Passion and Plaid - Her Highland Hero (Scottish Historical Romance) (22 page)

Gavin turned to John, mouth open in disbelief.
“How did he...?”

“His goons must’ve snuck down there in all the
chaos and let him loose,” John said.

From the deck, Gavin retrieved one of the three
discarded muskets that the Company men dropped when they attacked with swords.
“He’s not getting away from me this time. Never again.”

Fumbling with the ramrod, loading the weapon took
longer for the unpracticed Scotsman than it would for someone familiar with the
gun, but he got the job done, and moments later, bent at the waist, lining the
iron sight with the middle of Alan’s body. He cocked the hammer, and waited.

The door to the captain’s chamber, where Willard
had retreated, swung open and before his foot could hit the ground, Rodrigo and
John grabbed him, each taking an arm. “Please,” he said in a defeated voice.
“I’ve made a terrible mistake.”

Gavin’s heart skipped a beat. He took a deep
breath, held it in his chest, and felt the cold steel of the musket’s trigger
push back against his finger as he began to squeeze.

“Gavin...” John’s voice was a whisper.

The gunshot split the air with a thundering crack.
Alan ducked, covering his head with his hands and looking back around wildly.
Four feet from the boat, the musket’s ball hit the water, made a little splash,
and vanished.

“You’re welcome,” Gavin said loudly. “I didn’t
have to miss.”

John let out a long sigh.

Before the sheriff could respond, Gavin turned,
and faced his friends. Willard’s face was drawn, tired, and as grey as the
clouds above them.

“I’ve...in there,” the mayor said, tilting his
head to the open door. “The key is in there.”

John and Rodrigo pushed him through the opening.
Willard stumbled and almost fell, but John caught him under the arm.

“Where is it?” Gavin demanded. “Give me the key!”

“Here. I don’t...I’m sorry. It’s in this desk, let
me get it.” Willard began to fumble with the latch on a drawer, but his hands
were trembling so much that it proved difficult.

“What are you mumbling about? Isn’t this all your
doing? Why did all this happen if not for you?” Rodrigo stuck his finger in the
mayor’s chest.

“I could blame the sheriff. I could say he tricked
me into letting him on the boat. I could make more excuses, but...”

Gavin’s attention was short. “But what, old man?
Speak up! And give me that key!”

“Here. But the key only gets you Kenna. The rest
of them are locked up, being...held...under the deck. Hearing them cry, it
broke me.”

“What are you saying? Kenna’s being kept in a
room? Where are the others?” John grabbed Willard’s collar, shaking him
violently. “Tell me!”

“I’m through with the excuses,” Willard said. “I
can’t keep doing this.”

“You’ve hurt too many people, Master Willard.”
Rollo’s voice came from the doorway. “I don’t know if these people are willing
to listen to you, and I can’t say that I blame them. Tell him where Kenna’s
being kept.”

“I...yes,” Willard said with a hand trembling on
the tabletop beside him. “Yes, of course, you’re right Rollo. I’ve fallen so
far. This whole year I’ve been slipping, but when the sheriff convinced me that
you all – that Gavin and John and the rest of you – were dangerous criminals, I
thought the only thing I could do was to keep her from you. To keep Kenna
safe.” He turned to Rollo with tears in his eyes. “She does look so much like
my daughter, does she not?”

Rollo’s eyes moved from Gavin to Rodrigo to John
and settled on Willard. “She does, yes. But you have to stop. Now. You can’t
change what you did, but you can start making it right. Give Gavin the key.”
The little man turned to Gavin. “She’s being kept in a locked chamber in the
sailor’s bunk area below deck. The others I don’t know. I was guarded, I assume
to prevent me from snooping around. I only got away when you escaped.”

“Why was he here?” Gavin asked. “The sheriff? Why
didn’t you leave him in Scotland?”

“My mind,” Willard said, he finally popped the
latch on the desk, “has not been with me. He convinced me that he had sway with
the Company men. Really his influence was just with those two brutes he paid to
act as his personal guard.”

