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

Chapter Four

G reer had felt many things since her mother and little sister left years ago, but nothing quite like what she felt at the moment. Her mother was here. So she wasn’t seeing things. With that relief came an arrayof emotions that made focusing difficult.

Joy, frustration, and anger filled her.

Her mother remained silent until they were alone in the gardens. Once there, she pulled Greer into her arms again and held on tight. Still stunned and not sure how to respond, Greer embraced her weakly before pulling away.

“You are upset with me,” her mother surmised. They continued strolling.

Though she didn’t think it possible, she finally found her voice.

“Why didn’t you come back or, at the very least, write to me?” Though she’d intended to sound detached, Greer sounded more sad than anything. “Why did you flee with Isabella De le Croix when you should have come home? Back to me?” She looked around as if by some miracle, her sister would appear out of thin air. “And where is dear Julianna?” She swallowed hard, envisioning the worst. “Is she all right?”

“I’m so sorry I could not write to you once I arrived in Scotland.” Mother shook her head. “We couldn’t risk your uncle knowing our whereabouts. He might have come for Julianna.” Her pained gaze lingered on Greer’s face. “All is well. Your sister is safe in Scotland with Isabella. We are all…safe.”

Scotland? Truly? Yet, that wasn’t what concerned her the most.

“What is it?” She frowned. “Why do you sound so hesitant?”

“Come.” Her mother sat on a bench and patted the space beside her. “Sit a moment so that I might tell you something.”

She went to do as asked but hesitated, suddenly feeling defiant. This wasn’t a man telling her what to do but her mother.

When would it end?

As if she recognized the mistake in her actions, her mother rephrased her wording. “Might you join me, daughter?” she asked. “I have news that you will want to hear…difficult news.”

Unsure she wanted to hear it but grateful to be asked rather than ordered, she sat and folded her hands on her lap. “What is this news?”

“’Tis about your father.” Cecille rested her hand over Greer’s. “I’m afraid I heard news about him in Scotland…”

When she trailed off, Greer released a shaky sigh. “I had hoped it was not true.” He had left without saying goodbye. Simply rode off, never to return. The last of all that was good in her world. “I had hoped the missive was wrong.”

“Missive?” Mother frowned. “What missive?”

“The one sent to Uncle Randolph.” She wondered at her mother’s confusion. “A friend of father’s wrote saying he had lost his life in an attack.”

“An attack?” Her mother’s finely arched brows pulled together. “That cannot be right, for that’s not how it went at all.” She shook her head. “What friend of father’s said such? Did they give their name?”

“A grand mystery,” Margery would have said. “Something is not adding up.”

Greer shook her head, more curious by the moment. “No, they gave no name. Why do you ask? More so, why do you seem so surprised?”

When her mother shook her head and said nothing, Greer sighed. She was never told anything of importance. Her mind being that of a simple woman, she wasn’t worth the words. More than that, many around here thought she lacked the necessary intelligence to converse. All but the Scottish children and their mother, that is. They found her quite clever and interesting.

“My brother has changed you, hasn’t he?” Mother said softly. She eyed Greer with concern, seeing what most could not. But then, once upon a time, her mother had known her quite well.

“As has that man set to marry you,” her mother continued. “My apologies, Greer, I hesitated to speak about your father because I feared spreading rumors or even getting your hopes up. But I see you are indeed a grown woman now with your own mind.” She inhaled. “Not all that long ago, I learned of your father’s passing in a Scottish seaside village. According to the kind old woman I met, he did not die in an attack, but of an illness he caught when tending to her sick husband.”

“That sounds like something father would do,” she conceded, missing him terribly. “Or at least the father I once knew.”

The corners of her mother’s mouth curled down. “You say that as though he changed?”

“He changed enough that he left without any explanation.” She bit back emotions. “I lived but a few estates over, so why not say goodbye?” Greer stood, needing some space between her mother and herself. “I do not know what to tell you about his death other than what I already divulged.”

“What do you mean you lived a few estates over?” Her mother’s brows snapped together, and she stood as well. “Why were you not living here?”

“Why do you think?” she envisioned replying hotly, trying to keep bad memories of the baron she was married to before at bay. “What would you imagine your brother would do with me in your absence? In your assumed death?”

“It no longer matters,” she said softly instead. While tempted to storm away, she was raised with better manners than that. “Father left without saying goodbye, plain and simple.”

“It does matter,” her mother insisted. “Why were you not…”

She trailed off, stunned, evidently figuring it out.

“He did not ,” her mother ground out. “Tell me my brother has not already married you off once? Not after what you had been through?”

“He knows nothing of that,” she whispered, mortified her mother brought it up. That she would dare mention old demons. Events that no longer mattered.

