Ravished By The Iron Highlander (Steamy Scottish Historical Romance) Read online

  He laid his palm on her forehead, hoping she was not running a fever. Her skin was cool and he was satisfied she was not ill. She was shifting under his touch and he sensed she was waking up, “Miss Dellendine, I must imagine yer hungry.”

  She laughed. “If you want to be alone with her, Mr. Goreidh, you need only ask.”

  Giving her an apologetic look, his attention was captured by Isabella’s eyes flitting open. Miss Dellendine stood and fixed her skirt. She bent over and kissed her niece’s forehead, “Get well, Isabella.”

  As they left, he managed to catch Miss Polver’s cool gaze and for the umpteenth time, wondered why she was so aloof. He turned his attention back to Isabella and fondly caressed her face, “How are ye feeling?”

  “Tired,” she shifted her head to the side but the edges of her lips curved. “I think the tea the healers give me is working but it makes me so tired.”

  “That’s why they call them healers, sweetling,” he said while reaching to help her sit and brace her back on the headboard. “I’m here to help ye eat.”

  She reached for the bowl and he stopped her. “Let me.”

  Carefully, he fed her the broth while she broke the bread and ate it without help. Then she dropped her hands, “Duncan, I still think the dream means something. I don’t put much stock in prophetic dreams but…it felt too real to not mean something.”

  He placed the bowl on the table and reached over to brush his knuckles over her cheek. “Were you worryin’ about him?”

  Golden eyes dipped and her lips went tight, “On and off. He…never really left my mind.”

  Rising from his seat, he slid into the bed near her and cradled her close. “I promise ye, love, ye’ll be safe here.” She still did not look comforted and he asked. “What can I do to take that doubtful look in yer eyes away?”

  Her face went tight, lines appeared in her forehead and her jaw went stiff. Then, in a sudden turn, her face dropped and her voice was a whisper, “Don’t die.”

  He stayed there until she drifted asleep on his chest and tenderly, he extricated himself from the bed while laying her down gently, kissing her cheek. He got to the great hall just as supper was ending and managed to get a servant to get him his meal while sending a guard to stand at Isabella’s door.

  A platter of cold roasted beef, bread and broth was served to him and while he was eating, a commotion had him looking up and running from the room. He made it in time to see two men carrying— God’s wounds—Ewan up the stairs to the infirmary. The man looked…dead.

  26

  Ewan was not dead, but he surely looked like it. His skin was deathly pale and his breathing was shallow—but he was breathing. Sweat was a constant thin sheet on his skin and he was shivering.

  The healers were rushing to make an infusion to have him vomit. The young soldier was fighting for his life but Duncan could not understand why. With the rush to get to the sickbed and the healers leaping into action, it took him a while to pin down someone to ask what happened.

  When he did get someone, he pulled the man over to the side while the healers were forcing the concoction down Ewan’s throat. “What happened?”

  Distressed, the man rubbed the back of his neck while shooting apprehensive looks over to the man on the bed. “Honestly, Sir, I cannae tell ye. Ewan has just come from his rotation on the grounds. He went to have a late supper and then out o’ nowhere, grabbed at his chest and keeled over. Spilled his soup and all.”

  “His soup? What could be put in his soup to hurt him?” Duncan wondered. “Where was he?”

  “In the barracks, Sir,” the soldier replied. “He was frothing at the mouth so we had to act quickly.”

  Clapping the man on his shoulder, Duncan said. “Keep an eye on him, I’ll be back.”

  Almost running down the steps he took one of the many backdoors and sprinted to the barracks. The bunks were lined up on both walls and to the back, where he and Isabella had once eaten, were the dining tables. He skidded to a halt when he saw the stain on the ground where the bowl had spilled—but no bowl.

  He crouched to see the spot and bit back a cry of astonishment. The stain was scrubbed. Had one of the soldiers done that? But how would they have time? The man was dying, who would have come back and cleaned?

  One who is responsible, that’s who.

  Someone had tried to kill Ewan and as this attack came so close on the heels of Isabella’s “accident” he was being forced to think that a soldier was responsible for both incidents. A soldier would have the speed and strength to cut through all the leather girths that quickly.

  But why poison Ewan?

  Heading back to the castle, he paused at the door. He never dared tell Isabella about this. She was already bothered about her brother and she was still weak. He would be senseless to give her another thing to worry about. It was best to keep it close to his chest for the time being.

  Taking the stairs back to the infirmary, he arrived to see Ewan curled over the arm of a healer while he retched into a pot being held by another woman. His deep breath of relief left him nearly light headed. He sagged on the wall and waited for Ewan to finish. When he had, he fell back on the bed and sucked in a deep breath.

  His pale skin showed his illness but he was alive and that was all Duncan was happy for. He turned to the soldier who he had ordered to stand guard and said, “Summon the rest of the soldiers for me at the barracks, I have to get to the bottom of this.”

  “Aye, Sir,” he nodded and left to the door.

