Chapter Two
Brianna settled into the airplane seat and peered out the window at the wing while waiting for takeoff.
Her gut clenched tightly as her hands shook.
Years had passed since she’d left Nassau.
Now she was facing the unknown. When she got to Edinburgh what then?
She didn’t have a plan. She needed a plan.
What the hell did she think she was doing?
Aside from her nerves pounding through her, making her ill, it was awkward saying goodbye to Grayson as he ferried her back to the main island in the Bahamas.
She was met with stoney silence when she tried to thank him for everything.
She started to walk away from the car to hail a cab to the airport.
“Brianna,” he called.
She turned to see him leaning across the passenger seat, the window down. Her chest tightened at the sight. His face twisted with raw, unguarded pain.
“I hope you find your sisters.”
It was the last thing he said to her as he rolled up the window and drove away.
The worst part was she wasn’t sad about that at all.
In the airport restroom, she managed to dress into something other than her bikini and cover-up. She dressed in faded jeans, a well-worn t-shirt, and sneakers, pulling her sun-kissed auburn hair back and tying it with a colorful scarf at the nape of her neck.
She stared into the mirror, her reflection unfamiliar.
Dark shadows clung beneath her pale gray eyes, making them look hollow, haunted.
Lines carved deep across her sun-kissed forehead, each one a reminder of too many years baking under the Caribbean sun, too many nights lost to rum and music.
She looked brittle, worn thin, like the life she’d built had taken more from her than it had ever given back.
Now, settling into her first-class seat, she leaned back and slid on her Bulgari sunnies, shielding more than her tired eyes.
Her body ached with exhaustion, and the thought of the long flight ahead—with layovers in Miami, then London—made her shoulders sag.
Still, a flicker of relief stirred in her chest. She was finally on her way. She would finally get answers.
*
Twenty hours later, Brianna landed in Edinburgh.
She was not prepared for the weather. Though it was mid-September, the temperature was certainly not what she was used to—warm Caribbean breezes and sultry afternoons.
Her lightweight clothes were not going to work and she looked as out of place as a clown at a TED Talk.
She hadn’t thought much ahead when she boarded the plane.
She had no place to stay. So when she was herded through the airport to the taxi line, she hadn’t a clue what to tell the driver.
A quick search on her phone yielded numerous hotels in the area.
She picked one closest to the museum where Chloe worked.
At the hotel, she garnered a few strange looks at her summer attire, but she ignored them.
After settling into her room, she decided her next order of business was to find proper clothing.
She made a significant dent in her credit card on Princes Street as she purchased everything from jeans and sweaters to scarves, hats, and a coat.
By the time she was finished shopping, hunger pains cramped her stomach. Her last meal was in the Nassau airport before take-off. She really had no sense of day or time. She only knew what day it was by looking at her phone.
Carrying her packages, she made her way through the Royal Mile looking for a place to eat when a strange little shop caught her eye.
She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk to peer at it from across the street.
Gold lettering over the door announced the name of the shop as Mystic Treasures.
It was nestled between a cigar merchant and a shop specializing in cashmere and lambswool.
It looked out of place and yet not.
The shop called to her, a silent whisper threading through the air and wrapping around her soul.
A hum vibrated beneath her skin, an electric current that seemed to pulse in time with her heartbeat.
It wasn’t mere curiosity—it was something deeper, a pull that felt woven into her very being.
Destiny, a voice in the back of her mind whispered, though she tried to dismiss it.
She didn’t believe in fate or mysticism, but the sensation refused to fade.
It coursed through her veins, insistent, impossible to ignore.
The shop wasn’t just a place; it felt alive, waiting for her.
Before she realized she’d made the conscious decision to move, she crossed the street, making a beeline for it. Juggling her packages, she shoved open the door and stopped short as the bell chimed her arrival.
The antique store overwhelmed her senses.
Trinkets crowded every surface, furniture loomed in every corner, shelves sagged under the weight of old books.
A wall of glass cases gleamed, filled with jewelry that caught faint glints of light.
The air was thick with the dusty scent of forgotten attics and musty basements, mingling with the comforting aroma of aged paper and brittle parchment.
She froze, her breath hitching. Memories surged—her grandmother’s house, warm and cluttered, where books ruled every room.
Dusty shelves had groaned under their weight, each spine faded and cracked with age.
Her grandmother would never part with a single one.
Those books were treasures, just like this place, every corner alive with echoes of the past.
“Hello!” a woman called from the back.
It startled her out of her reverie.
The woman weaved her way through the crowded store to greet her with a smile.
Long, silver hair was in a thick braid hanging over her shoulder.
Her sparkling bright blue eyes glinted with friendly warmth and yet there was something otherworldly, something ancient, lining her ageless features that indicated to Brianna she was someone worthing knowing.
“How can I help you today?” Her voice was warm, flowing, hinting at a faint Scottish brogue.
“Oh, I—” she started, then pressed her lips together.
It would sound odd even to her own ears if she told the woman she was drawn here by some strange force.
The woman gave her a quick once-over. “You look a bit out of sorts.”
Brianna flushed hot to the roots of her hair wishing she’d taken time to change into her new Scotland friendly clothes. “I landed today.”
She didn’t know why she said it. It was a lame excuse but it was the only thing that came to mind.
“Good thing, too. I’ve been expecting you.” She smiled, showing off the one dimple in her cheek.
Sharp, unexpected surprise jolted through her as she stared at the woman grinning at her with eager anticipation. Words tangled in her throat, her muddled thoughts scrambling to make sense, to form a reply.
