Page 34 of Highlander Unraveled
But what I didn’t expect was the front door to open and Mrs. MacDonald to step outside. I squeezed myself against the wall, straightened out my legs, trying to become one with the house around me as I watched her.
She crept down the few stairs and onto the walkway, looking back and forth. When she glanced up at the house, I ducked further down, even though I knew she couldn’t see me. The blinds were turned in a way she couldn’t, no light was on in the room to show my shadow.
She headed toward her car and opened the passenger door, leaning in and riffling around. When she came out, she held a black box in her hand, maybe the size of a block of cheese. I couldn’t make out more than its shape and color. It could have been anything. Something mundane and boring, or something as wacky and spy-like as the tracker I was certain McAlister had put under her car.
With another glance around, Mrs. MacDonald ran back inside, the door closing with a near inaudible click beneath me. She didn’t want me to know she’d left. That was clear by the way she tiptoed around, and from the blaring of the television.
As soon as she was inside, McAlister climbed from his car and ran back across the street toward the house. He ducked into an alleyway around the side and out of view.
Dammit!Where was he going?
I tried to imagine what the backyard had looked like when I was out there. Was there a gate in their fence? An alleyway along the side? I couldn’t remember.
Downstairs the television kicked up a notch, but a creak on the stairs had every single hair on my body standing on end.
Had my savior from Steven turned up the television to mask the sound of her approach?
Oh shit…
Just who was Mrs. MacDonald? Did a name leap centuries? Was she my enemy? Was she one of those, time jumpers that McAlister had warned me about?
As quietly as I could, I climbed down from the window box seat and looked around the room, searching for something, anything, I could use as a weapon.
My eyes lit on a tennis racket in the corner.
Another creak, this time from outside of my room. I crept to the corner, picking up the racket. It was light, but hopefully a good swing would be all I needed to get around the old bat.
The door handle jiggled, the distinct sound rattling louder in my pounding head.
Was she going to kill me? Try to abduct me?
“Mrs. MacDonald?” Speak of the devil… McAlister’s voice floated back up the stairs.
There was a thump on the outside of my door and then the scuffle of footsteps. Groans and grunts.
“What are ye doing here?” Her voice was muffled, angry and further away as though she’d moved back to the top of the stairs.
I couldn’t hear McAlister’s reply, but seconds later there was a loud thumping sound coming from the stairs, muffled curses.
They might just kill each other.
If I’d not been scared out of my damned mind, I might have thought the idea of a fight between two elderly people to be a thing of comedy.
But I was scared, frightened for my life.
I stared at the box window. Perhaps it would be the second window I’d climbed out of today.
10
Logan
Three misery filled days had passed since I’d sent a summons to Rory and Moira.
Every night I’d spent in the glen. As soon as gloaming descended upon the Highlands, I rowed across the loch and marched up the mountainside, bursting into the stone circle as though a dragon waited there for me to slay.
And every time I whirled in a circle wanting to see Emma, or to face off with Fate, I found myself, utterly and undeniably alone.
I had long conversations with the charged air around me. Why had Fate forsaken me? What could I do to prove myself, to bring Emma back?
