The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae by Stephanie Laurens
“Damn it, yes! All six of them—both my brothers, and my four older cousins. The other two, the ones hanging back on the shore, are Breckenridge and Jeremy Carling.” Turning, putting her back to the high stone, she met his eyes. “If Mirabelle sees them, she’ll balk. God knows what she might do.” She glanced back at the bridge. “They’re going to spoil everything!”
“Can they swim?”
Angelica looked at him. “What?”
“Can all six on the bridge swim?”
She stared, thought, then nodded. “Yes. Why?”
Dominic looked past her. “Ready?”
Swinging around, a little further along the battlements she saw three large men manning a massive lever that connected with a huge, notched wheel.
“Aye, m’lord,” the men chorused.
Turning back, she saw Dominic glance at the bridge, then she peeked out again. Her brothers and cousins were still there, talking, scanning the castle, planning . . .
“Now,” Dominic ordered.
She swung back to see the three men heave, strain, and slowly push the heavy lever over. Released, the huge wheel started slowly, ponderously, turning.
“What the—!”
Demon’s yell had her whirling to look out at the bridge again.
Her jaw dropped. “Oh, my God.” The entire surface of the wooden bridge was slowly and smoothly tilting from the horizontal, gently tipping horses and riders into the rippling waters of the loch. Mesmerized, she watched as, unable to turn their horses back to shore, one after another her six closest male relatives were forced to take the plunge into the no doubt very cold water. All slid out of their saddles; bobbing alongside their mounts, they swam a little way to where the shoreline dipped. One after another they emerged, dripping and cursing fit to turn the air about them blue.
She clapped a hand over her mouth, tried to choke back her laughter, felt her eyes tear. “Oh, Lord! They will never, ever, forgive you for that.”
Dominic shrugged. “They’re in London, I’m up here. I’ll survive their displeasure.” After one last look, he turned away. “The dip should cool their blood long enough for us to fetch the goblet. My mother and her directions should be in the great hall by now.”
Angelica hurried alongside him as he strode along the battlements to the steps leading down to the bailey. They went quickly down and crossed to the keep, tacking through the crowds, thinning now as the keep staff and others returned to their abandoned chores. “Wherever you have to go to fetch the goblet, I’m coming, too.”
Looking ahead, he nodded. “Just hang back until I have the directions in my hand. Don’t let her see you until then.”
She obediently slowed, letting him go up the keep steps before following. Reaching the porch, she hung back outside the doorway until he’d crossed the foyer and stridden into the great hall, then she slid into the shadows edging the foyer—
“Aa-aahh!”
The scream brought them both up short. Dominic swung around; eyes locking on her, noting it wasn’t her who’d screamed, he strode back into the foyer.
Echoes reverberated off the stone, confusing the direction, but Angelica had heard the original sound. Stunned, she pointed. “Mirabelle’s tower. Upstairs.”
Dominic ran for the stairwell.
Picking up her skirts, she raced after him. Brenda and Mulley came hurrying along the gallery. Seeing them, Angelica pointed upward, then dashed into the stairwell. As she climbed in Dominic’s wake, she could hear awful, hysterical, gulping sobs coming from one of the rooms above.
She followed Dominic and the sounds to Mirabelle’s bedroom.
The door had been pushed wide. Elspeth stood to one side of the doorway, hands pressed to her mouth, staring in disbelief at the figure Dominic had crouched beside.
Dark skirts flared over the floor. One hand lay flung out, clutching a crumpled piece of embroidery.
Slowly, Dominic rose. Staring down at his mother, he shook his head. “She’s gone.” His voice was flat, empty.
Reaching him, Angelica looked at Mirabelle’s empurpled face, her tongue protruding, her blue eyes vacant and staring, then she turned and waved Brenda to Elspeth; while the maid folded Elspeth, shocked and starting to shake, into her arms, and drew her away, Angelica gripped Dominic’s hand and held on.
