidently he was now a part of the luggage. This was not how he meant to make his way to the Highlands, and he was
not
going to be what got them caught. Grunting, he pushed with his hands, trying to sit up. Nothing happened.

“Ye didnae tie me doon, did ye, lass?”

“I didn't want you or the bags to fall off. Nor do I want you to get up and faint again. Stay there.”

“I didnae faint. I lost consciousness.”

Her lips twitched. “State it however you wish, but stay where you are. We'll be at our destination within an hour.”

“And what is our destination?” The dull thudding in his head kept growing louder, and he couldn't make out her answer. All he knew was that this was no way for a man to perform a rescue. Tied to a door and being dragged along the ground—it was humiliating. Devil take it, he'd beaten off four men just a few hours ago. He had the bruises beneath his newest bruises to prove it. When he managed to force his eyes open again, he would demand that he be allowed to walk.

Summoning every ounce of willpower he owned, he opened one eye. “I didnae quite hear ye, Mary. Where are we…” Arran trailed off as he realized he wasn't looking up at a late afternoon sky, any longer. A deep blue touched the western horizon, deepening to black the higher he looked. A minute ago he would have sworn he'd been in the middle of a conversation. How long had he been wading about in his own muddy mind?

For the first time, panic touched him. If he lost time with every blink of his eyes, he couldn't protect Mary. Just the opposite. His unplanned inability to act, to think clearly, was putting her in danger.

“Mary,” he forced out, more loudly.

“I'm here,” her sweet voice came immediately, and then she was walking beside his makeshift litter.

“Mary, ye need to go. I'll nae be the reason anyone hurts ye.”

“This is my rescue, Arran.” She glanced ahead, then motioned at someone in front of her. “Wait here for just a moment.”

He grabbed for her hand, but she'd stepped away before he could make himself move. “Peter, go with her!”

“I am, lad,” drifted back to him.

This time when he closed his eyes, he couldn't recall thinking anything except that he'd failed. Perhaps he'd been too rash to begin with. Perhaps he should have waited, lurked about in Wiltshire until the day of the wedding while he made his own plans, and then stolen her off to a ship and sailed to America. Perhaps the Highlands had been his life, his sanctuary, for so long that he'd been unable to let go of the idea that he and Mary would be safe there.

Of course if he'd failed to appear at Glengask after a fortnight Ranulf would have come looking for him. And the idea of Mary being trapped at Fendarrow with no allies, waiting to be locked into a marriage she dreaded—no. Waiting might have been wiser, but this was one time he was proud that he'd done what was right rather than what was wise.

If he'd feel that way in ten or twelve hours when the Campbells ran them down, he had no idea. But by God he wasn't going to let her go without a fight, even if he had to lie flat on the ground and keep one eye shut to shoot at the bastards. He'd claimed Mary Campbell in every way that he could. And his only true worry in all of this was that while he'd managed a sly comment that he loved her, he hadn't come out and said it directly. And that when the coach had gone over, he wasn't certain what she'd been about to say back to him.

He didn't want her gratitude or just her friendship. He wanted her heart.

*   *   *

With Peter standing at her shoulder and clearly uneasy at this little plan of hers, Mary struck the old brass knocker against the sturdy oak door. She wasn't certain which outcome would be worse—that this was the wrong door, or that it was the correct one.

“This is a very bad idea, m'lady,” Peter grumbled. “Laird Arran wouldnae like it.”

“Laird Arran needs a bed and likely a doctor,” she returned, pushing down her worry by counting the seconds of silence inside the house. Her breaking down and weeping on some stranger's front step wouldn't help him, and it wouldn't help
them
.

As she reached twenty the door rattled and cracked open. “The Mallisters aren't seeing anyone tonight,” a mild-voiced older man said. The door began to close again.

Mallister.
That was it. “I'm Mary Campbell,” Mary said swiftly. “I'm looking for my aunt Mòrag.”

The door froze. “Wait here.” It clicked shut again.

All she wanted to do was put her shoulder to the door, push her way in, and demand assistance for Arran. For heaven's sake, he was lying out there in the cold with only a one-eyed coach driver to watch over him. But she knew quite well that patience would serve her better than brute force.

The cottage itself was almost comically innocuous, with a low, white fence covered with summer roses, a steepled roof, and a quartet of windows shuttered with pretty green and white curtains looking out from the ground and first floors. By Fendarrow standards it was tiny, smaller than the gatekeeper's cottage there. But for a pair of lovers looking to escape a powerful family or two, it seemed … perfect.

“What if they dunnae open the door again?” Peter asked gloomily.

“Then I'll think of something else.” What, she had no idea, but he couldn't be allowed to know that.

The door swung open again, wider this time. A man and a woman of about her parents' age stood there side by side, gazing at her. The woman had the same light green eyes that Mary and her father shared, the same high cheekbones and narrow chin she saw in herself and her grandfather.

“Aunt Mòrag?”

“I … I go by Sarah now,” the woman said, the merest trace of a brogue in her voice. That was how her father would sound, if he hadn't studiously flattened his vowels and reined in his
r
's for so long that they'd become lost. “This is my husband, Sean.”

Mary nodded at him, offering what she hoped was a friendly smile. “I … have a small problem, Aunt Sarah, and I need your assistance.”