Highlander's Reckoning (The Sinclair Brothers #3) (15 page)

He’d pushed his luck too far. As eager as Warren was
for his information, the man was unpredictable and ruthless. Warren towered
over him, just as Sinclair had done. Malcolm had no choice but to fall back on
his helpless act, as usual.

“You have been more than generous with me, my lord,”
he said pleadingly. “I only beg safe harbor from you.”

Warren lingered intimidatingly for another moment
then smiled, but it didn’t touch his hazel eyes.

“If you can make yourself useful, you can stay at
Dunbraes for the time being. Now, out with it, man.”

“Kennedy’s daughter often ventures into the Galloway
forest,” Malcolm said quickly. “She used to go alone, but now Sinclair
accompanies her.”

Warren’s eyes sparkled in the low light. “Just the
two of them? No men-at-arms to guard them?”

“Aye, just the two of them.”

“Very good,” Warren said, but he spoke more to
himself than Malcolm.

He resumed his pacing, and after a moment he waved
Malcolm away as if he was nothing more than a midge.

Malcolm quietly let himself out of the chamber, then
made his way back to the castle’s hall, where several dozen soldiers slept on
bedrolls laid out on the ground.

Malcolm allowed himself a deep, relieved breath.
Kennedy had been easier than a child to handle, but Warren was far more
difficult—and dangerous. He still had Sinclair’s gold tucked out of sight,
which could go a long way in getting him safely out of the fray. It was hard to
walk away from an opportunity to make another coin, but Malcolm could sense
that it was past time he made himself scarce.

Despite Warren’s offer of—temporary—safe harbor, he
would leave Dunbraes after a few hours of sleep, a hot meal, and Warren’s last
payment for his report. Perhaps he would travel along the Borderlands in search
of either Englishmen or Scotsmen in need of information, a watchful eye, or a
simpering manservant. Or perhaps he would travel into England and see how far
his knowledge of Scotland could take him. Either way, he would never return to
Dunure, Loch Doon, or Dunbraes. It was simply too dangerous, and as he always
told himself, he couldn’t make another coin if his throat was slit.

He tiptoed around the snoring soldiers sprawled out
in the great hall, looking for a place to lie down. Eventually, he settled
himself as close to the large hearth as possible, squeezing his narrow
shoulders between two large soldiers. Within moments, he fell into a deep,
untroubled sleep.

Rona took the stone stairs leading up to the top of
the curtain wall two at a time. They’d just received word from one of the
boatmen who’d arrived from the village that Garrick Sinclair and his wife were
on their way.

At the top of the wall, she could barely make out a
speck against the churning loch waves. Another storm was blowing in from the
west, but it promised rain rather than snow. Rona doubted it made much
difference to Daniel’s brother and sister-in-law at the moment, however. They
were likely getting tossed violently in the wind-roiled loch waters, despite
the fact that they were traveling in one of the village’s larger, barge-like
boats.

A warm hand suddenly slipped under her cloak to
press against the small of her back. She nearly jumped at Daniel’s silent
approach. Instead, she managed to shoot him a wobbly smile.

“Excited to meet them?” he said, coming to stand
behind her. He wrapped his arms around her so that she leaned back into his
chest.

She nodded silently.

“Nervous?”

She let out a breath and nodded again. But it was
more than just her girlish fears that his family wouldn’t like or accept her.
She remained motionless, but it was hard to accept Daniel’s touches when she
knew there was something going on that he wasn’t telling her.

Apparently she wasn’t good at disguising her
frustration, though.

“What is it?” he asked, tensing his arms around her.

“We should be at the docks to greet them,” she said,
slipping from his embrace. Before she could get a foot on the stairs, however,
he captured her wrist.

She turned to look back at him, her hair whipping
around her face. His eyes were as stormy as the sky behind him.

“I know I am being…withholding,” he said quietly.
“And I know I am jeopardizing your trust in me. But I’m only doing it to
protect you.”

Though his voice was soft, his words held a hard,
commanding edge.

“Like I was protecting you from my falconry?” she said
coolly.

“Rona, I—”

“I can’t force you to open up to me,” she cut in
tightly. She tugged away from his grasp, but he held fast. He brought her hand
up to his mouth and wordlessly placed a searing kiss between her knuckles.
Despite her frustration with him, the feel of his lips sent tendrils of heat
into her belly. How could he have that effect on her? How could she be angry
with him and long to have him take control of her body at the same time?

He released her hand, and the tendrils of heat
faded. She turned and hurried down the stairs, out through the raised
portcullis, and to the docks before he could confuse her further with his
cryptic words, searing eyes, and intoxicating touch.

