Christine Dorsey - [MacQuaid 02] (2 page)

“It isn’t that easy.”

Ebenezer agreed. “You’ve passed over.”

“But it was a mistake. You said so yourself.
Your
mistake.” Her temper—another of her faults if she were honest—was upon her.

“I’m only an apprentice.”

Rachel was preparing her next argument, after all, none of this was
her
fault, when the other spirit interrupted.

“There is something we might do.” He paused just long enough to garner Rachel’s and Ebenezer’s attention. “Perhaps if she earned her way back.”

“Of course.” Ebenezer sounded relieved. But then the whiny edge returned to his thoughts. “Do you think He will agree to it?”

“We shall see. There are precedents, of course. We must speak with Him straightaway.”

Rachel felt the force of the two spirits leaving her. “Wait!” She wasn’t sure she liked this turn of events any more than she liked the ones that brought her here. “What do you mean precedents? What must I do to earn my way back?”

Off in the distance near the light she felt the spirits pause. Then the one who seemed to be in charge answered. “It’s very simple, actually. You need only save the life of a lost soul.”

“Sometimes accidents happen in life from which we have need of a little madness to extricate ourselves successfully.”

— La Rochefoucauld

Maxims

“Don’t jump, for heaven’s sake!”

The sound of another human voice would have shocked Logan MacQuaid even if the words weren’t screamed in his ear. Gravel slid beneath his moccasined feet as his body jerked. He scrambled, catching himself as he teetered precariously on the edge of the rocky summit that looked out over the gap below. His heart pounding he twisted around, catching a glimpse of silvery blue from the corner of his eye. Then something... or someone touched his arm. He recoiled instinctively and this time no amount of scrambling kept his feet from sliding over the edge.

“Shit!” Logan wrenched around, clawing at the granite, clutching at the rock face with his hands and feet, knees, anything to stop his descent. Knowing what lay below.

A sudden and painful trip to eternity. Pebbles torn loose by his thrashing rained around him, clattering down the side of the mountain. He grabbed hold of an outcrop of moss-covered rock, jolting to a stop a good rod from the top.

Sweat slicked his palms.
Pull yourself up. Pull yourself up, damnit!
Logan wasn’t sure if he said the words aloud or not. He was trying to control the panic swelling inside him. He hated the thought of having nothing beneath his feet. Nothing. The sound of his ragged breathing roared in his ears and Logan forced himself to inhale slowly. But he didn’t look down.

Around him the wind whistled, chill with the promise of winter. And he just hung there, doing his best to hug the rock, feeling his fragile hold slowly slipping away.

Then he heard the voice again.

He must be hallucinating. No one knew better than he how pain and loneliness could do that to a body. But the more he tried to ignore the shouts, the more insistent they became. Finally he had no choice but to look up. More loose pebbles skittered down the cliff when he shifted.

“Are you all right?”

Logan squinted. The sun had started its afternoon dip toward the west, the last rays glinting at him from atop the mountain. They formed an aurora of light behind what appeared to be a woman. A woman with a huge pile of white hair curled crookedly on her head. But that was ridiculous. Yet he could see her head as she leaned over the edge of the cliff. Logan blinked, squeezing his eyes shut before he allowed himself to peek again. The idea that a woman would find her way to this remote mountaintop was so absurd he was convinced she was his imagination... except she was still there. And still frantically calling to him. The same idiotic question over and over.

“Are you all right? Are you all right?”

“Hell no, I’m not all right,” Logan yelled. If she were an apparition only the solitary eagle circling overhead would hear him talking to himself. And in a few more moments, after he plummeted to his death, what in the hell did it matter anyway?

“What shall I do?” Her head disappeared a moment, then popped back into view. “I don’t know how to help you.”

Logan could swear he saw a hand reach down toward him, a hand nearly dripping with silver lace. But it didn’t come within fifteen feet of reaching him and was quickly withdrawn. He must be losing his mind. His half-brother Wolf said it would happen sooner or later if Logan kept to himself... and the drink.

Christ, he didn’t want to die like this, despite what he’d thought in the past. He had to fight this foolishness. Logan concentrated on sliding his left foot up slowly till his toes found a small niche in the rock.

“Tell me what to do.”

The voice was pleading now and taking Logan’s attention away from working his other foot into a toehold. “Get the hell away from me!” He was in a life-or-death struggle. He didn’t have time for distracting daydreams.

“I can’t.” His imagination sounded incensed. “I’ve been sent to save you.”

“Then for God’s sake get a rope.”

Then she just vanished, leaving Logan convinced he’d imagined the entire thing, as he tried to make himself loosen his grip on the slippery ledge to feel for something higher up to grab hold of. He couldn’t let panic overpower him. He couldn’t.

Sweat ran rivulets down his back. It streamed into the creases across his forehead and stung his eyes. But it didn’t keep him from noticing the rope that flopped down not two feet to his left. It was his. He recognized it as one he’d traded skins for at Seven Pines. But what was an apparition doing with his—?

“I tied it to a tree,” she yelled. “I think it’s strong enough to hold you.”

Damn, this imagination thing was getting out of hand.

“Well, aren’t you going to grab hold of it?”

Logan swallowed, the natural function painful because of the tightness of his throat. He had lost what was left of his mind. There was no woman. No rope. Except he could feel it bumping against his arm as she jiggled it.

Whomp!

It hit him again.

“What are you waiting for?”

She sounded impatient and it was all Logan could do to keep himself from laughing out loud. He glanced toward the rope, then squinted up, unable to see anything distinctly.

“What the hell.” There was no place above him to grip the side of the mountain. He might as well die hanging to a nonexistent rope. If he could only make himself let go and try. Logan clamped his teeth down on his bottom lip and tasted blood. As many times as he’d thought about death—thought about taking the extra step off the cliff necessary to end it all—this should have been easy. But it wasn’t.