“Aye, but
why
did you allow him here in the
first place? Is this the key?” Gavin pushed Willard’s hand away and reached
into the desk himself.

The mayor, shaken, licked his lips. “It is, yes.”
He grabbed Gavin’s hand. “Below decks, third door on your left as you go down
the stairs. Know that the same awful conditions that befell the others...the
sheriff wanted me to give him Kenna too, but I refused. I fought him at least
on that count.”

Gavin’s eyes narrowed, and he grit his teeth. “I
don’t have time for this. Rollo, come with me, show me where I’m going. And
you,” he said, turning to Willard, “take John and Rodrigo to their women.
Now.
”

––––––––

“T
his one?”

Rollo nodded. “I’ll wait out here.”

“Gavin!” Kenna cried as soon as the key slid into
the door. She didn’t know
how
she knew it was him, but she just did,
deep down inside. A half-second later, the lock groaned, and then before she
knew it, Gavin’s hands were on either side of her face, and then Gavin’s arms
were around her, and Kenna couldn’t keep herself standing out of relief, out of
happiness not only that, and out of utter, absolute joy.

“I thought I’d never see you again, not in this
life anyway,” she said as tears poured down her cheeks and he wiped them away
first with his thumbs, then with his lips.

“I’d never let that happen. You know me better
than that.” Gavin’s fingers in her hair made Kenna fill with warmth.

Tears ran down her cheeks, and when Gavin kissed
her again, Kenna’s knees almost buckled. Clutching him tight, Kenna flattened
her hands against his back, letting his heat flow through her. She kissed his
neck and breathed in the scent of his hair, of his skin.

“John and Rodrigo, are they...?”

“Aye, they’re fine,” Gavin whispered, kissing
Kenna again and then holding her face near his, drinking her in with his eyes.
“God it’s good to see you.”

Kenna searched his face, and then closed her eyes
when she was satisfied that he was really holding her, and that it wasn’t
another mirage like the ones she’d been haunted by for the past few days.

“I’m sorry, Gavin,” Kenna said. “But I canna think
of anything but the others. I’m so happy to see you that I could just die, but
can we go and make sure everyone is safe? From the things the guards were
saying, they were being treated...”

“Yes, of course we can.” Gavin brushed her hair
aside and kissing Kenna’s forehead one last time. “This way. Rollo’s outside,
he’ll take us to them.”

––––––––

“I
t’s no good,” John said, as another of his blows
glanced off the heavy door to the holdfast, where Willard said Lynne, Elena and
Olga were being held.

“Lynne?” John shouted.

A whimper.

“Lynne! I’m coming! We’re here!”

A sound like exasperation, or maybe it was excitement,
or maybe it was terror, came from below. Soon it was joined by two others.

One last kick and his heel shattered the board,
that awful barrier between the two men and their loves.

 “John!” Lynne shouted, fighting to keep back her
tears. “I thought maybe this was it. I thought...”

John took her face in his hands, then held her
tight.

“At first, I knew you’d come for me. At first I
knew that, but then the days went on and on, and we were starving, and those
men kept coming and threatening us, pretending like they were...”

“Shh, it’s okay now,” John hushed Lynne, smoothing
her hair with his hand. “I’m here. I’m here, Lynne. You’re safe.”

“This is your doing? This is what you refused to
stop? You’re lucky I’m leaving you alive,” John said over Lynne’s shoulder.

Willard shuddered, and slid down the wall into a
crouch. “I’m sorry,” he said in that distant, hollow voice. “I’m so sorry, I
let him convince me they were being cared for. I refused to believe the cries I
heard were real. I’m...I’m so sorry.”

Ignoring him completely, John turned his attention
back to Lynne, cradling her in his arms.

Three pairs of footsteps

“Mister Gavin! Kenna!” Elena said as the two
descended the stairs.

