The Laird (Captive Hearts) (30 page)

That last part, about being Michael’s only close family, was what hurt the most.

“Somebody took the trouble to get Brenna’s horse up here from Aboyne, left the saddle and bridle on so there’d be no mistaking the animal, and made sure the beast was found near the MacLogan holding. That makes no sense.”

“If thieves are desperate enough to steal from an entire village, then they sell the horse, saddle, and bridle down on the coast,” St. Clair concluded. “Unless they’re trying to implicate the MacLogans.”

An unhappy, speculative silence spread, broken only by the pennant snapping and whipping in the breeze.

“I expect Angus back from Aberdeen tomorrow,” Michael said. “I thought I’d search his quarters before then.”

“Not by yourself,” St. Clair said in a tone that suggested pulling rank was yet within his abilities. “You’re distracted, you’ll miss the obvious—”

The door scraped open, revealing Elspeth Fraser looking flushed and unhappy.

“You’ve missed him,” Michael said. “MacLogan and his brother are already scrubbed as clean as soap and cold water can make them.”

Elspeth put Michael in mind of that quote about a woman being little but fierce, and she wasn’t having any of his teasing.

“Never mind the daft MacLogans. I cannot find Maeve, and was hoping she’d taken herself up here to sketch.”

“She’s not with us,” Michael said, “and she’s not with Brenna, and evening will soon descend. St. Clair and I have been up here for a good half hour, and we haven’t seen her leave the castle. Find Lachlan, search the stables, talk to Cook, and, for God’s sake, hurry.”

***

Dinner was a quiet business, with the Baroness St. Clair carrying most of the conversation. She quizzed Brenna on how wool was woven, the various Brodie plaids, and the accoutrements necessary to create a formal Highland dress ensemble.

While Brenna was so upset, she barely tasted her lamb and potatoes, and Milly St. Clair took over the duties of hostess for her.

As a friend would have.

“You might consider wearing the colors of Clan Sinclair,” Michael said. “Brenna can show you the plaid, and it wouldn’t take long to have a kilt made up. Sinclairs have been in Scotland for centuries.”

“You’ve sewn kilts, then?” St. Clair asked over a bowl of trifle.

“I’ve been measured for my share.” Michael’s reply was served with an indulgent smile in Brenna’s direction, a husbandly smile, and yet it would do him no good.

They were doomed to have a rousing argument, and Michael likely knew it.

Brenna rose without giving Michael a chance to hold her chair.

“In the interests of allowing all and sundry to get a good night’s sleep, I’ll suggest Lady St. Clair and I withdraw at this point. We’ll be in the solar, gentlemen.”

“You’re preoccupied,” Lady St. Clair—Milly—observed as they made their way down the corridor.

“I’m furious.” One could be honest with friends.

“Maeve’s a little girl, and far from home. Of course she’ll explore, and she came to no harm.”

These were the arguments Brenna anticipated from Michael. She did not want to hear them from her friend.

“She came to no harm this time.” Because Angus was in Aberdeen, because Elspeth had known to keep a close eye on the child.

Because Michael had raised the alarm the instant he’d realized Maeve was missing. Brenna didn’t want to be fair about that, but in the disagreement she intended to have with her spouse, she’d have to acknowledge that much.

“We are tired,” Milly observed as they reached the third floor. “Would you be very offended if I sought my bed and left you to the company of the teapot?”

“You are well otherwise?” This mattered to Brenna, that Milly be in good health. It mattered very much.

“Fatigued, but otherwise thriving. I suspect Sebastian will abandon the port with unseemly haste.”

“And Michael will join me soon enough as well.”

Milly stifled a yawn, then fussed the drape of Brenna’s tartan shawl. “You were terrified for that child.”

Brenna was terrified for all the children, though in Angus’s absence, she’d relaxed her guard.

“The little ones can so easily come to harm.” Saying the words provoked an ache in Brenna’s throat, an ache where tears ought to be and never had been.

“Go to bed,” Milly said, kissing her cheek and enveloping her in a brief hug. “Things always look better in the morning. We’ll sew Sebastian a fine kilt and make a laird of the Western Isles of him.”

Things did not always look better in the morning. Sometimes, for years, things looked just as bad in the morning as they had the night before. Sometimes they looked worse, because sleep had been interrupted by an unwelcome visitor or bad memories.

Brenna resisted the inexplicable urge to hug Milly back desperately tight, and took herself off to prepare for battle with her husband.

Because the night was mild by Highland standards, she did not bother lighting the fire, but tended to her ablutions and then climbed into bed to await her spouse. He arrived quietly less than thirty minutes later, while Brenna feigned sleep and kept her face toward the wall.

The mattress dipped, the sound of two male feet rubbing together whispered in the darkness, and then Michael raised the blankets and climbed in beside her.

“You’re not asleep, Brenna Maureen. If you’re too upset to talk, we can have our discussion in the morning.”

He was brave, and he was braced for a fight.

“I do not want to argue with you in this bed.” She did not want to argue with him at all, but argue, she must.

“Not argue, discuss. We’re getting better at sorting things out together, you’ll recall. Maeve’s situation requires sorting out.” His tone made it plain that Brenna’s reaction to Maeve’s situation was what he intended to sort out.

And yet, beneath the covers, Michael’s hand sought Brenna’s. He linked their fingers, even as Brenna lay with her back to him.

“She cannot be kept safe here,” Brenna said. “If any harm befell that child, I would never forgive myself.” Michael wrapped himself around her, and while Brenna tried to find some resentment for his presumption, all she located was relief.

“She was picking flowers, Brenna, and teasing the cat. This hardly qualifies as courting disaster.”

Maeve had been picking flowers in the walled garden, a place Brenna avoided for the memories it held.

