Perfect Strangers (12 page)

Gabrielle gritted her teeth, stifling a half groan, half cough in the back of her stinging throat. What had Elizabeth done, sending her here? Didn't the woman know what kind of land, what kind of
people
, she was sending her faithful lady to live among? What kind of
heathens
? Oh, of course Elizabeth knew. Twice while Gabrielle was in her service she remembered the Queen traveling to the Borders in unsuccessful attempts to tame them.

The clang of metal hitting metal startled Gabrielle out of her disturbing thoughts. She tried to gasp, but couldn't. Perhaps it was the tightness of the trews, the raid, the fever, the realization of exactly how much her life had changed... Whatever the cause, she suddenly found she could not pull even the smallest of breaths into her lungs.

Her empty hands closed into white-knuckled fists at her sides, her nails creasing painfully into tender palms.

If she couldn't make herself force in a breath soon, she was going to faint. The last time she'd fainted, she landed smack in The Black Douglas's arms.

Gabrielle closed her eyes and sent up a silent prayer. Thinking of Connor now was the
last
thing she needed to quell her panic... she realized too late. His harshly carved features, inky black hair, and piercing gray eyes stabbed through her memory. The world around her seemed to recede and tilt in the background. The earth beneath her was solid, she knew, yet it felt like the planks of a ship, pitching and swaying sickeningly beneath her feet.

"Och! I dinny ken a lad's lanky body could hold so much blood!"

"Aye," Ella whispered in agreement, "yet still he fights. Methinks Gilby will end him by skewering him through the belly. What thinks ye?"

"The throat," Mairghread said with grisly enthusiasm. "Gilby will give the lad a second grin and send him to hell. It be maun quicker, albeit a good deal messier."

"Methinks it cannot get messier. Look at the blood! 'Tis all o'er. E'en Gilby is covered in it, as is the ground and—"

Gabrielle grimaced when her stomach churned, lurched, then convulsed with a heave.

Fresh air.

Aye, fresh air! Gabrielle seized on the thought. She had to get a breath of fresh air, had to get it soon. Already her vision was getting familiarly dark around the edges. Thanks to the memory of her arrival at Bracklenaer, she knew exactly what
that
meant!

Gabrielle's gaze went to the opening, past the two women huddled there, locking desperately on to the midnight sky and the icy drizzle of rain that fell from it. Did it do nothing but rain in this country?!

Her feet felt leadened as she lurched forward. Her hands were shaking almost as violently as her knees as she settled her palms atop each woman's shoulders, clenched with a strength she'd not normally have given herself credit for possessing, then parted Ella and Mairghread as though they were double doors.

The women were apparently too shocked to protest. Or Gabrielle too desperate and too intent on her goal to notice if they did.

She was only a few short feet away from filling her burning lungs with much-needed fresh air.

Gabrielle didn't burst from the narrow opening so much as stagger and explode from it. The rain pounded the top of her head, splattered her face and neck and shoulders. Its icy drops accomplished exactly what she'd meant for them to: they made her shudder and suck in a long, deep gasp of blessedly fresh night air.

Hers wasn't the only gasp.

The two men, scarcely ten feet in front of her, came to an abrupt halt. Their attention jerked in Gabrielle's direction.

The one standing had to be Gilby, for she remembered the big redhead as the man who'd brought her from the inn in Dumfrees to Bracklenaer. That meant the other one—much younger and lighter of hair and complexion—the one on whose stomach Gilby had a booted foot planted and was standing over, the one he was about to lunge the point of his sword into the chest of, must be Willie O' Nill's Tom.

Once his surprise at seeing her had worn off, and it did so with alarming swiftness, Gilby raised his sword and prepared to strike.

Later, Gabrielle would regret that she'd no time for thought or deliberation, but only one throbbing heartbeat of time in which she was forced to take immediate action.

Chapter 6

Connor bit down on the inside of his cheek until he tasted the sharp tang of blood on his tongue. He was hoping the sting of pain would distract him, stop him from laughing.

It didn't.

He shifted his thoughts, tried to concentrate on the lingering odor of smoke, on how much work it would take to rebuild the small portion of the first floor that the Maxwells had torched; luckily, the damage was minor. That plan didn't work very well, either; he could still feel a grin tugging at the muscles in his cheeks, tempting him no matter how hard he tried to suppress it. Oh, aye, he knew this was not a laughing matter. Yet things could be worse and, grave though the situation might be... well, it was comical the way Ella flailed her arms, stomped her small feet, and otherwise used her whole body to reenact the account she breathlessly narrated.

How much of what his cousin said was actual fact, Connor didn't know. Yet. Nor was there any way to discern it. Until Gilby regained consciousness, he'd only Ella and Gabrielle's version of the mishap to go by; he wasn't sure about the Sassenach, but he did know his cousin was wont to stretch the truth a wee bit if it suited her purpose.

"It all happened so
fast,
Connor! We snatched Gabrielle the way ye asked, and the three of us made it to the tunnel without mishap. E'erything seemed to be going smoothly. Until we reached the end of the tunnel. One minute, we were waiting until 'twas safe to scoot into the woods and join the others, the next..." She shook her head, sending the tight red braid swaying against the curve of her bottom. "Ye should've been there, should've seen it. 'Twas so much blood!"

"Aye, and yelling," Gabrielle added with a nod of her dark head as she watched Ella pace in front of the fire blazing in the great hall's hearth. The half dozen hounds, usually asleep at this late hour, scrambled to their feet and tipped their heads as though sensing and reacting to the young woman's agitated excitement.

"Dinny forget the swearing," Ella reminded her.

"Good heavens, how could anyone forget it?" Gabrielle replied with a shiver. "I think there was more cursing than yelling," she told Connor, "if you can believe it. Never have I heard such language before. M'lord, I blush just remembering it."