  Duncan went to Ewan and met his hazed eyes, “Ewan, the healers will do all they can to get ye back on yer feet. Is there anything ye can remember about the moments before ye ate the soup?”

  The poor youth’s eyes were so unfocused Duncan knew it was a waste of time. Ewan shook his head and then slumped back on the bed and sucked in deep breaths. Resting a hand on Ewan’s shoulder he said. “Get well, lad.”

  He went back to the barracks and did not have to even enter to feel the worry and tenseness inside. The men were clustered around the eating tables, and most of their faces were painted with worry, others stiff with alarm.

  He barely opened his mouth when Fergus called out, “Me Laird, I ken why ye called us here and I’ve asked around. Nay one had seen anyone or anything suspicious before Ewan had his meal.”

  “Nothin?” he asked, scanning the room. “I dinnae believe that. Surely there was something!”

  “Sir,” someone spoke, “the only thing I can tell ye is that a few servants came to do their weekly clean. We had left Ewan’s meal on the coals as we had all had ours.”

  Another breadcrumb. Servants this time.

  “The saddle Isabella had taken had its girth cut,” he said and paused to look at each face, “and it was not the only one. All of them in the stables had their girths cut to the point it would fray if ridden.”

  No one showed the guilt he had expected to see and that threw his mind in disorder. Was it one of these men? He wanted to ask the question but his soul warred with his mind. As far as he knew, all these men treasured Isabella as their sister. She had spent more time with them than with him.

  If he dismissed all of them, was he going to sieve through the maids, the groundsmen, the stable boys, the washerwomen—every servant in the castle?

  He rubbed his face in weariness, “The servants ye say.”

  “Aye,” the soldier said then stood away from the rest. “Sir, I ken I’m speaking for all of us here, Miss Isabella is like our blood. She is precious to us too.”

  The mirroring nods and murmurs of ayes, had his spirit resting a little easier. He nodded. “I ken…and thank ye. Look out for each other, men. And report to me if ye see anything or anyone suspicious. Good night, and in the morn, send someone to find Grant.”

  On the way back, he lingered on the dark lawns, stopping to look back on the dark stable, the high bailey and then, the castle where the lit rooms made a haphazard pattern in the dark building. A cool wind whistled through t
he barren trees and flung the snow on the ground up to swirl around his feet.

  Dispirited, he went inside and felt the warmth of the fires wash over him. He took the stairs to Isabella’s room and relieved the guard and went inside. He sat as quietly as he could and braced his elbows on his knees. Isabella was sleeping peacefully while his chest was in turmoil. Ewan ill, Grant missing and her almost death…nothing felt right.

  He tugged his shirt off and slid into the bed near her. Isabella blinked, looked at him, sighed and slid under his arm. “About time.”

  “Ye ken I was here?” he asked.

  “Aye,” she mimicked and he pinched her behind. “Go to sleep.”

  I’ll tell her on the morrow…

  * * *

  He could not do it, not the day after, nor the two days beyond it.

  Missing Grant had come back and begged pardon for his absence. He had gotten notice of his father’s death and had gone to see his family in the town beyond. Duncan had been beyond relieved that he was not dead or injured or poisoned like Ewan. When he had told the young soldier about what had happened while he was gone, the man had been fit to be tied—especially when it came to Isabella.

  Now, looking at her relaxed face, sleeping in his bed, a mere handbreadth from him, he still could not work up the fortitude to tell her what had happened in the days’ past. He slid away from her and found his shirt.

  “Where are you going?” Isabella asked sleepily.

  He paused in lacing up his boots, “I’m going to check with the stable boys, the saddles should be repaired by now.”

  “You do know that I’m feeling better,” Isabella said, sitting up with a rather coquettish look. She reached out and slid her hand on the space he had left. “Come back…stay with me for a while.”

  Her eyes were hooded and beguiling and her hair was a riot of dark curls, a mouth that was begging to be kissed. There was only so much temptation he could take and with the memory of how she felt under him, paired with the image before him, had his control being chipped away. He did not want to take advantage of her, especially as she had just come out of a very vulnerable state, but the woman he loved was offering herself to him, and it was testing his willpower.

  Finished with his boots, he braced his arms on the bed and dropped a kiss on her lips. “Nay now, love,” he said. “But I’ll be holding onto that offer.”

  He knew she was disappointed but he had more digging to do. The servants who had cleaned the soldier’s barracks had all been exonerated from adding poisons—a lethal mix of belladonna and mandrake root, both of which had been reported stolen from the infirmary’s stores—to Ewan’s food. Something that was told to him last night.

  This web was getting so tangled he did not even know where to begin and which twist it would take next. He did go to the stables and found all was well but then went to the barracks to check on a recovering Ewan and then to the infirmary to find the last breadcrumbs of this mystery.

  With all those concerns sitting like a boulder on the top of his head, he sat with the head healer in her private room and began to question. “How could someone steal these herbs from the houses?”