“Very good, Elena! Very good! Come on, let’s you,
Rodrigo and I go up with Lynne and John and make sure he’s healthy. We’ve a
long journey ahead of us, no matter where we go.” Olga rubbed her wrists where
they were red and raw. “If we’re going back, I certainly would like to
go...er...visit Mr. Duggan.”

Gavin smiled. “I think that can be arranged. Thank
you Olga, for everything you’ve done. I’m sure you were the calmest one of the
bunch down here.”

Rodrigo walked past Gavin with a pat on the
shoulder and a knowing smile. Elena bowed just a little, and Olga kissed Gavin
on the cheek and gave his arm a squeeze. He smiled, laughed softly, and grabbed
her in his arms, giving her a big kiss in return, and sending her giggling up
the steps.

“This is it then, aye?” Gavin said in a whisper as
he pulled Kenna to him again.

“Aye,” Kenna said, allowing herself to tremble now
that it was just she and Gavin. “God above it’s good to see you, Gavin
Macgregor. I put on a brave face. I never let the guards outside my room know
how badly I was terrified.”

The two of them laughed softly before Gavin hushed
her with a kiss. “It’s okay now. I’ve got you, and everyone is safe. It’s all
over.”

Above, John’s voice came through the boards loud
and clear. “Rodrigo! Are you sure you know how to steer this thing?”

Kenna laughed, and then Gavin started in after
her.

“How on Earth did I find you, Gavin Macgregor?”
She whispered before she kissed him on the chin. “I’m supposed to be a farm
girl in Fort Mary. Raising young ones and shearing sheep. Now here I am on the
open seas, in the hold of a ship where I was held captive. And all I can do is
think I’m the luckiest person in the world for having you here with me.”

Gavin smiled his easy, disarming half-smile. “You
can keep saying that if you want, I won’t be stopping you.”

He kissed her and she giggled. He pulled her tight
and put his hand to the back of her head, cradling him against her chest.

“But you’re wrong,” he said. “You canna be the
luckiest person in the world.”

“Oh, is that so? And why’s that?”

“Because I am, and I won’t let you say otherwise.”

Up above, the wheel of the ship groaned, and
minutes later when the turn was complete, the sails caught wind and the mast
creaked. John shouted that he thought Rodrigo was the pirate and should know
how to do all of the work. Olga said how exciting it was to have known a real
pirate, and Elena said something very loud in Spanish that Kenna thought it
probably best she not understand.

“Seems like we’re headed back,” Kenna said. “We
have to go get Duggan. I think Olga’s in love.”

“Scotland, the islands, I don’t care if we go to
India. All that matters to me is right here, in my arms. We’ll go get Duggan.
Everyone deserves to feel how I feel right now. I love you Kenna, more than you
could ever know.”

For a moment, she was silent. Then she smiled. “No,
no, Gavin. I think I love you exactly as much.”

She melted against his chest as he held her tight.
He kissed her once on the forehead, once on the nose, and then brought his lips
to hers.

“The whole world, Kenna. I’d cross the world to be
with you.”

“Aye, and I you, Gavin. Good thing we don’t have
to go that far.”

She kissed his chest, closed her eyes, and tugged
Gavin to the floor.

“Hold me,” she said. “And let me sleep. It’s been
days.”

He smoothed her hair and put his arm under her
head. Snuggling down against him, Kenna let the gentle waves thumping against
the hull of the boat, the gentle rise and fall of the ocean, lull her into a
peaceful, safe sleep.

M
ornay’s Cleft

August 27

––––––––

“T
here’s no smoke,” Kenna said. “Can you smell
that?”

Gavin pulled a huge lungful of the fresh lowland
air, smiling as the rounded scent of oak, fir and pine caressed his nose. “No
smoke,” he said, “and no noise. It feels like the town has gotten back to how
it likes to be.”

“Aye,” she said, wrapping her arm around his waist
the instant he hopped off his horse in front of Duggan’s inn. “It’s a beautiful
li’l place, no?”

“That it is, lass!” The big, red-bearded Scot
pushed open his door, stretched, and slapped his belly. “And a good welcome of
a morning to all of you! We’ve all been quite worried. Am I to understand that
the dinner at the Mayor’s wasn’t quite so peaceful and enjoyable as one might
think?”

