No Other Woman (No Other Series) (13 page)

"Get this one up and moving, there, man! There's work to be done on the sails."

He jumped as he was viciously kicked in the ribs. Despite the pain that continued to wrack his head, he managed to leap up to a squatting position.

Sunlight filled his eyes, nearly blinding him. He realized that he was naked and filthy. And indeed, he was upon the water, on a large ship. Seamen surrounded him, doing the bidding of a peg-legged man who stared down at him now with contempt.

"Get this murdering, ragged-ass bastard up and about!" the peg-leg shouted. He had an accent. A strange accent.

David tried to stand, tottered, nearly fell. He saw that he had been lying on a pallet. He staggered to his feet once again, in agony, but was ready to leap for the throat of the peg-leg. "Do you know whom you address?" David demanded in a rage.

"Aye, you jackanapes! You're going to live you sorry bastard, but 'tis my belief you should have met with the •hangman in Glasgow."

"The hangman?"

"For murderin' that poor wee lass."

"Murder...?"

He did leap at the peg-leg. The man shouted, choking. In seconds, half a dozen brawny seaman were atop David. He fought them off; had no strength. He fell back to his knees, a wave of nausea and dizziness sweeping over him again. The peg-leg had remarkable balance and struck David with his wooden limb, knocking him to the deck. David barely felt the pain. What were they talking about? What had happened after he had been knocked out in the stables? He could remember nothing but the smell of fire. Had someone come and done harm to Shawna? "Murder!" he cried, pushing back to his knees. "If she's dead—"

"Aye, the wee lass is dead, you cut her throat on a drunken binge on a cold Glasgow night, my man, and in my care, I bloody well swear that you'll pay for it!"

"Glasgow!"

"So drunk he canna remember his own crime!" Peg-leg muttered with disgust. "Mr. Phipps!" he cried to one of his men. "Take the bastard back to the hold for the next few days; he's been in a fever too long to be much good to us yet. But mark me, Mr. MacDonald, I'll wring flesh and blood from you yet, I will."

"MacDonald!" David roared. "I am not a MacDonald. I am David Douglas of Craig Rock, heir to the laird!"

Snickering from the seamen who had gathered round him greeted his words.

"Get the bastard below!" the peg-legged captain shouted with disgust.

"Have me touched again, you pathetic piece of pig sty, and I'll murder you, I swear it!" David promised.

Peg-leg seemed to take the threat to heart. "Shackle him, wrists and ankles!" Peg-leg commanded.

The first man came toward David. David managed to deal him a telling blow to the left jaw. He spun in time to catch the man to his right with an elbow jab to the ribs. He kicked the one before him, slammed the one in the rear with both fists.

But there were four more to fall atop him. He was shackled, and a solid blow with a fisherman's sinker sent him spinning back into oblivion once again.

He came to stretched out upon dirty, molding straw. A stench surrounded him. He had been wrapped in the remnants of a blanket. A small, ragged little man with sharp features and huge eyes was attempting to spoon some kind of tasteless gruel between his lips. David coughed, sputtered, and managed to lift a hand to stop the man.

"Water," he croaked.

The little man provided it, watching him anxiously. He drank, forcing himself to be careful. His voice remained a sorry croak as he asked, "What manner of ship is this? Into what pit of hell have I fallen."

"A sorry pit, indeed," the little fellow said. "You're on the convict ship.
Revenge,
bound for labor in Australia, mate."

"Sweet Jesu, heads will roll for this! I am the heir to Laird Douglas of Craig Rock!"

The little man was still. In a fury, David knocked the bowl of gruel from the very hands that had tried to help him. "Why will no one believe me, man?"

"The Douglas heir was killed in a fire a good two weeks ago now."

"What? The fire was two weeks ago—"

"The laird's son is dead and buried, MacDonald, and most men aboard think it's blasphemy that you, the murderer of a young woman, dare to use his name."

"What young woman was murdered? Shawna of Craig Rock?"

The man shook his head in confusion. "Nay, MacDonald! The serving wench you met in Oarmsby Tavern!"

"I met no serving wench, and I haven't been to Glasgow in years! If we can but turn this ship around, I can prove—"

"Sh! Sh!" the little monkey of a man warned him. "Some think as how that fever you suffered has you daft now, man, believing you're a laird and able to put on airs and all. But the captain, he's a fierce man, and he says that from now on, every time as how you start claimin' to be a Douglas, you're to receive twenty lashes with a cat-o'-nine-tails."

"I am David Douglas!" he roared.

There was a bursting sound as the swinging door to the hold was thrown open. Peg-leg maneuvered down the ladder, wrinkling his nose at the stench of the hold. He was followed by a number of his seaman, one of them the nasty-looking fellow David had previously struck in the jaw.

The seaman's face was still swollen. David had probably cost the fellow a number of teeth.

"MacDonald, I'll have no more of your mad cries on board my ship!" Peg-leg roared. "See to him, men."

Again, David fought. In the end, he was too weak to face so many men. He found himself dragged up, still naked, bound to the center post in the hold.

And the threat of the twenty lashes with the cat-o'-ninetails was carried out. The man with the swollen face was to carry out the punishment, but even he paused, voicing a protest to Peg-leg. " 'E's half-dead, now, Cap'n. Twenty lashes will kill him."

"He stands tall as an oak and he's muscled like a fighter. He used that strength against the innocent. God will judge him. If he dies, so be it, but I'll watch each strike—he's a fine one for work in Sydney, and worth more to me alive than dead. Carry on."

Each lash bit cruelly into David's flesh. In his weakened state, the pain was unbearable. He blacked out before it was over.

