Scoundrel’s Redemption (Highlander’s Pact #3)

Chapter Two

Northern England

G reer made the symbol of the cross over her chest and lowered her head in prayer when Bartholomew paused at the door of the chapel. She prayed that he would keep going. That he would not linger and make her uncomfortable as he so often did.

Unfortunately, he did linger. Even worse, he paced and cleared his throat every so often in impatience.

Biting back a sigh, she finally joined him, doing her best to muster a tepid smile.

“Did you not pray already today?” he muttered in greeting, holding out the crook of his elbow. “Walk with me, Greer.”

Not a question but an order.

While tempted to tell him she had no desire to walk with him, let alone touch him, she knew better, so took his arm and headed down the corridor. She had spent enough years under the thumb of her domineering, cruel uncle to recognize the same traits in Bartholomew. Traits that he had already exhibited several times over the past few months. So she knew it best to be compliant lest risk his considerable temper.

Older than her by nearly two decades, wrinkles fanned out from the corners of Bartholomew’s eyes. She often wondered about that because he rarely, if ever, smiled. He was, however, quite good at grimacing. With an overly long forehead and too-thin face, he had likely never been a handsome man. But he’d always been a well-titled one from a prominent family.

That, regrettably, gave him the choice of any bride he wished.

She, of course, had no say in the matter.

Sometimes she pondered what it would be like if she were in charge. If she ruled this estate and told her uncle what he could and could not do. She might have responded to Bartholomew far differently if that were the case.

When Bartholomew announced with a haughty, she-should-be-grateful look that he would take her as his wife, she would have told him quite politely that he would not. That if, and only if, she entertained the idea, he would go about things correctly. Because how one appeared meant little to her.

How they acted, on the other hand, meant a great deal.

“Oh, but you are a dreamer!” her dear friend Margery would have said.

“Am I?” she’d reply in turn. “Is it too much to ask that he might woo me? Respect me?” She would shake her head. “I’m not looking for love, I hardly believe in it, but some respect would be nice.”

Unfortunately, Margery had died years ago. Since then, she had become a comforting voice in Greer’s mind, helping her get through life. Helping her cope not only with something traumatic that had happened in her past but with the horrible men she’d dealt with since her family left. Not just her uncle and Bartholomew, but the old man she’d been married off to. Her late husband had been just as overbearing if not more so.

“Are you listening to me, Greer?” Bartholomew asked, interrupting her thoughts.

“Of course,” she lied, biting back another sigh. Quite frankly, she preferred the calm of her own thoughts to conversing with most people nowadays.

“Good, then you agree pushing our wedding up is for the best.” The lust in his gaze when he looked at her chest rather than her face matched his crude words. “For as you know, I wish to sire a son. Sooner rather than later.”

“Then look me in the eyes, you miscreant,” she envisioned saying. “And at least pretend you care what I think rather than how I look!”

Needless to say, she said no such thing.

“Of course,” she said again dutifully, lowering her head to please him. When did he want to push their betrothal up to? Panic simmered beneath the surface, but she kept it well hidden. “Whatever you think is best, my lord.”

“Good.” The red that had bubbled up in his face drained. “Less than a month from today, then.”

Less than a month? From today? To Bartholomew? Dear God, no.

He was about to say something else when a commotion outside caught their attention.

“Who is that?” He frowned out the window at three people approaching on horseback. “They seem to be creating quite a stir.”

By stir, he meant her uncle’s men coming to attention on the curtain wall and in the courtyard. She tried to see those approaching more clearly, but they were too far off.

“Stay here,” Bartholomew ordered. “I will go see to this.”

See to this as though he owned the castle, not her uncle.

She wrung her hands, mulling over what to do next.

“You know what you need to do,” Margery would have said.

She nodded. “Right, yes, stay.” Then she shook her head. “Or mayhap ’twould be better if I made sure all was well belowstairs.”

Margery would agree. “It really would be prudent, all things considered.”

All things being innocent children who could end up underfoot. More so, beneath her uncle’s wrath. That in mind, she flew down the back way, sticking to the shadows whilst watching for the little ones who, at the moment, were nowhere to be found.

In the short time it took her to get to the courtyard, her uncle’s men had intercepted the newcomers and were leading them over the drawbridge. So said the clamor of hooves on wood. Dust rained down from those getting into position on the wall walk, their arrows cocked and ready at the first sign of trouble.

“Ho there,” Bartholomew called out when they were just beyond the portcullis. While that should have earned him a disgruntled look from her uncle, he’d never risk upsetting the titled baron.

“He should, though,” she muttered under her breath, envisioning another response altogether.