After an instant, he gripped her fingers—too hard, but he immediately gentled his hold. “She’s gone, and we don’t know where the goblet is.” He shook his head. “But who killed her—and why?”
The embroidery in Mirabelle’s hand drew Angelica’s eye. She bent, eased the worked linen free of the clutching fingers. Straightening, she smoothed out the piece. Felt her heart catch. “It’s a map.”
“What?” Dominic glanced at her.
She showed him, turning him from his mother. “See—here. That’s the goblet.” She tried to orientate the design, but bits of the map hadn’t been finished. “Can you tell where it is?”
He took the embroidery, walked to the window, studied it, then turned the fabric—and swore. “It’s the cairn by the waterfall. She’s hidden it there.”
Angelica looked at his mother. “I suppose it’ll be safe enough—”
“No, it won’t be.” Dominic glanced at the woman who had given him birth, then flung the map down and headed for the door. “Whoever killed her wants the goblet—that’s why she’s dead. Someone else knew she had it—and that someone else now knows where it is, and they also know that the future of Clan Guisachan rides on that goblet.”
He met Mulley on the landing. “Take care of this—I’m going after the murderer and the goblet.”
“Aye, m’lord.”
Dominic went down the stairs three at a time. He heard footsteps behind him. “You can’t come,” he yelled back at Angelica.
“Don’t waste your breath,” she yelled back.
He swore again but didn’t stop, going straight past the ground level to the lower level and the store room that housed the postern gate. Shoving open the door, he raced across the room—and almost tripped over McAdie.
“Oh, no!” Angelica dropped to her knees beside McAdie.
Dominic crouched on the old man’s other side. McAdie had been stabbed twice, both strikes close to the heart, almost certainly ultimately fatal; he lay with his eyes closed, his lips parted. His breathing was labored.
Angelica’s hands fluttered around the hilt of the dirk buried in McAdie’s chest. “What should we do? Do we pull it out, or . . . ?”
“No. Leave it.” Noting the worn crest on the dirk, Dominic clasped one of McAdie’s cold hands in one of his.
McAdie’s lids fluttered. “Is that you, my lord?”
“Aye. Was it Baine?”
“Aye.” McAdie’s features fleetingly hardened. “It was Langdon Baine.”
“Thank you. I’ll see you avenged.” Dominic tensed to stand, but McAdie gripped his hand.
“No, wait. Have to tell you.” Eyes closed, McAdie moistened his lips. “Baine was my lady’s lover—it was he who talked her into stealing the goblet. He said just now that he was going to take it and rid the highlands of the Guisachans once and for all.”
“Over my dead body.” Dominic’s tone was harsh. He gentled his voice. “Rest. The others are coming, but I must go if I’m to catch up with Baine.”
McAdie’s head moved in an infinitesimal nod; his hand slipped from Dominic’s.
“Who’s Baine?”
Dominic looked at Angelica. “The laird of a neighboring clan.” He rose. “Fetch Griswold, Erskine, or Mrs. Mack for McAdie.”
She scrambled to her feet and ran for the door.
Reaching it, she looked back—and saw Dominic disappear through the open postern door.
She swore—not in Gaelic—glanced at McAdie, then raced up the stairs. “Griswold! Erskine. Mrs. Mack!” She kn
Dominic raced up the tunnel and straight past the grille Baine had left hanging open. Exploding into the small clearing beyond the tunnel’s mouth, looking down as he concentrated on keeping his footing over the rocky ground, his mind already following Baine up the track, he didn’t see the men in his path until he mowed into them.
Their presence shocked him more than his appearance had shocked them, but his momentum carried him well into the pack, forcing some of them back, but they didn’t get out of his way.
He stopped; so did they. For one fleeting instant, they looked at him, and his brain caught up with who the hell they were—
They threw themselves at him, grappled, caught, and clung. Hands seized; wet bodies slammed into him. He flung them off, struggled to get clear, to get free and on up the path.