“Oh, to tell it would take days. How about some of
those sausages?” John patted the big man on the shoulder and walked past him as
he replied that some were already cooking.

“And oats?” Lynne asked.

“Aye, of course. For a lady like you, I’d mill my
own.”

“You’re too kind, Duggan. But we’re famished, so I
wouldna argue with you on that count.”

Disappearing into the inn, John and Lynne let
their hands bump against one another’s and John grabbed hers, lifting it to his
lips.

“They’re a good pair, aye?” Gavin said, turning to
Kenna as her hair glittered in the morning sun. “I’m glad he found her. John’s
never been one to be...ach, at any rate, she’s good for him.”

Rodrigo slid off his horse slower than any of the
others.

“What’s wrong wi’ you?” Duggan said, helping
Rodrigo off his steed. “Caught a crick?”

“No, no, I took an elbow in the back. Very painful.”

“Rodrigo, you are such a lying!” Elena pushed her
husband through the door, cursing him in Spanish. She turned back when he was
within and said, “He slept wrong the night last and twisting himself when he
woke today. Gets old, won’t admit it!”

Duggan laughed so hard his belly shook. “Happens
to all of us, dear. Every single one. Go get him something to eat, and if you
want, I keep a cauldron of hot water boiling most o’ the day, so he can have a
bath if he thinks it’ll help.”

With her standard courtesy, Elena gave a little
curtsey and followed her grumbling Rodrigo inside.

“Ach! And there’s a face I hoped wasna gone
forever!”

As soon as he saw Olga, Duggan’s red face turned
an even brighter shade. He threw her arms around her, kissed her twice, and put
such a crimson in her cheeks that Kenna couldn’t help but giggle.

“Oh! You fresh, fresh innkeeper! With your big
scratchy beard and your...well I do suppose your eyes have something of a
twinkle.” She smiled at him with open, unbound joy. Her round cheeks absolutely
glowed no matter what sort of protest she put up.

Twining his thick fingers in Olga’s hair, Duggan
stared at her for a moment longer. “It’s good – it’s so good to see you. I was
afraid that...I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’ve not had such a fine time with
anyone lately as I do you. When you vanished, I...”

“Oh, calm down there, Duggan with your red beard.
It was a frightening thing, yes, but thinking about you kept me from worry. I
knew I’d see you again.”

“You...did?” The big man blushed all over again,
that time even his forehead turned pink. “Well, would you like something to
eat? I think...ach, I’m not doing much of a job of hiding it. I missed you damn
it! Come on, I’ll make you breakfast.”

With a hand on her back, Duggan led Olga to the
door and opened it for her.

“Wait,” a raspy voice said as boots hit the dirt
and walked slowly forward. “Duggan, wait.”

“Mayor? Mayor Willard? Why are you...?” Duggan’s
eyes settled on the ropes on Willard’s wrists for a moment, and he whispered to
Olga to go inside.

“No,” Willard cut in. “Go get the rest of them.
Please.”

John was the first to return. “He’s been quiet for
four days. Must have a lot bottled up. I’m interested to see what he’s got to
say for himself after all he’s done. What sort of excuses might he have for his
behavior. That’s why we’re here, I expect? To hear his excuses?”

Descending the steps deliberately, Rollo’s face
was somber. “I hope he doesn’t take long. The ships usually leave Edinburgh for
Tunisia tomorrow, and I’ll need to catch one unless I’m hoping to stay for
another month.”

“Oh Rollo, I wish you would reconsider. Come to
Fort Mary with us,” Kenna said as she grabbed his hand. “There are plenty of
places there you’d be welcome.”

“No, I think delusion is what has kept me here so
long. I don’t belong. By going along with...
him
...I allowed myself to
become sullied with his cruelty. I see that now.”

“Rollo, you’re a good man,” Kenna said. “I hate to
see you torture yourself for things that weren’t your fault.”