He came to with the little man by his side, staring at him sorrowfully. "Your name is Collum MacDonald," the little man warned. "Ach, sir! Be you the laird's issue in truth, you'd best forget it for now. Captain Barnes will kill you like as not if you give him more reason! Work the sails, scrub the decks as he commands you. Live to tell your story where someone might care to hear it!"

"I am David Douglas, eldest son and heir to the laird of Castle Rock, Craig Rock, the Highlands," David insisted.

"Fine, man, and I'll believe you. But if you've a mind for livin', answer to the name 'MacDonald,' sir. And try to eat this broth. Something's got to keep you going. They'll be draggin' you up to work, soon enough."

David stared at the little man and frowned.

"Who the bloody hell are you and why do you care, man?"

The jackanapes smiled. "Once upon a time, I was Dr. James McGregor of High Street, Glasgow. But that was before a great man's mistress chose to abort his child, then come for my help. She died as I tried to staunch the flow of blood pouring from her womb. The great man let the courts convict me, but the mercy of a judge sent me aboard this ship rather than straight to the hangman. Now, sir, they'd not believe my story, and they'll not believe yours."

"Doctor," he mused.

"They call me murderer now."

David stared at the little man, and at last saw the wisdom in his words.

"I am MacDonald, eh?"

"Aye, that I beg of you."

David shrugged. "Not a bad clan as clans go. Even good families must throw out a bad egg now and then, eh?"

"MacDonald. A good enough name
to live by
if you'd seek to retrieve your own."

Indeed.

There was but one way for him to find justice and vengeance, and that was to survive. His rage against what had happened, against
her
and those who had conspired with her, would not help him now.

Had he been supposed to die?

But he had not perished.

Yet it did not seem that he had lived.

He had found hell on earth.

But he was going to survive it. He was going to survive it because he was going to go back. Find out who had sought to kill him, and who was buried in his stead. Discover what evil cunning and conspiracy had brought him to this pit of eternal fire.

And he was going to enter
her
life again.

And God help him...

She would have all the fury of hell to pay, and he would see to it that they were damned together.

* * *

David awoke with a start. He was no longer aboard a ship, nor was he any man's prisoner. He had found his freedom, and he was back in his room at Castle Rock.

In his own bed.

He looked quickly to the floor. She slept.

All those years...

All those years he had waited to come back, and she had been both the focus of his revenge and the spirit that plagued his sleep, for, though he longed for his revenge, he had found himself simply longing for her as well. Her scent had haunted him in the night. Memories of the satin-smooth feel of her flesh had come to him in the darkness, along with those of the soft brush of her hair against his limbs. And now...

He still longed both to hold her tenderly, and to shake her. When she had been younger, he had cared for her as an unruly, headstrong, beautiful child.

When she had grown and matured, he had desired her.

Aye, he had wanted her, therein had lain his weakness, and therein now lay his thirst for revenge.

Yet again, it was Shawna twisting his heart and senses and reason.

He rose from the bed and walked to where she slept now upon the cold stone of the castle floor. He gently picked her up and laid her upon the bed.

And because he could not help himself, he gently placed his lips against her mouth, and there tasted her sweetness with the breath of his kiss.

Fool!
he charged himself.

And he departed the room, in the same manner by which he had come.

Chapter 8

Shawna sat in the office, scrupulously going over each individual set of books kept for both estates. As far as she could tell, not a single shilling had been miscounted since the day David Douglas—or the charred corpse that had supposedly been David Douglas—had been buried.

She sighed, setting down the books, rising, stretching, looking out of the large window that was so similar to the one in her bedroom. Steps led to it, and beyond it was a stone balcony. The balconies naturally offered a fine method of defense for the castle, but to the best of her knowledge, they'd never been used so, for in the days when feudal wars had plagued the Highlands, the outer walls had stood strong against any attempted invasion.

She frowned, staring at the window, hoping it would give her some insight as to how David was coming and going from her room.

Since she had awakened the second morning after his arrival—back in the bed—three days had passed.

Tense days for her.

She continually waited for him to appear.

He did not.

Yet she knew he came at night. Very late, she thought. She would find some subtle reminder that he was near.

The first morning, she found a bunch of wildflowers lying by her pillow. The second morning, the pillow by her head was indented, and she realized that he had lain beside her the night before, leaving behind a small, beautifully wrought Celtic cross on a delicate chain, a Douglas family heirloom, she was certain. The third morning, she found a delicate silk handkerchief—along with an empty brandy glass which sat upon the old trunk at the foot of the bed.

She wondered about the gifts, half-tempted to throw them one and all in the fire.

But he had left them for her. To taunt her, perhaps. No matter, she wore the cross, kept the flowers by her pillow and the handkerchief in her pocket.

It infuriated her that she found herself so pathetically unnerved and unable to sleep—then unable to awaken when he made his irritating appearances.

He was about, somewhere during the day, she knew. She was quite certain that he was slipping in and out of the office here as well as at the stables and the mines. He could probably even come and go from Castle MacGinnis as he chose, though she had never heard of secret passages within her own family's home.

But what was he doing? What was he discovering?

She realized that although she was angered by his easy movements and although she dreaded their encounters, in which he insisted on blaming her family for the evil afoot, she was anxious to see him again.

She didn't want to long to see him.

But she did. In the most curious manner, she ached. He was in her thoughts day and night.

She heard footsteps coming hard and fast up the stairway to the second floor, and she spun away from the balcony, looking toward the office door as it was flung open. Alistair stood there, his handsome face completely free of any hint of a mischievous smile.