Punches were thrown, not by him, but he hardly felt the impacts to his torso, and he avoided the blows to his face. He tripped three of them, almost got away, but the rest flung themselves on him and nearly brought him down.
He had to turn and fight them off.
One on one, even two or three to his one, he might have managed, but eight to one was impossible.
Eventually, two men hanging on each arm, they trapped him, held him, forced him to still; all of them were breathing heavily.
“What are you doing?”
They all jumped at the ear-splitting shriek. All turned to look at the point from where the sound had come—the mouth of the tunnel—but Angelica was already streaking across the clearing toward the path to the waterfall.
Two of the men who’d been squaring up to face him turned and gave chase.
One, brown-haired, snagged her arm. “Angelica—”
She abruptly halted and slammed her elbow into his side. “Don’t you Angelica me!” Her brother doubled over. She wrenched her arm free—and quick as a flash raced on and up the path, avoiding the dark-haired man who’d been circling to cut her off. Not knowing the lie of the land, he ended facing a rock wall and had to turn back.
While Angelica raced on.
“Oh, God.” Dominic suddenly realized she was perfectly capable of confronting Baine on her own. “Angelica! Don’t! Come back!”
The look she flung him as she sprinted up the rising curve of the path plainly told him not to hold his breath. Her brothers and cousins, bewildered and confused, hesitated, not knowing if they should follow—letting her get further ahead.
Dominic cursed, struggled again, but they hadn’t loosened their grips.
Just before she would disappear from their sight, Angelica whirled and imperiously pointed at her brothers and cousins. “If you want to protect me, just let him go and you’ll have done your job!” She paused to see if they would comply. When they didn’t, she flung her hands in the air. “Idiots!” She turned and raced on.
Dominic stared after her. He’d had no idea she could run that fast . . . realized what waited for her at the end of the path.
Forcing himself to calm, to still, shackling his instincts and his emotions, he glanced at the men around him; a leader himself, he had no difficulty picking out the one who led them.
Pale green eyes flicked his way, curiosity and assessment in the glance.
He caught the man’s gaze. “She’s racing after the man who just strangled my mother, and stabbed my old steward and left him dying. We can settle this now and lose her, or we can leave this for later and get her back, but you won’t find her without me.” He paused. “Choose.”
The black-haired man—Devil Cynster almost certainly—hesitated, but only for a second. He nodded to the others. “Let him go.”
They hesitated, too, but did.
The instant he was free, Dominic charged up the track after Angelica.
The Cynsters followed at his heels.
Chapter Twenty-two
Angelica slowed as she neared the waterfall. The roar of the cascade drowned out her footfalls as she eased around the last curve in the rocky path, then crept the final yards to the ledge.
Regardless, the man kneeling beside the cairn appeared too absorbed to notice; his attention was locked on the stone pyramid, on its rear face. His shoulders were broad, but not as broad as Dominic’s, his hair brown and curly. Although it was difficult to judge with him on his knees, he would certainly be much taller than she.
She seriously doubted rational discussion would get her anywhere.
Silently stooping, she picked up a rock, the biggest she could grip and heft. Placing her feet carefully, she inched steadily closer. Stepping onto the ledge, she paused, but she was still well out of the man’s line of vision as he scrabbled and pulled rocks from the rear of the cairn. He was wearing a jacket made of sheepskin over breeches and riding boots. What she could see of his face was rough, craggy without being honed.
Unhelpfully, her mind chose that moment to remind her that Mirabelle was—had been—bigger, and possibly, at least in her final desperation, stronger than she was. And this man—Baine—had strangled Mirabelle easily enough.
Baine paused, then, still on his knees, leaned into the alcove, reaching around and into the cairn. “Yes!” Twisting and shifting, he gradually withdrew his arm, along with what he now held in his hand. Sinking back on his ankles, he held up a golden goblet.
Angelica stopped dithering. Raising the rock, she stepped forward and brought it down on Baine’s skull.