Wind-whipped waves smacked the wooden dock. The
speck of the boat had drawn much closer, and Rona could now make out a splash
of red plaid on board. As the two figures standing at the boat’s prow grew
larger and more distinct, Daniel came to stand next to her.

Finally, the boat bumped into the dock, and a giant
Highlander jumped onto the wooden boardwalk. He quickly turned to his
companion, a woman, and lifted her out after him. Both turned to Rona and
Daniel, and she finally got a good look at them.

The man—Garrick—looked eerily like Daniel. He wore
the same garb as Daniel, his red kilt belted over a white shirt, though Garrick
also wore a leather vest studded here and there with metal. She guessed this
was as close as these Sinclair men came to wearing armor. He had a bow and
quiver full of arrows slung over one shoulder, as well as a sword on his hip.
The bow was unlike any she had seen before. It was shorter and strangely
curved, not at all like the longbows most men used.

Though Daniel was one of the tallest, most muscular
and honed men she’d ever seen, Garrick rivaled him in height and breadth of
shoulders. Rona was used to being of a height with many men, but these two
towered over her.

Garrick’s hair was pulled back in a queue at his
neck, though the wind had pulled some of it loose. His face was firm and
unreadable. Rona met his eyes, which were steely gray, and she had to root her
feet to the dock to prevent herself from stepping backward.

But suddenly a wide smile transformed the
fierce-looking warrior’s face, and all at once he looked younger and less
terrifying.

“Brother!” Garrick shouted and slammed into Daniel
in a brutal hug. Both men laughed and pounded each other on the back heartily.

This gave Rona a chance to gaze shyly at the woman,
Jossalyn.

She was stunning. Golden blonde wisps of hair
whipped around her flawless features. She was shorter than Rona, though a
normal height for a woman, and built delicately. She wore simple clothes, yet
she stood with a quiet assurance and confidence.

Jossalyn’s emerald green eyes fell on her.

“You must be Rona!”

The woman closed the distance between them and
without preamble, she embraced Rona in a tight hug.

Rona stood stiffly, thrown off-guard by the woman’s
warmth. Jossalyn pulled back a little, and unfettered happiness shone in her
eyes.

“I’m so glad to meet you,
sister
,” she said.

Daniel had warned Rona that Jossalyn was English,
but her accent still surprised her.

“A-and I you,” Rona stuttered. Her stomach sank even
as her heart pinched. This woman was so warm and kind and beautiful, whereas
Rona was awkward and hard-edged. She swallowed. This was only the first in what
was sure to be a long string of reminders about her shortcomings.

“Let me introduce you to my wife,” Daniel said to
Garrick.

Introductions were made quickly all around. Then
Garrick collected a few small bags from the boat and the four of them made
their way to the castle just as heavy raindrops began to fall.

As they entered the great hall, Jossalyn took Rona’s
hand.

“That boat ride has sent my stomach spinning,”
Jossalyn said. “Do you happen to have any chamomile and clove?”

“Um…I don’t know.”

Rona felt her cheeks flush. She didn’t pay any
attention to household matters and instead left everything to Agnes and
Elspeth, the castle’s head cook. Another of her failings as the lady of the
keep.

“Let’s ask the cook,” she mumbled.

Rona and Jossalyn peeled off from Daniel and
Garrick, who continued through the hall and to the stairs, likely headed for
Daniel’s study.

“Elspeth, do we have any chamomile and clove?” Rona
said bluntly as she pushed her way into the kitchen.

Elspeth, rotund and rosy-cheeked, turned in surprise
at their entrance. Normally Rona stayed completely away from the kitchen,
unless it was to quickly snatch a heel of bread or an apple for her treks into
the woods.

“Aye, my lady,” Elspeth said with a quizzical look.
She opened a narrow door at the back of the kitchen and stuck her head in.

“Oh, is that your storeroom? Do you mind if I have a
peek at your herbs?” Jossalyn said, her eyes lighting up.

Rona deferred to Elspeth with a shrug.

“Of course, my lady,” the cook said.

Jossalyn poked her head in and immediately started
muttering to herself. “Very good, very good. Hmm, low on fennel.”

“Do you…cook?” Rona said awkwardly, trying to make
conversation. Daniel had told her so little about his family, and of course he
hadn’t even met any of the new wives.

“Oh, no! That is, I do my best in the camp, but I’m
not skilled,” Jossalyn replied, removing her head from the storeroom and
turning to Rona. She had a few dried flowers in one hand and a jar in the other

“I’m a healer—of sorts.”

To Rona’s surprise, Jossalyn lowered her head and
blushed.

