A Highland Sailor by Aileen Adams

Author:Aileen Adams [Adams, Aileen]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: 0
Published: 2018-01-31T22:00:00+00:00

16

Broc could only open one of his eyes on waking.

When he did open the left eye, the one not caked shut with dried blood—he could smell it. That plus the searing pain in the back of his head told him what he needed to know—he looked about him and wished he had never woken at all.

Everything hurt. Not just his head. His hands and feet were bound, the feeling having long since left both. Time had passed, then, enough for the blood to stop flowing.

Why would it flow there when it could flow out of the back of his head?

If the pain was in back, he reasoned—thinking helped distract him from the pain, something he had learned long ago—but the blood had flowed over the side of his face, it meant he’d been on his face, or at least face down.

He didn’t need to ask himself where he was. The scent of manure and pigs assaulted his nose to the point where his eyes watered. A barn, tucked in a corner somewhere. Aside from shuffling feet and occasional snorting, there was silence.

They’d left him alone.

Why not? He was bound, arms behind his back, with a cloth wadded up and stuffed into his mouth. He was no threat to anyone.

He also didn’t need to ask himself who had done this to him. It had been too much to ask that Lord Randall not recognize him. The man had known him on sight, as Broc had known him.

It was folly, beginning to end. The entire thing. He had no business return to the scene of his crime. Whatever happened was no less than what he deserved—after all, he’d gone seven years without paying for his crime.

They had been good years, too. He had Derek to thank for that. And himself. He’d worked hard, but it had been work at which he’d excelled, work which had pleased him greatly.

Perhaps that was as much as he’d deserved.

He told himself not to despair, not to give up so easily, but what was the alternative? Lord Randall, who had most assuredly seen to his capture, wouldn’t make it so easy for him to escape again. There wouldn’t be a moment in which he’d be left to his own devices.

He would be bound at all times. And though he was currently alone, he wouldn’t be alone for long. He knew that, too.

Derek and Hugh didn’t know where he was. They would read his letter on waking and assume he had left with the lass. And they would ride out at dawn, as Lord Randall had demanded.

There was one hope. Only one. That they would first ride to the farm to confirm that he’d kidnapped Beatrice. When they found her there, never having arrived, they’d know something befell him.

What difference would it make? What could they possibly do?

He’d seen what they could do. He’d heard the stories, too. But there were only two brothers, that was all. None of the men Hugh had trained to fight, none of Maccay’s men or any of the others.

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