He reeled.
Dropping the rock and grabbing the goblet with both hands, she wrenched it from his grasp.
He bellowed.
She whirled and ran.
He flung himself at her and caught her hem.
Swinging back, she tugged, yanked, but he didn’t lose his grip. The material held as he pressed it to the ground, pinning her, while clumsily, woozily, he got his feet under him, then rose. With the back hem of her skirt crushed in one hand, he pulled her to him.
As he did, his gaze searched her face, then rose to her hair; his puzzled frown evaporated. “You’re Dominic’s Cynster whore.”
She kicked him in the side of the knee, but he shifted at the last second and the blow glanced off his shin.
“Now, now.” He seized the moment to let go of her gown and cup his fingers about the bowl of the goblet.
He tried to jerk it from her grasp, but she’d locked the fingers of one hand around the swirling stem. Slapping her other hand over them, she clung with all her might. “No—it’s not yours.”
“Ah, but it’s going to be . . .”
He realized that if she was there, Dominic wouldn’t be far behind; she saw the change in his dark eyes, the coalescing of evil. “Let go, you little fool.” He raised the goblet as high as he could, shook it like a terrier with a bone.
Chin stubbornly set, she hung on; he wasn’t quite strong enough to lift her off her feet.
He glanced aside, at the edge of the ledge, then looked at her. “A pity, but . . .”
Using the goblet, he swung her, dragged her, step by halting step, closer to the edge.
She resisted, pulled back, fought, but he kept far enough away that she couldn’t risk trying to kick at him again.
Foot by foot, he drew her on. “Let go.”
“No.”
“How long do you think your grip will hold once you no longer have rock beneath your feet?” Abruptly, he jerked the goblet.
Caught off guard, she screamed.
She lost her balance and stumbled into him.
Absorbing the impact, he steadied and tensed to rip the goblet from her desperate grasp—
The primal roar that erupted over their heads had them both jerking back.
Dominic leapt from the cliff above the ledge. He’d taken a shortcut over rougher ground, had heard Angelica scream just as he reached the lip, had taken one gl
He landed all but nose to nose with Baine.
Instinctively Baine had released the goblet, released Angelica, to face him.
He was a much bigger threat.
He didn’t waste time. He went for Baine’s throat.
As Baine went for his.
They wrestled, neither immediately getting a decent grip, one sufficient to throw the other. Even without looking, Dominic knew where Angelica was, knew she’d retreated to the cairn, the goblet clutched in her hands.
The goblet was safe, and so was she.
Leaving him free to turn the full ferocity of his strength on Baine, on avenging McAdie and his mother.
They teetered, each battling to seize that telling instant of supremacy, but they’d always been evenly matched. Even though Dominic had grown taller and had a longer reach, Baine was heavier, more solid, less top-heavy. But Dominic knew balance was his weakness; he guarded against losing it and prayed his knee would hold through it all. Thus far, it had.
Jaws clenched, eyes burning on the other’s face, they shifted and swayed, neither willing to give ground, both intent on victory. Either Dominic would kill Baine, or Baine would kill Dominic. This was the end of a fight that had been going on since their teens. Why, Dominic had never understood; Baine was seven years older, and competitively speaking, their paths shouldn’t have crossed. But they had, constantly.
Dominic’s feet shifted, slid. His back was to the falls; the ledge beneath his boots was wet. The tussle remained inconclusive, but the longer it went, the advantage would slowly tip Dominic’s way; stamina-wise, Baine couldn’t match him.
Baine knew that, too. Eyes narrowed, he spat, “I should have finished you off when I sent you into that ravine.”
The instant of shock—he’d never dreamt that long-ago fall had been anything but an accident—was all Baine needed. Instead of grappling, Baine stepped into Dominic and heaved, pushing him back.
Feeling his shoulders, his balance, tip too far, knowing his feet would slide from under him, Dominic flung himself back—trusting in his instincts, in what they told him lay behind him.