“I’m sorry?” she finally said.
“I’ll let you have a look around while I tend to some business in the back.”
The woman hurried away, leaving her alone surrounded by musty old furniture and the strangest feeling creeping through her. She didn’t understand what was happening. Maybe too many hours in the sun had addled her brain.
Brianna shoved aside the strangeness of the interaction. Juggling her packages, she moved deeper into the shop, her gaze alighting on all the vintage and antique objects.
Then a strange power thrummed through her, vibrating her senses. She halted to look around, trying to pinpoint where it was coming from. Her gaze landed on a glass case on the other side of the shop, the one that appeared to hold jewelry and other trinkets.
She made her way over to it, that thrumming igniting her senses and making the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. When she reached the glass case, she paused to look over all the objects resting on glass shelves.
A dagger with a gilded hilt. A sapphire and ruby brooch imbedded in Celtic knotwork glittering under the garish light.
A silver kilt pin in the shape of a clan crest. Several old coins that appeared to bear the visage of a woman.
Perhaps Mary, Queen of Scots? A small ornamental knife with a carved handle of a stag horn.
A jagged piece of stone with strange markings on it.
As soon as her gaze landed on the stone, the thrumming deep inside her intensified. She stared at it, wondering if that was the thing she was drawn to.
“Och, I see you found it.”
Brianna jumped. The woman appeared at her side as though she’d materialized out of thin air. She noticed the nametag on her crisp white shirt read Moira. She had a pleasant look on her face as she if she were delighted Brianna stood there in front of that case.
“Found what?”
“The stone. Would you like to see it?” Moira asked.
Her mind screamed no but her mouth said, “Yes.”
Pleased, Moira opened the glass case and retrieved the piece of stone.
Brianna dropped several of her packages at her feet and held out her hand.
Moira placed the stone into her palm. The moment she did, there was a warming sensation that flickered through her from the center of her palm all the way up her arm to her shoulder.
A flash of something strange and vivid ripped through her mind—a woman standing tall on a craggy hill, her fist raised to the stormy sky.
Light spilled through her clenched fingers, fierce and otherworldly.
Beside her stood two more women, their stances unyielding.
Before them stretched an army so vast it sent an icy bolt of fear straight through Brianna’s chest.
Her breath hitched, sharp and shallow, as the vision dissolved. Her gaze snapped back to Moira. The warm, pleasant expression was gone, replaced by something heavier, more serious. The weight of it pressed against her, making her pulse stutter.
The air around them shifted and suddenly the woman standing next to her was different. More ethereal. More otherworldly. There was an ancient glint to the depths of her eyes.
“Wh-what was that?”
“That is your future. And your past,” Moira said, her tone even and clear.
Brianna’s brows drew together. “I don’t understand.”
“Find your sisters, Brianna.”
Her breath caught, the words slamming into her like a physical blow.
“What?” she gasped, her heart hammering in her chest. “How do you know my name? How do you know about my sisters?” Her voice cracked, rising with each question, raw with desperation and fury.
“Did you have something to do with their disappearance? Who the hell are you?”
“Without you, all will be lost,” she said.
“All what will be lost?” Brianna shook with the force of emotions she couldn’t contain—fear, anger, and a growing, terrible dread.
“The future and the past.”
“I-I—”
“There isn’t much time,” Moira said, her voice stern and her expression grim. “Evie and Chloe need you. Now more than ever. Without you, chaos cannot be corrected. Without you, the future will never come to pass.”
Moira reached for her hand, then, and closed her fingers around the stone. “Take it.”
“But—”
“Find them. Help them.”
“I don’t know how to find them,” Brianna said. “I don’t know where they are.”
“You will know,” Moira insisted. “Take the stone but never let it out of your sight. You are its guardian now. Go. Rest. All will be clear in the morning light.”
And just like that, the air shifted around them once again. Moira’s expression was back to a pleasant one, an expectant one as if she’d asked Brianna a question and she hadn’t heard her.
“I’m sorry. What?” Brianna asked.
“I said would you like me to package it up for you?” She nodded to the stone still resting in her palm.
Brianna blinked the confusion from her eyes. A moment ago, the woman had closed her fingers around it. But maybe she’d imagined that? Was she also imagining that humming of the stone?
“Ah, yes, please.”
Grinning her delight, Moira plucked the stone from her palm and walked to the middle of the store. Brianna scooped up her packages and followed. By the time she was at the counter, Moira had the jagged piece of stone in a blue velvet bag.
“Here you are,” she said, handing it over to her.
Brianna juggled her packages again to reach for her wallet. “How much?”
“Free of charge.”
She halted. “Free?”
“Aye, lass.”
She noticed the picture of the castle on the wall behind her.
The castle towers reached for a blue sky while behind it the sunlight glistened off the calm waters of a loch.
As soon as she looked at it, a strange déjà vu rippled through her, as though she had stood in that same spot once before staring at that same castle. She couldn’t quite grasp when.
“What is that place?”
“Dundale Castle in the Highlands,” Moira replied. “Home of Clan MacLeod.”
Brianna stared at it another long moment, trying to shake the feeling. She took the bag from the shopkeeper. “Thank you.”
“Enjoy your visit to Scotland, Miss Sinclair.”
As Brianna stepped out of the shop, a chill prickled down her spine. She froze mid-step, the realization hitting her like a cold slap. She hadn’t given the woman her name. So how the hell did she know it?