“Of sorts?” Some of Rona’s nervousness ebbed as she
motioned for Jossalyn to take a seat on a nearby stool.

“I haven’t been formally trained by a physician, of course!”
Jossalyn said as she sat down. Elspeth brought over a pewter mug of already-hot
water, apparently able to tell what Jossalyn was about with the herbs.

Jossalyn tossed the dried flowers into the hot
water, then sprinkled in a dash of the ground contents from the jar.

“But I was trained by two medicine women,” she went
on with a shrug. “I have a knack for it.”

“And you are the village healer where you and
Garrick live?” Rona knew she was fishing, but she knew so little about her new
family. She perched on the stool next to Jossalyn as Elspeth went back to the
hearth to stir something fragrant in the large caldron over the fire.

Jossalyn gave her a curious look and took a small
sip of the tea she’d made.

“Daniel hasn’t told you?”

Rona stiffened, simultaneously embarrassed that her
husband hadn’t seen fit to explain more to her and angry at herself for not
probing him further about his family.

Jossalyn must have noticed, for she placed a soft
hand on Rona’s forearm.

“These Sinclair men are impossible, aren’t they?”
she said with a sympathetic smile. “They’re about as talkative as rocks.”

Rona snorted, then quickly shot a look at Jossalyn,
but she was grinning.

“And as stubborn as mules,” Jossalyn added.

Rona’s face heated, for she, too, could be mulish.
She pressed on, though, too curious to let it drop.

“Daniel hasn’t told me anything of where you live,
other than the fact that you all are coming from the Highlands.”

Jossalyn’s green eyes sparkled. “Perhaps we can
discuss this someplace…private?”

So it wasn’t just Daniel who could be reserved and
secretive. It was the whole family!

“Let me show you to your chamber,” Rona said,
standing.

She led the way across the hall and up the stairs on
the far side. Jossalyn and Garrick would be staying in her old chamber. Once
they were inside, she closed the door behind them.

“Make yourself comfortable,” Rona said, trying her
best to be a good hostess.

Jossalyn, still clutching her mug of tea, sat down
on the corner of the bed and sighed contentedly. “I haven’t slept in a real bed
in so long.”

Rona’s eyes widened. She really didn’t know anything
about her in-laws.

“You see,” Jossalyn went on calmly, “Garrick and I
currently live outside Inverness, though it changes.”

“Changes?”

“We reside in Robert the Bruce’s rebel camp. It
moves from time to time to protect the secrecy of the exact location.”

“You…what?”

Rona knew in the back of her mind that she was being
rude, but the shock of what Jossalyn had just said was too much.

Jossalyn smiled. “Garrick is one of the Bruce’s
closest confidantes. And I serve as the camp’s healer. It’s unusual, I know,
but it works for us.”

“But...but you’re English!”

“Yes. In fact, I used to live not far from here.
Perhaps you’ve heard of Dunbraes?”

Rona nodded numbly, trying and failing to sort out
all this information.

“I lived there for five years with my brother,
Raef.”

Through the fog of confusion, Rona registered that
for the first time since she’d met her, Jossalyn’s face dropped into a pained
frown. Then the name clicked.

“Raef. Raef Warren. Raef Warren is your brother.”

Rona was vaguely aware that she slumped onto the bed
next to Jossalyn.

Jossalyn nodded. “Your voice tells me you know
something of him. At least Daniel told you that much.”

Suddenly the door to the chamber opened, and Garrick
and Daniel entered.

“Sorry to interrupt, but we need you, Jossalyn,”
Garrick said.

“This way to my study,” Daniel said, gesturing out
the door.

Rona frowned in confusion.

“But surely our guests are tired from their journey,
Daniel,” she said with more bite than she intended.

Daniel crossed his arms over his chest, a scowl on
his face. Strangely, Garrick quirked an eyebrow at her in amusement.

“Rest will have to wait,” Daniel said curtly.

“Why?” Rona shot back. Why on earth would Daniel
need both Garrick and Jossalyn in his study? And why was she being excluded?

Daniel’s face darkened further and he looked ready
to bite something back, but Jossalyn stood.

“I hope we can continue our conversation later,” she
said warmly to Rona.

Rona could only nod dazedly as Jossalyn rose and
went to the door. Garrick followed her out. Daniel waited for Rona to rise from
her old bed and exit the chamber. But as he turned up the stairs toward the
study and she turned down, she couldn’t suppress a mutter.

“Mulish and rock-like.”

“What was that?” Daniel said, turning back to her.

“Nothing,” she said sourly, then descended the
stairs to the hall once more. Now wasn’t the time to pick a fight with him, but
as soon as the opportunity arose, she’d give him an earful and demand to know
what was afoot.