One dark brow cocked as Connor glanced at Gabrielle. In the crackling firelight, her cheeks looked flushed with excitement; his shrewd eye couldn't detect even a hint of a blush. For her first raid, he had to admit that she'd held up quite well. Admirably so. His glance volleyed between her and his cousin. "'Tis not surprising," he decreed finally. "Gilby was hurt, of course he swore. 'Tis what men do in such situations. I've been kenned to—"

"Gilby?!"
Ella and Gabrielle exclaimed in unison.

Gabrielle waved a hand, indicating that Ella should continue the story.

Ella gave a toss of her fiery red head and abruptly stopped pacing. Planting her fists on her hips, she glared at Connor as though he'd lost his mind. "Nay, Cousin, ye've got it wrong. Whilst I dinny doubt that Gilby cussed—God's truth, I dinny remember, so maun happened so fast—'twas
Mairghread
we be talking aboot."

It took a second for the full impact of what Ella said to sink in. When it did, Connor found himself grinding his teeth together in order to keep his jaw from sagging in disbelief. "Margie?"

"Aye."

"Mairghread Douglas?!"

"Aye!" they echoed.

"Who else have we been jabbering aboot?" Ella asked smugly. "'Tis what we've been trying to tell ye, Cousin.
She
be the one who did all the cursing."

"And you should have heard what she called your man's mother!" Gabrielle added. "'Tis not fit to repeat, and even if 'twere, 'tis simply not physically possible!"

Clearing his throat, Connor's narrowed gaze shifted to Ella. "After the swearing was through, what happened?"

"She attacked Gilby."

Gabrielle nodded. "Aye, jumped right on his back, she did. And clung to him like a she-cat. 'Twould have been a comical sight were the circumstances not so dire. Your man, Gilby, dropped his sword in the struggle—she had her arms wrapped around his throat and he couldn't breathe. By the time he managed to shake her off, the boy had already recovered his own sword."

"From there," Ella added with a grimace and shiver, "the situation became maun unpleasant."

"Maun
unpleasant? 'Tis possible?" Connor asked, surprised. From what he'd heard, the situation couldn't get worse. Nay, that wasn't true. The Maxwell might have been successful in stealing Gabrielle from him, that would have been a good deal worse.

"Aye," she replied gravely. A few red curls had come free of the plait, curling softly against her cheek and brow. Ella swept them behind her ear, crossed her arms over her stomach, and again began pacing in front of the hearth. The hounds whined and scooted out of her path as far as their leashes would allow. "But that isn't how Gilby got hurt."

"Nay?"

"Nay." It was Gabrielle who answered. Ella merely snorted in agreement, gave a toss of her fiery red head, and picked up her pace in front of the hearth. "His back will no doubt be sore come morning, but I don't think he was hurt when Mairghread jumped on him. The second he saw her flying toward him, he dropped his sword and put his hands up for protection. I was already outside the tunnel. Ella tried to grab your aunt and haul her back into the tunnel, but the old woman is amazingly quick. 'Tis lucky for your aunt that Gilby was unarmed by the time she reached him. Ella says he wields the blade expertly, that you and he learned to fight together, and that he's almost as good as you."

"Aye." Connor sighed and raked his fingers through his inky hair. The story was getting more convoluted by the moment. More and more he wished Gilby would regain consciousness, and regain it soon, so that he could learn precisely what had happened without female embellishments and melodramatics. "But I still dinny understand how—"

"Don't rush me, m'lord, I'm getting to that part," Gabrielle admonished saucily. "At the same time Gilby was dropping his sword and Mairghread was cussing and pouncing on him, the boy Willis Tom Something, was fumbling for his own blade and gaining his feet. 'Twas he who wounded Gilby."

Connor had suspected as much, and wondered why the devil the two women hadn't told him this in the first place. He decided it best not to quibble. If he knew nothing else about women, the Black Douglas knew that it didn't pay to rush one into telling a tale they were determined to tell at their own leisurely pace. Not, that is, unless one wanted a longer story, a story enhanced beyond credibility. "So that was when Margie was taken by the Maxwell?"

"Er, not exactly, m'lord."

"I ne'er said she was taken by the Maxwell. Did ye say so, Gabrielle?"

Gabrielle sneezed twice, sniffled loudly, and shifted her gaze to the flames snapping in the hearth as her fingers toyed with the hem of her tunic. The trews suddenly felt embarrassingly snug. So much had been happening before that she'd had no time to care about the tight fit. She had adequate time to care now. Especially when Connor Douglas's gaze gravitated to her, trailed slowly, slowly over her legs, his gray eyes darkening to a mysterious shade of midnight blue. "I-I don't think so, no," she muttered finally.

Connor gritted his teeth. Except for the ticking of a muscle in his jaw, and the way his hand closed in a fist around the arm of the chair, his demeanor remained as neutral as his voice. It wasn't easy. The sight of Gabrielle Carelton's legs, indecently encased in snug trews, had caused an odd tightness in his chest, constricting his breathing and wreaking havoc with his heart rate; the sight was an uncomfortable distraction. He forced himself to look away and focus on his cousin. "So now ye're saying she wasn't taken by the Maxwell?"

"Did I say
that?"
Ella asked.

Her tone was much too sweet and innocent for Connor's liking. It took a good portion of his self-restraint not to bound out of the chair, grab Ella by the shoulders, and shake the rest of the story out of her. Where was Mairghread? Who had taken her? Which way had they ridden off, and how long ago? He must learn these things before a rescue attempt could be launched. If only Gilby hadn't been wounded. A man would have told the story
while
they rode to the old woman's rescue, and done it in a far less dramatic fashion.