“You have no right to greet guests in my castle,” her uncle should exclaim, huffing and puffing as he was wont to do, at last seeing the light of what kind of man Bartholomew really was. “What was I ever thinking, allowing you to marry my lovely niece? She is far too good for you!”

But alas, he said no such thing, nor would he ever.

“Ho there,” one of the three called back as they finally entered the courtyard, and she could see them.

She recognized the first as a distant relation to the family who visited rarely but had a prominent enough name that he was always welcome. Edmund, she believed. Handsome with dark, wavy hair and intense features, she’d always thought him rather mysterious. As though he acted one way but was someone else entirely. A spy, perhaps.

Going off her delicate frame, the second person was a woman, but she was hooded and turned away, so impossible to see.

The third figure, however, was impossible to ignore.

Had she ever seen a more striking man? With broad shoulders, thick dark blonde hair, and chiseled masculine features, she imagined he turned many a female head. All , for that matter. Even more noteworthy, however, at least to the storyteller in her, was his deceptively relaxed yet astute gaze. He might seem nonchalant, but she saw the way he took in the castle’s curtain walls, noting the location of her uncle’s men.

“Oh, but you are seeing another story unravel, are you not?” Margery would say.

“No,” she would deny, already envisioning Edmund as the secret infiltrator, here to distract her uncle and Bartholomew, whilst the warrior saved her from this awful place.

He would plunk her on his horse—plunk?—no, no, that wasn’t right. It sounded quite abrupt and perhaps a bit painful. No, he would gallantly swing her up onto his horse, and they would ride off together. She would be free at last. Gone from this place of foul deeds and wrongdoings.

Yet, no such thing happened, nor would it.

She wished she could hear what was being said, but they were too far off.

“Who are they?” came a whisper from her left. Her friend’s son, Duncan, had snuck out of the shadows and joined her. “I dinnae recognize them.”

“Shh.” She crouched and put a finger to his lips. “Lest you draw attention to yourself.” When his eyes rounded in alarm, she smiled in reassurance. “Everything will be just fine. They are not here for you and your sister.”

Or so she hoped.

The truth was, she had no idea.

She glanced back at the three travelers only to find the handsome warrior’s gaze locked on her. A strange but pleasurable warmth swept through her when their eyes met. As if they were connected in some indefinable way.

“But of course you are,” Margery would remind. “He just plunked, I mean ‘swung’ you onto his horse and rode off into the sunset with you.”

“He’s looking at ye,” Duncan whispered. “My countryman sees yer magic, aye?”

Countryman? He was Scottish? How did Duncan know that?

“Can you not see it?” Margery would say. “The wild hovering just beneath the surface?”

Where a chill might have swept through some, she felt another rush of warmth. Then again, she didn’t harbor the resentment her countrymen did toward the Scots. Rather, she commiserated with their misery. The feeling of forever being oppressed by someone who wanted to control and own you .

“Niece,” her uncle barked, jolting her to her feet.

When Uncle Randolph scowled at Duncan, she tucked him behind her skirts and nodded.

“Well, come here already, girl!” Randolph made an exasperated come-hither motion. His thin lips slanted down, and his sparsely lashed bug-eyes rounded all the more. “You have a visitor.”

“I’m not a girl anymore,” she envisioned calling back. “I’m a full-grown woman, you buffoon!”

“I am nae afraid of him,” Duncan said, even though his voice shook.

She wasn’t surprised he’d rallied his courage so quickly. He had been working on that. When he tried to step around her, she stopped him because, truthfully, he should be afraid. Very much so when it came to her uncle.

“Go.” She gestured to her uncle that she would be right there, then turned to Duncan, trying her best not to sound panicked. “You must go now . Right now, you hear?”

When his dirty little chin jutted out in defiance, she got as stern as she was willing to get. “Please. Now. For me.”

He narrowed his eyes and scowled before he finally sighed and relented. “Aye, then.”

He left as silently as he had come, used to sticking to the shadows and going unnoticed.

“Niece!” her uncle barked again, this time louder.

“Enough, Randolph,” the woman exclaimed. “Her name is Greer.”

She froze at the sound of the voice. One she hadn’t heard in far too long. Thought she never would again. Yet when the woman pulled off her hood and looked her way, the truth was clear as day.

“’Tis your dear mother,” Margery would have exclaimed, a smile in her voice. “She has arisen from the dead! How absolutely wonderful!”

No, not wonderful.

Impossible.

She shook her head, not sure she saw correctly. “It cannot be. ”

Should not be.

For that meant but one thing.

What some had long whispered about Greer was actually true.