Her past was in the past.

“Is it, though?” Margery would say. “Because I’m not so sure of that.”

“Of course it is,” she muttered under her breath, then cursed when she realized she’d said the words aloud.

Though renewed concern flashed in her mother’s eyes, she made no mention of Greer’s comment.

Having had more than enough of this, she needed time alone. To go someplace quiet and reflect. Too many underused emotions were bubbling to the surface.

“I must go.” She curtsied, praying her mother gave no issue. “I have…” What did she have? What was she saying? “Something pressing to see to.”

“More pressing than reuniting with your long-lost mother?” Margery echoed.

Worry only pushed her mother’s brows together more, but thankfully, she nodded. “Of course, dear. We will talk again soon?”

“Yes.” She curtsied once more and did her best to walk rather than run out of there.

The moment she was around the corner and out of sight, she leaned back against the wall and breathed a sigh of relief. Why couldn’t she be stronger? Why couldn’t she just say how she felt to her mother?

“You have no right to show up out of nowhere and bring up my past when you abandoned me,” she should have voiced with heated passion and self-confidence. Not too much heat, though. There was something to be said for calm intensity. That in mind, she should have narrowed her eyes and spoken with authority because she was in control of herself, nobody else. Or so she liked to imagine despite it being the furthest thing from the truth.

A tug on her skirt brought her out of her daydream.

“Hello, there.” She smiled down at Duncan’s sister, Besse, with her golden locks.

“Hello.” Besse’s big green eyes were round as saucers. “Did ye see them? The new characters?”

She referred to Greer’s mother and those with whom she traveled.

“I did.” Greer crouched, glancing left and right as if they shared a secret and spies might be listening. She leaned close and whispered, “What do you make of them?”

“I dinnae know.” Besse slid a sly little look toward the back stairs. “But mayhap ye can tell me, aye? Mayhap spin yer magic?”

She smirked. “Are you asking me to spy on our visitors?”

Besse nodded, knowing Greer would never tell.

Enjoying being with Besse and Duncan almost as much as spending time alone, Greer pretended to think about it before she nodded. “All right, but you must be very, very quiet. Can you do that?”

The girl’s eyes lit up, and she nodded with excitement.

“Okay, then.” Greer took her hand, and they headed up until they were in one of several hallways overlooking the great hall. Crouching behind a pillared balustrade cast in shadows, they peeked through with no risk of detection. Nor, with all the bustling castle activity below, could they be heard.

Disappointment flashed in Besse’s eyes. She pouted at the men sitting in front of the fire. “Och, he isnae down there anymore.”

“Who?” But Greer knew. Edmund’s brother. The Scotsman called Teagan. Her dashing ride-off-into-the-sunset hero.

“The big warrior with the sad eyes.”

He did have sad eyes, didn’t he? Soulful, thickly-lashed, deep brown eyes that looked as haunted as she felt. How she’d wanted to stare at him when she joined everyone earlier but didn’t dare. Bartholomew was always watching and quick to jealousy. She could only imagine how he would have responded had she dared cast a glance at a younger man.

Especially one who was not only Scottish but put him to shame physically.

“Well, of course, our warrior-hero is not there right now,” she whispered, spinning her ‘magic’ as Besse and Duncan liked to call it. “For he is doing a sweep of the castle to see what his men are up against before they raid the estate and steal us away.”

“I thought that might be it.” Besse’s eyes rounded again. “Where will they take us?”

“To his castle, naturally. A place where you do not have to hide in corners anymore. Where you can speak your mind, within the realm of good manners that is, and smile and laugh in the open.”

Where some might say it cruel to give children like Besse and Duncan false hope, she knew better than anyone how important hope really was. It allowed one to get out of bed in the morn. To get through their day, then start all over the next. For poor Scottish children like Besse and her brother with nothing but a bleak future ahead, she saw no harm in it.

But then, one way or another, she was determined to get them out of here before her uncle sold them off. Because he would. He had before. It mattered naught that their mother was here because she would be sold as well. Or kept and used for free labor and other unsavory purposes.

“I have never seen a place like that.” Besse shook her head. “Do ye think his sweep is going well? That he will save us soon?”

While she knew it wrong to put such responsibility on a perfect stranger, she truly did mean to see it through herself somehow. Now that her mother was here, perhaps there might be a way. If Cecille would agree to such. For it would mean a great deal of stealth lest she risk Randolph’s considerable wrath.

“I think ’tis verra likely yer warrior-hero will save ye,” came another whisper. “And save ye soon.”

It took her a moment to realize that hadn’t been a voice in her head.

Rather, it had been the voice of the last person she expected.