The vast emptiness below him seemed to beckon, to laugh at him, a mocking laugh, a victorious laugh. And even though Logan knew it was only the wind rattling through the pines, he couldn’t make himself let go.
Concentrate on breathing. Pretend you’re simply reaching for a rope.
“No! Don’t look down. Won’t do any good to look down. Pretend you’re somewhere with solid ground beneath your feet. Anywhere. Seven Pines. Aye. You’re at Seven Pines and someone... Raff asks you to hold this rope for him and you...” Logan jerked his hand off the rock ledge and grabbed for the rope.

Twisted hemp bit into his palm as his long fingers clutched for purchase. At first relief that he defeated his paralyzing fear overshadowed his surprise that the rope was real.

It was easier to let loose his death-grip on the rock with his other hand. Now both fists clung to the rope. And though it swayed and groaned with his weight, the rope held. At least he didn’t go swinging down into oblivion.

“Climb up, can’t you?”

Damn, she was a nag, her voice sharp and edged with impatience. If he had to conjure up a female, why couldn’t she be soft-spoken? Logan took a deep breath and inched his right hand up. Then his left. Right. Left. The muscles in his arms bulged as he pulled his weight up the rope, inch by inch.

The rope hummed, taut and straining, as Rachel clasped her hands and glanced back toward where she’d tied it about the tree. It appeared to be holding, though she couldn’t be certain. Tying ropes... tying anything was not a skill where she excelled. Why even her petticoat tapes were fastened by her lady’s maid. But she’d done her best. Now why didn’t the foolish man come along? There was more than his life at stake... a lot more.

Rachel hurried toward the side of the precipice when she heard a string of mumbled curses. Then a hand appeared groping its way over the edge. She stepped back as he hauled himself straining and puffing onto the gravely ground. He lay there sprawled out at her feet, his face pressed into the dirt, his feet dangling over the cliff. She could see little of him other than he was large, garbed in buckskin, and had long, tangled black hair. And that his breathing swelled the side of his chest like a bellows.

“Are you all right?” Her question was tentative... and went unanswered. Rachel stepped closer. “Excuse me,” she began, only to have something latch on to her foot. Before she could do more than squeal in dismay her ankle was jerked and she landed hard on the ground, amid blue silver silk and petticoats. The creature bounded up pressing her down till the pebbles dug into her shoulders and plopped on top of her.

“Who are you?” His voice was a low growl, demanding in her ear, and Rachel tried to answer. But the brute had knocked the air from her lungs and his weight kept her from taking a breath. Which shouldn’t really matter since she was already dead, but for some reason it did. Rachel wriggled against his strength, tearing at his clothing with her fingers. When he shifted, she sucked in air, now breathing near as hard as he.

“You heard me, wench. What’s your name?”

He was so close she could see the tiny flecks of gold that starred from the center of his green eyes. For a moment she just stared, fascinated. But then his rough hand wrapped around her chin, and the reality of her circumstances flooded about her. With a twist of her aristocratic head, Rachel dislodged his hold.

“I,” she said in her haughtiest voice—the one she reserved for servants who dared not anticipate her every whim—“am Lady Rachel Elliott. And you will kindly remove yourself from my person.”

Her words seemed to startle him, for he blinked, and for a moment she thought he would comply with her command. But instead he settled his long body more securely on top of her, his legs sliding between hers.

“First you will tell me what demon possessed you to near kill me.”

“Kill you?” It was disgraceful the way he lay there looking at her. But Rachel refused to enter into a contest of strength with him. For one thing she would most certainly lose. For another, as uncomfortable as she was, none of this really mattered. She saved his wretched life, though by the looks of him she couldn’t understand why anyone cared that she should. She would soon be gone, back to where she belonged. “It was I who saved you from leaping into the abyss. And I assure you, t’was no demon that possessed me.”

“Mortal man then?” He pushed up on his elbows enough to glance around the clearing. “Who’s with you?”

Rachel’s eyes were focused on his taut, sun-darkened neck. “No one.” She tried to sigh—this was all becoming very tedious—but his chest was in the way. “I came alone. Now would you kindly—”

But she never was able to finish her request for before she knew what he was about there was a knife near as long as Prince William’s sword poised beside her cheek.

“Don’t be lying to me wench.”

“I am
not
lying.”

The blade inched closer. “You think I don’t know how steep the path to get up here is? How out of the way it be?”

Rachel admitted to a moment of fear. The kiss of steel along her face seemed very real. But she didn’t imagine a person died more than once, at least not two times in as many days. She looked him straight in his strange light eyes. “It matters naught what you do to me.”

“Oh?” He lifted a dark brow. “And why might that be?”

Rachel pursed her lips. Should she bother explaining herself to the brute? The slight pressure of the blade skimming her skin decided it. “I’m not... well, I’m not what I appear to be.”

He pushed further up on his elbows, giving her an insolent stare. “You appear to be a woman.”

Heated blood rushed to her face and Rachel’s lips thinned. Blushes were something she could prettily fake. They were not something caused by men garbed in animal skins. “I am not real,” she managed to say between clenched teeth. But the last word was cut off as she sucked in her breath. He’d covered the exposed curve of her breast with his free hand. His palm was rough and hot, heating her flesh.

“You feel real enough.” His fingers dipped beneath the lace-trimmed bodice.

Rachel could only sputter. Which wasn’t like her at all, she who was known for her sparkling wit and clever conversation. She who was rumored to have captured the heart of the king’s brother. “Stop it this instant,” she finally managed, but could have saved her breath. He seemed to have tired of the diversion and with a swiftness and grace she never expected pushed to his feet. His hand manacled her wrist, dragging her up with him.