Page 28 of The Highlander's Captured Bride
“Sadly, yes,” Violet said as they entered the hilly pass to MacFerson’s lands. “I ken this was nae what ye would have like to hear, but it’s the truth.”
She left him to mull over the unpleasant truths until they made it to the stables and he helped her off the horse. He did not drop his hands from her hips though—and again, her hope mounted—but he sighed.
“I ken that was nay easy for ye to tell me that, but is it wrong for me to say that I hope we dinnae have to face that situation.”
“I dinnae want it either, but it is what we might have to look into,” she said, slightly regretting that she had the well of experience to draw from.
He stepped away and slid his hand to the back of his neck. His face was downcast and troubled. When he did look at her, she hid her reaction to his grimace and tried to prod a smile from him. “Thank ye, though, I loved today. Ye gave me another good memory to contrast the bad ones.”
His lips curled. “Ye’re welcome. Go ahead, I’ll have to get these horses cleaned up and fed. I’ll join ye soon.”
Knowing that she would not see him as quickly as she would like, she still nodded. “Take care, Ethan, and try to nay worry about too much.”
His soft sigh told her he wouldn’t.
12
It felt like bricks made of compacted worry were being stacked on top of his chest, and they grew heavier and heavier with every day that passed by. His worry for not finding the woman was alleviated somewhat, but now that they might have to consider a third culprit might be involved in his brother’s murder, it was just that more troubling.
He was brushing down the second horse when his strength just failed, and he had to sit down. It was either that or crumble to the ground. The brush dangled in his hand as he stared at the floor scattered with straw. Bleakly, he counted his worries that sat atop his numbly throbbing sorrow for his brother.
He had to take on the lairdship, they had to find the O’Bachnon woman, then, hopefully, get a lead on the murderer and even consider a third party. His free hand rubbed his forehead. Almost as troubling—or possibly most troubling—were his feelings for Violet.
She had a heart and mind that fascinated him and bravery that stunned him. She was not like the rest of the women he’d known, and he was beginning to leave his reservations about her being different and getting to welcome it. If she had not been that way, so canny and resilient, they would have never found the keystone to this mystery.
Her body, slender with gentle curves in all the right places, had him clenching his eyes tight but that only made her image grow in sharper focus. Violet’s sparkling eyes were bright, and her smile was even brighter. When she had gazed on the druidic shrine, her lips had parted and to his shame, his eyes had dipped to her lips. Bitten and pink with that plumpness in her bottom lip that was so deeply distracting. He hated himself for even considering what it would feel to kiss her.
The reasons he had made himself consider many nights ago sprang up again—she was too young, she was innocent, she did not know this type of Highland life, and lastly, when they solved this case, she would be leaving— but the desire lingered.
A scrape from the door had him looking up and he saw a stable boy enter. He jerked to a stop and stammered, “M-Master MacFerson, I d-dinnae ken ye were here. Can I help ye with something?”
Standing, he handed the brush over to him, “Aye, finish brushing him down and get him some food. Thank ye.”
Heading off to the castle, he blinked when he realized it was deep in the evening. Had he spent all that time in stable castigating himself about Violet and juggling his worries as if they were balls? Entering the castle, he headed towards the kitchens then stopped. There was not even a twinge of hunger in his body, and with regret, turned back to the upper room.
The need to speak to his father was gnawing at him. The door to his father’s meeting room was cracked open, and after a brisk knock, he went in. His father was at his desk, sorting through sheets of paper on his desk. His face was expressionless and stoic like a slate of chiseled rock.
“Faither, may I speak with ye?”
His father shoved the papers away and gestured for him to come and sit in one of the two chairs before his desk. “Whatever ye have to say would be much better than what I’m reading. What is it, son?”
“We might have to consider that there might be another party concerning F-Finley’s murder.” His voice had nearly hitched at his brother’s name. “We still dinnae ken what happened between when the woman took him out the tavern and finding him dead. Yes, someone did kill him but we dinnae ken what the women really did. We dinnae ken if she had carried the sleeping draught for that purpose, or could it be that she had only had, er, relations with Finley and left, leaving someone else to give him the draught and frame her for it. Until we find her and get what she kens, there might be another party involved.”
The tight-knit of his father’s face had him grimacing too. Pinned under his father’s gaze, he was asked, “And was it ye or Miss O’Cain that came to this conclusion, eh?”
“Honestly, Faither, it was Miss O’Cain,” Ethan confessed. “We spoke about it on the way back from the loch.”
“Wise young lady, that one.” The Laird nodded before releasing a low breath. “And she’s right, until we find this woman and get her story, we dae have to ken a person or even more,people, would be involved.”
But who would want to kill Finley?That was the unspoken question. He and his father sat in thick, uneasy silence until his father broke it. “I dae hope Mister O’Cain found something that would—”
And as if summoned, the investigator appeared at their door. His coat was off, but he was plucking a hat off his head and asked, “May I, me Laird?”
“Please,” his father said and the light of hope that sprung to his father’s eyes, mirrored the one inside him. Sitting up in his chair, Ethan felt his fingers clutching on the arms of the seat. His gut was clenching and releasing with the heavy expectation that the investigation had found something.
The moment Mister O’Cain let out a breath, his expectation plummeted. “I went to Perth searching for this Gavina O’Bachnon, and aye, some people kent who she was, but the last time someone had seen her, had been three years ago.”
“That’s the same time her brother told me her husband had died,” Ethan said. His eyes shifted between Mister O’Cain and his father. “Perhaps she left? But if she met me brother that night, she had to be somewhere near.”
