Chapter Eight
LOTTIE WAS SURROUNDED by wildflowers—the bright gold of gorst, the brilliant purple of thistle and heather, the rare lilac bindweed.
Flowers covered the meadow—which meadow, and where, she wasn’t sure—but her horse, Stjerne, trotted confidently along, shaking his mane now and again with his pleasure at being in bright sunlight.
Lottie glanced back over her shoulder. Anders was riding an inky black horse and she laughed—he’d been trying to catch her for miles, but could never reach her.
She came upon a stream and dismounted to let her horse drink.
She heard the black horse approaching and stepped out from beneath the boughs of a tree that stretched over the stream.
She leaned up against Stjerne’s side, his body warm and firm.
Lottie watched the man ride into view, and realized, with an increasing race of her heart, that it wasn’t Anders at all, but Captain Mackenzie.
He was wet, soaked through. Wet and vexed, judging by his dark expression.
His hard gaze slid from her face to her legs, and Lottie glanced down.
When had she donned trews? She looked up, her pulse galloping, because his gaze was quite heated and locked on hers.
She couldn’t move. Her feet were stones, unmovable.
She had no feeling in one arm, and the other was as heavy as a dead man.
He leaned closer still, and his lips touched hers so softly that Lottie’s heart stopped beating altogether.
It aroused her, pooling warm in her groin, making her perspire in spite of the chill around her.
But the kiss was rough and strangely tasteless, too, and something smelled like mildew. ..
Her eyes flew open. She blinked the morning blur away and slowly became aware of something at her back, something warm and firm. And against her mouth and cheek, the rough fiber of rope.
Rope? Lottie groggily pushed up onto her side and glanced over her shoulder.
She suddenly recalled where she was, and worse, realized that she had rolled into the captain’s outstretched leg.
Her mouth had touched the tail end of the rope that bound his hands.
He sat with one leg bent at the knee, the other stretched in front of him and stared down at her with an expression that was quite smug.
Lottie banged her elbow in her haste to scramble away from him, rolling up onto her knees and pushing herself back. How on earth had she come as far as three feet to be resting against his leg like an old dog?
He glanced to his right; she followed his gaze.
She saw instantly what had caught his attention: the gun.
She must have kicked it or pushed it in her sleep.
She dove for it, sliding across the wood floor and catching the butt of the gun just before him, managing somehow to roll to her side with it just out of his reach.
She came up on her knees again and whipped around.
She was breathing hard with exertion and he.
..well, he was not. His expression had gone quite dark as he eased himself back against the wall.
The smugness had turned into a wee bit of a smile, as if he was confident that while he’d lost this opportunity to have her gun, he would ultimately prevail.
How odd that part of her hoped he would. She had a sudden image of being taken in hand by this man, forced to atone for her crimes—
“Ah, there you, mo chridhe, my heart.”
The sound of her father’s voice startled Lottie; she clambered to her feet, her traitorous heart beating hard against her ribs.
Her father was sitting up on the bed at an odd angle.
He’d bled through his bandage, but at least the gray pallor had gone from his face.
His eyes were shining brightly. Very brightly, as if he’d had too much to drink.
“The captain and I thought you’d never wake, aye? Sleeping like the dead, you were. He’s been out for a morning stroll, he has, and we’ve had a wee chat.”
Lottie blinked, disoriented. What time was it? How long had she slept? Sunshine was pouring in through the portholes, casting shadows around her father. The ship, she noticed, was scarcely rocking at all.
“Look here, lass, I’m good as new, what did I tell you, then?” her father said with some effort.
“Are you?” she asked, moving to his side and smoothing the hair from his brow. His skin was damp to her touch. She opened the porthole so that he might have some fresh air.
“A wee bit of pain, as one might expect, having taken a bit of railing to the gut, aye? But hungry, Lot. Quite hungry, I am. I should think our good captain is hungry as well.”
Lottie couldn’t look at Captain Mackenzie. If he was hungry, he didn’t volunteer it.
“I’ll go fetch food for you, Fader.”
“Aye, and bring Gilroy round. I’ll have a word with him.”
Lottie winced inwardly. She didn’t relish Gilroy reporting that she had offered to pay the Mackenzie crew. Her father would be livid with her, but what was she to do?
“Go now, aye? We’ve only a day before we reach Aalborg and plans must be made.” He thrust his finger into the air for emphasis, then winced with pain that it caused him.