  “Alas me Laird, the storehouses are nay guarded,” the head healer said regrettably. “They are left open for the normal maid to get what she needs on the day of her courses for the groundsmen to get something for sunstroke or headache. We keep vats of each herb here for emergency purposes but they are kept in the huts where they grow and are stored in greater vats. Anyone could have gotten in there, me Laird. We knew the source of his illness was a mix of those plants because Mr. Dugall’s pupils were dilated, consistent with belladonna and his vomit was consistent with mandragora use.”

  “And no one, no healer, kenning the effects of both plants would ever use such a mix,” he asked even as he knew the answer.

  “Nay, me Laird,” was his confirmation. “But anyone who kens the deadly effect of both would use them together. On their own, they are deadly, mixed they are sure to ensure the person died. Thank god we acted so quickly.”

  “Aye,” Duncan said tiredly, “Things have changed so suddenly. Everyone is tense, no one acts as if they are safe anymore. This used to be such a peaceful place, but with the war…” his gut churned in worry, “every one’s different, even down to me Mother and now someone is out there robbing storehouses and poisoning me men. I—I hate this but I will have to put guards everywhere. Our safe haven will be a prison.”

  The healer was sympathetic, “That is one of the many ripple effects of war, me Laird.”

  “I’ll have to—”

  “What!” Isabella’s voice, as sharp as a javelin, cut through the air. “He almost died!”

  Hurrying out, he spotted Isabella, clad in her loose shirt and trews staring at a man with a white, horrified face. “Isabella—” he called out only to see her glare at him then spin on her heel and take off.

  Chasing her down was not something he wanted to do but he hurried after her. The tip of her braid was the only indicator of where she went, as it was the last thing lingering after her when she spun around a corner or darted behind a wall. He found her in one of the least used gardens and she was huffing with the effort it had taken her to run.

  “Isabella—”

  She spun, eyes blazing, “You do not get to talk to me now. All this time you did not think to tell me that Ewan—one of my good friends— had nearly died! Why Duncan? Why did you not tell me that?”

  He held his hands up in the same way he would do while approaching a skittish horse, “Ye were ill, Isabella. Ye had taken a nasty fall, was half-dead yerself when I found ye. Ye were weak and ye were worrying about yer brother. What do ye ken I’d do? Put more distress on ye when ye were suffering pain?”

  Isabella’s face betrayed little emotion, but he was reassured by the dropping of her tense shoulders. He did not say a word more, allowing her to direct the discourse. He would have never told her anything distressing because he cared about her, too much, more than his life even. He would not have stayed by her side every night, care for her every day, run himself ragged to find out who had dared to kill her or make love to her the way he had if she was not the one who completely owned his heart.

  Dropping his hand, he edged closer, “I’d never do anything to hurt ye, Isabella. I love ye too much for that.”

  Her shoulders firmed, as did her jaw, “Did you find who did it?”

  “Nay,” he said and it felt as if he was swallowing bitter gall. “Nay matter how I tried, I couldnae. The web they had weaved was too complex to follow. At first, after yer injury, I suspected it was a stable boy, then me mother, then a soldier, but those did not pan out. With Ewan I kent it was a fellow soldier with a hidden grudge, then a servant who cleaned the barracks and then a healer, but none of those were found true.” He came and held both of her shoulders, sinking his thumbs into the tense muscles. “What I did find is that me men count ye as their family and are willing to go to war if needs be to save ye.”

  Her head jerked up and light sprang to her eyes, “What if that’s it!”

  “Eh?”

  “War,” she rushed, “my dream, this attack on Ewan, what if my brother has found a way in to disable yer ranks and get a way in? To throw you into disorder so you wouldn’t be prepared for his attack?”

  Her words had merit but he doubted that was the cause. When he did not speak, she pulled away. “You don’t think so, do you?”

  “‘Tis nay—”

  Now, she was two feet—and growing—away from him. “Don’t patronize me, Duncan. I can see in your eyes that you do not believe a word I said.”

  “It's not that I—” he stopped mid-sentence at the blatant lie he was about to tell. Frustration knotted his inside and his tone was clipped. “Aye, I do not believe ye because it's implausible that he has found us. Aside from ye and yer aunt, nay one kent who I was, me name or the clan I came from. We avoided towns and villages as if they held the black plague and apart from that
inn far out of bounds at Lanark, we never gave anyone our names. It's odd, dinnae ye ken that out of all the places he would search, he’d find that one?”

  She was trembling from head to toe, and he could see that she was refraining from running…or sending a balled fist into his gut. Her fists were clenched at her sides, and her voice was tight, “You do not know my brother. He might not be a seasoned warrior but he is a scheming, manipulative man who will find ways to get here, that you would never think about.”

  “Isabella—”

  Spinning, she was about to dart away when he grabbed her. She struggled to free herself from his hold, yet he held her tight.

  “Let me go,” she demanded.

  “I cannae,” he refused, while tugging her even closer. Nosing at her ears and jaw he said, “And I willnae.”