“Can you cut this? I won’t be running anywhere,
I’m a bit tired for that,” Willard said, turning to Gavin.

The look Gavin returned was one of disbelief. He
crinkled eyes in a squint and looked to Kenna, who nodded. “Aye, cut him
loose,” she said.

As the ropes fell away, Willard rubbed his wrists
and looked from person to person, making sure to catch each of them in the eye.
Duggan cleared his throat.

“I stand before you all a man shamed. I am shamed
by my own weakness, and my unwillingness to keep to what I know to be right. As
John said, I’ve been silent since what happened on the boat. I’ve been
thinking, and trying to come up with some way to explain myself to all of you.”

“He expects forgiveness? He was going to force
Kenna to wed! He would have had us all enslaved! And you all
listen
to
this?” John spat. “I’m finished. I’m finished with him and this whole damn fool
game.”

“John,” Lynne said in a short voice. “You’ll
listen and then you’ll decide. This is no time for hot headedness. Kenna, Olga,
Elena and I were his prisoners too, and you don’t see any of us frothing at the
mouth. But I agree, he had better have quite an explanation for this.”

Willard licked his lips, which trembled slightly.
“I deserve this. I know I do, and I’m not just saying so to get sympathy. To
answer directly, no, I do not expect forgiveness, especially not after I
visited my wrath upon two villages when it should have been upon only four
men.”

John clicked his tongue against his teeth, but
remained silent.

“My daughter, Sara, she...” Willard’s voice
hitched in his throat. “Kenna, you remind me of her. You both have the same
eyes. Hers were green, but you both have a way of looking that goes through a
person. Do you know what Sara always told me?”

Kenna shook her head.

“This is coming from a girl who was hardly twenty
when she was...taken. Whenever I made a rash decision, or did something that
benefitted only myself at the expense of the towns, she looked at me with the
crossest expression and said ‘Father, you’re a better man than to do this’, and
she was always right. She was my conscience, and when she was gone, it broke
me.”

Rollo stepped forward, reaching for Willard, but
the mayor held him off with a shake of his hands.

“I turned my back on everything, on everyone who
cared for me. I allowed myself to become bitter, to start seeing the people in
these two towns – I let myself think of my
friends
– as monsters. I went
from being someone who never spoke a harsh word to someone who called Rollo, my
best friend for the past ten years, a hunch-backed cripple. Those words aren’t
mine. That tongue isn’t one that I want. It would disappoint her; disappoint
Sara, to hear me say things like that.”

“How are we to know you’ve not just spent the last
few days figuring out the best way to weasel out of what you’ve done?” John
asked. “Is it not convenient that you say this? That you say it now?”

“I...am a man of the Crown, am I not?”

“Aye, that you are,” John said.

“Legally, do you think anything would happen if
you took me to court? I’m the mayor of these two towns. I administer them, I
run them. I was appointed by King George to do this.”

John sat silent.

“I don’t mean this as a taunt. My point is that if
I wanted, I could continue to do what has made me richer than I’ve ever been. I
could keep selling the woods to the Company, make a fortune and move across the
ocean at my whim. If I wanted, I could have the lot of you arrested, and
probably Duggan, Lachlan and Egan as well for being privy to a conspiracy and
not having spoken up.”

“You say that like a conqueror, mayor! You speak
like someone who rules us, not as someone who lives with us.” Duggan stepped
forward, a bit red in the face. “This isn’t the Willard I knew for a decade.”

“No, it isn’t, and that’s exactly what...what I’m
trying to say. We are conquerors here. We English, we’ve taken up the idea that
we’re for some reason better than all of you. Men like Ramsay Macdonald, and
Sheriff Alan, they believe it true. Macdonald believes so fully that the Scots
are inferior that he pretends to not be one. And that’s what I became. Do you
see, Duggan?”

“Aye,” Duggan said as he scratched his beard. “But
this dinna explain anything. You were ready to run us all into the ground, and
I – forgive me, Councillor, I’m speaking out of turn.”