“Fader, please, donna move,” Lottie begged him. She turned away from her father, and her gaze landed on Mackenzie. His expression, other than being quite intent on her, was as impenetrable as it was searing, scorching her all the way through to her bones.
She quickly pulled on her damp boots and went out, careful to shut the door behind her. She stepped over Norval Livingstone, who had been put at the cabin door to guard it through the night. “Norval,” she whispered, shaking his shoulder. “I need you now, aye? Find Morven to tend my father.”
Norval’s response was a grunt. She continued down the steps. “You! Miss Livingstone!” She turned around just as Beaty vaulted down the steps from the quarterdeck. “We need men,” he said curtly.
“Pardon?”
“Men,” he said again, as if she didn’t speak a word of English. “We’ve sails and rigging that need work. We canna carry on like a wee rowboat can we?”
“Use as many of our men as you—”
“No’ your men, madam! Do you no’ understand, then, that your men are addlepated? They could no’ raise or lower a sail if their life depended upon it.”
She wished she could feel proper indignation at his characterization of her clan, but she happened to catch sight of Duff and his brother Edward behind Mr. Beaty. They were trying to pry open one of the whisky barrels with no success, and arguing as they went about it.
“Well then?” Beaty demanded.
“I canna simply free your men after taking such care to tie them up!”
“Hold your guns to us, I donna care, but I bloody well need men up on the rigging now!” Beaty demanded, his face red.
“All right,” she said, throwing up a hand. “I need but a moment to—”
“Lottie? Lottie!”
She suppressed a groan and turned about as Drustan came barreling across the deck. “I want to go home now,” he said. “I donna like it, I want to go home.”
“I know, Dru, so do I,” she said soothingly. “We’ve a day or two to Aalborg, then quick as a fox, we’ll be on our way home.”
“I want to go now,” Drustan shouted, and slammed his fist down on a barrel of whisky so hard that the top of it cracked, causing both Lottie and Beaty to jump. At the sound of it, Duff and his brother turned about, abandoned the barrel they’d been trying to open, and hurried forward.
Drustan was prone to violent fits when he was confused or frustrated, and sometimes, those fits were impossible to contain. Judging by the way he huffed now, Lottie feared such a fit was imminent if she didn’t do something. “Would you like to see Fader?” she asked quickly to divert his attention.
Drustan jerked toward her with his fists clenched, blinking.
“We’ll bring him some food, aye? Will you help me, then, Dru?”
Her brother nodded as his breathing slowed.
“Cracked the lid, you did, Drustan,” Duff said, examining the top of the barrel. “Good on you, then—we’re in need of a tot or two to keep the Mackenzie men from revolting.”
“Whisky!” Beaty cried. “I need those men working, no’ in their bloody cups! Look here, I need men on the sails!”
Lottie could feel Drustan tensing beside her.
“All right, all right!” she cried, and caught Duff’s arm to have his attention.
“Let him have his men, Duff,” she said. “Remind them that they will be well paid.” She felt anxious, too—there was too much happening, too many things to think of, and the fear of what would happen once they reached Aalborg was beginning to ratchet in her thoughts.
“Keep guard, but let them set the sails.”
“That is most unwise, madam,” Duff said majestically.
“Please, Duff. We’ve a calm sea—we must reach Aalborg by the morrow or risk more trouble.” She pulled Drustan around and made him move with her, leaving Duff’s complaints behind her.
Mathais was below deck with Mr. MacLean.
He was wet from the waist down, his dark blond hair sweeping across one eye.
He was assisting in the delivery of breakfast to both the Mackenzie and Livingstone men.
“Look what we caught this morning, will you,” he said proudly, pointing to a fish that was at least as long as Lottie was tall.
MacLean was hacking off chunks of it and throwing them onto a brazier. “I reeled it in myself.”
“With a wee bit of help,” MacLean wryly corrected.
“You ought to have seen me, Lot!” Mathais mimicked pulling in a line before taking a whack at the fish, slicing off a chunk of the meat, and tossing it onto the brazier.
The Mackenzie men, she noticed, seemed much more relaxed than the previous day. Quite congenial, really. Two of them were engaged in a lively discussion about the price of wool, of all things.
Lottie took some of the cooked fish and some ship’s biscuits, and two flagons of beer, and left Mathais to hack away at the fish.
Morven was already in the cabin, leaning over her father, when she and Drustan entered.