“She can pick flowers in Ireland. For all we knew, she might have gone down to the village or wandered to the river.”

“The river is about two feet deep in most places this time of year. I’ll teach the child to swim if that will ease your worries.”

Nothing would ease her worries. She turned so she faced Michael in the gloom. “You can’t teach her not to wander off, not to be curious. She has a solitary nature, and you can’t teach that out of her.”

“We’ll hire a governess.”

Brenna had had a governess, and even governesses had half days, and retired to their own chambers at night. “That’s an unnecessary expense.”

“We can afford it. The yearlings were prime horseflesh, and I’ve some funds too, you know.”

Brenna did not allow that shiny lure to distract her. “We’ll spend the yearling money entertaining the shire Friday next.”

Michael pulled her into his arms, where Brenna fit with an ease only recently gained.

“What is this about, Brenna? Will you deny us our marital pleasures because any child you bear might someday come to harm? Children do, you know. This one will fall from a pony. That one will come down with measles.”

Brenna was worried about measles and broken bones, but she was terrified of Angus. In her husband’s arms, the ramifications of Angus’s continued presence at the castle spread through her like symptoms of influenza.

Neither her daughters nor her sons would be safe. No tutors, governesses, or nannies would be vigilant enough, because the compulsion that drove Angus never slept, never paused in its desire for gratification.

And yet, she could not allow that beast to be unloosed on some unsuspecting community on the coast or farther away, where she’d be powerless to protect anybody.

Michael dipped his head to nuzzle her cheek. “Brenna, are you crying?”

“I am tired.” Weary unto death of coping, of managing, of holding inside fear and fatigue as well as a rage that would commit murder did she allow it to. “I am so tired.”

He gathered her closer. “Rest. We’ll talk more.”

“The child must leave, Michael.”

And thus did Angus win, again. Any dream Brenna had harbored of a happy married life dissipated in the darkness, because she would choose the safety of children she’d never meet above that dream.

How she would deny herself and her husband the pleasures they’d found in their marriage she did not know, but deny them, she must.

“Two governesses, then, and a nursery maid,” Michael murmured. “She shall be as a princess, never alone, wrapped in cotton wool every waking hour. Go to sleep.”

As Michael’s breathing became regular, and the scent of vetiver wafted through Brenna’s senses, a thought stole through her rage and sorrow—a radical, frightening, powerful thought.

What would keep the children safe, all the children, was the truth.

About Angus.

About Angus and Brenna.

If Michael believed her, then the truth would effectively hobble Angus, assuming Michael allowed his uncle to live.

If Michael did not believe her, then her marriage was over.

As it would be, quite possibly, if he did.

Fourteen

“The post is full of letters from afar,” Michael observed over a mug of summer ale.

The posting inn was the heart of the village, both geographically and otherwise, and a dozen people were scattered about the common, sipping their pints and waiting to see if any of the letters Martin Dingle sorted were for them.

“Post is usually from all over—it being the post,” Dingle muttered, making two tidy stacks of about a dozen epistles each.

“Let’s see who’s been mindful of their correspondence,” Michael said, scooping up the nearer pile.

By interfering with His Majesty’s mail, Michael was arguably committing a felony. By interfering with
Michael
, Dingle could provoke a confrontation that would split the room—and the village—asunder and require direct opposition to the laird whom the shire had waited years to see returned home.

“Here’s one for you, Goodie MacCray,” Michael said, holding a thin missive up to the window as if he might see the contents the way a candled egg revealed what lay within the shell. “Maybe you’ll let us know how your boys are doing?”

He wasn’t about to bring the letter to her. The blasted woman could walk eight paces to hear how her family fared. She pushed to her feet, tugged a plain wool shawl about thin shoulders, and snatched the letter from Michael’s hand with her thumb and forefinger.

“How are they, Goodie? Are they starving on the streets of Aberdeen? Are they so hungry their wives are doing the unthinkable to keep them in neeps and tatties?”

His tone was light, while the room had gone silent as a tomb.

Michael’s people were a canny lot, and clearly, the laird was in a mood.

“They prosper,” Goodie said. “Eagan has a farm, and he and Meg are expecting another little one this fall.”

“Delighted to hear it.” He swiped another letter off the counter. “And here’s a thick packet for you, Mairead. Maybe it includes a bank draft?”

He subjected it to the same scrutiny, holding it up to the light, shaking it, drawing as much attention to the letter as if he were a magician preparing to perform sleight of hand for his rapt audience.

Mairead rose, slowly, her gaze glued to the epistle in Michael’s hand. Whatever was within, she needed it badly.

And that was fine, because she had something Michael needed badly too.

“How fare your sons, Mairead? I’ve been meaning to ask.” He tapped the letter against his palm, the way a headmaster might tap his birch cane before administering discipline to a miscreant.

“They’re in Pennsylvania.”

“Pennsylvania? Not the wilds of Illinois? The woods of Kentucky? How are they managing in Pennsylvania?”

A masculine voice came from the door. “They’re managing wonderfully.” Hugh MacLogan came striding into the common, kilt flapping. “Dingle, pull a man a pint, if you please. Mairead’s boys are both married, and they’re farming not far from my brothers. If we get to exporting beef, we expect they’ll sell some for us.”

“So our crofters’ sons are now contemplating international trade? How things have changed while I was off larking about in service to the King.”

For good measure, Michael passed out three more letters, and all the while Hugh sipped his ale and watched from the snug. By the fifth letter, little old Vera MacDonald had caught on.

“My granddaughters are all married and raising their bairns in Boston,” Vera said as she hobbled up to get her letter. “Wee Sara can draw anything, and she sends me the sketches of each child. It’s not the same though,” she said, jutting her chin in Michael’s direction. “It’s not the same as seeing them, hugging them, hearing their prayers each night.”