“No, you’re not, friend. And that’s what you are
to me, Duggan, though I’ve forgotten it of late. You’re right. I was doing
those things. When I lost Sara, I flew into a rage. If you’ll recall, I refused
to leave my estate for a fortnight, and then when I finally emerged, it was in
the black cloak that is even still in the back of the carriage from whence I
came. Will you indulge my telling a story?”

John opened his mouth but Gavin silenced him with
a hand on his shoulder.

“For my part,” he said, “I would never forgive
you. I would never have let you speak. You tried to kill my friend, you tried
to steal my fiancée, and it’s only thanks to her that you’re not dead right
now.”

Willard nodded. “Yes, I know. For nine years, I
fought a war within myself. I came here with the advantage of being born to an
old family, and being born in England. When the Crown began to install mayors
like myself, I was on a short list that included people like Christopher
Fellworth, the man who runs the next county over. In fact, we went to Eton
together. Within months of his being given the reigns, he’d put in a terrible
tax, and begun to force the people to work on his estate to pay off what they
could not from their harvests.”

“That sounds familiar,” John said under his
breath.

“Yes – as well it should,” Willard continued.
“Over the years, I watched his estate grow and grow. He had a mansion so large
that he had not seen half the rooms in it, if he was to be believed. An army of
servants catered to him. Do you know who those servants were?”

“Aye,” Duggan said. “One of ‘em was my daughter’s
husband.”

The mayor nodded. “Yes. He was one of hundreds of
people forced to work as slaves.”

“This is despicable,” Gavin said. “He should be
tried!”

“He should, but he isn’t. Nor will he be.
Despicable yes, illegal no. Remember, we
are
conquerors, no matter what
anyone says. But as the years went on, his wealth grew. He was able to buy one
of his sons a Governorship in some far-flung colony, and get his daughter into
a marriage with one of the finest families on the Continent.”

Duggan’s eyes had begun to spark with realization.
“All the while you were...”

“Yes, exactly,” Willard said. “I labored day and
night to do whatever I could for these two towns, not because it was my job,
but because people like Duggan and Lachlan and even Egan I suppose, were my
friends. And whenever I started to think of them as something else, my Sara
wouldn’t allow it.”

“But then,” Kenna said, “why...why would you force
me to marry you? Just like Macdonald had done.”

Willard shook his head, then held it in his hands.
“I’m...sorry. When my daughter died, my rock was gone. I was adrift and allowed
all of the thoughts that she kept at bay, I let them run free. Fellworth
visited me a week after I found out about her, and he told me ‘Steven, your
problem is that you treat these Scots like they’re people. And look what it got
you. Shabby clothes and a dead daughter.’ And I’ll never forget those words
exactly as he spoke them. Shabby clothes and a dead daughter.”

He rubbed his eyes, and then looked at the ground
before raising his gaze to Kenna. “That’s why. I saw her in you, and I’d
allowed myself to believe that I’d been wrong all those years. That all of the
Scots were the same, just murderous savages. I couldn’t...I couldn’t let you
fall in with that.”

“You tried to keep your daughter’s memory alive by
stealing my fiancée?” Gavin squinted hard at Willard. “You realize what this
sounds like. It sounds like you’re mad.”

“And so I was. Am, probably, to some extent. It
also sounds like I’m trying to excuse what I did by blaming it on my colleague,
but I’m not. I’m only saying that what he told me at the exact time he did,
well, it allowed me to drop my guard against my own weakness.”

For a long moment, no one spoke. Willard rubbed
his wrists, and everyone else just watched him, waiting for something else to
happen.

“What was it then?” Gavin spoke softly, but in the
silence, it was loud enough. “What changed your mind?”

Willard shook his head. “As hard as this might be
to believe, it was the sheriff. When he was trundling away in that little boat.
If the situations were reversed, he would have killed you. I know he would. But
instead of getting revenge, you just let him go. At first I was incensed. After
all his lies, convincing me that lot would be treated humanely, after all he
did. You just let him go.”