Chapter Eleven
Jacob woke before the dawn.
The rain had found them sometime in the night, not gently but with purpose, drumming hard against the turf-packed roof and rattling along the single exposed wall of the shieling.
The sound filled the small space completely, steady and insistent, drowning the world beyond it.
He lay still for a time, listening, pondering the uses of rain.
Rain would muddle their trail, wash away what little sign they might leave behind.
That was good. It would also dull sound, steal warning, and keep the cold close. That would not work in their favor.
Elena slept pressed against him, warm despite the damp that lingered in her hair and shift.
She lay curled into his chest now, her stirring and turning into him being what had woken him.
His arm remained beneath her head, numb but warm, his other curved around her back, the rise and fall of her breathing felt against his palm.
The only movement between them was an absent-minded stroking of his hand along her spine.
He studied her quietly in the low gray light that seeped through the edges of the door. Sleep had softened her, smoothed the tension that had gripped her delicate brow these last few days. Her lashes rested dark against her cheeks, her mouth slightly parted as she breathed.
She murmured then, barely a sound, her brow knitting faintly as though a dream tugged at her. “Jacob,” she whispered, more breath than sound.
“I’m here,” he said mechanically, and dared to place his lips softly against her brow.
The rain continued its relentless patter.
Dawn would come gray and cold, and they could not afford to wait for it to brighten.
He had no wish to test how far the good fortune of this refuge might stretch.
The men who had chased them might have turned back at the cliff, might have told themselves no one survived such a fall—but Jacob had been taught not to chance safety on assumptions.
Before much more time had passed, he shifted carefully, easing his arm from beneath her head. She stirred but did not wake, as he rose. He drew on clothes still damp, grimacing at the contact, moving with the experience of a man who had learned to make no more noise than necessary.
He unbarred the door and stepped outside while fastening his belt and sword to his hip.
Shite, a miserable day—as expected, and then confirmed instantly as rain spit hard at his face, wrinkling his brow. He scanned the foggy gray landscape in every direction before returning to rouse Elena.
He grinned as he crouched over her, deciding that she slept more gracefully than she woke.
Her brow puckered faintly, her mouth opening in a wide, unguarded yawn that came with an unmistakable sound, and she blinked against the dim light as though personally offended by its existence.
One hand flailed briefly at the straw before finding purchase, and her hair lay every which way, matted with straw, having dried in uneven waves.
“Time to move,” he advised, rising to his full height again, collecting her garments while she sat and then groggily gained her feet.
He’d placed her gown and kirtle closest to the fire last night, and those items were the driest things, for which he was thankful.
His plaid, so thick and waterlogged last night that he could not fathom how she had managed the miles they had while wearing it, was lighter and drier now, but would only become saturated again this morning, he feared.
Still it would offer her some protection from the elements.
Within minutes of his having woken her, after they’d gone close but in different directions to see to their morning ablutions, they were on the move. Knowing she was sleep-imbued yet but wanting to at least start the day off with a brisk pace, Jacob took her hand again as they set out.
They kept to rough ground and broken lines, letting the rain do its work. The miles passed more easily than he had expected, and somewhere along the way recognition struck him clean and sure—he knew where they were.
Relief followed close on its heels. Strathfinnan lay ahead now, no great distance—five miles, perhaps less. Close enough that danger felt further away than safety.
He did not speak to his knowledge yet and would not until he was certain.
As they moved, he found himself thinking of the end of their journey, relief being overcome by something quieter and harder to name.
He would be glad to deliver Elena safely to Liam MacTavish, would be pleased to end his mother’s certain worry.
He would be glad for warmth and comfort, and for the sustenance he’d been unable to provide.
And yet—
He could not deny the other truth, the one that pressed at him as insistently as the rain: that their time together, harrowing as it had been, would end.
That the closeness born of necessity would give way to distance demanded by propriety.
She would wed another. He would step back, get on home to Blackwood, perhaps.
Or head off to war again. There would be no more nights like the one just past, no more moments unguarded to be quietly savored.
The conflict of relief and regret passed over his face, his jaw clenching and his lip curling before he forced on a mask, smoothing his expression into something purposeful and unreadable as he kept them moving through the rain.
“We’re close now,” Jacob said at last. “Few miles from Strathfinnan, maybe less.”
She looked up at him, rain clinging to her lashes. “Truly?”
“Aye.”
She didn’t smile, but her step changed all the same. The drag in it eased, her pace quickening until she no longer needed his pull to keep moving. She matched him stride for stride, lifting her face slightly as if the rain was now less of a burden than it had been a moment before.
Jacob felt a small, unexpected twinge at the sight of it.
He was glad for her—for them, for what waited ahead, for the safety so nearly won—but he didn’t miss the simple fact of her relief, how cleanly it came to her.
She was already turning toward what lay ahead, while he remained caught on what would be lost.
THE RAIN THINNED TO a fine, needling mist as they walked on, the land around them rising and falling in ways Elena did not yet recognize. Everything looked the same to her—wet grass, low stone, the dark line of a distant ridge blurred by weather.
He kept them moving with the same deliberate restraint he had all morning, his grip steady on her hand, his gaze shifting constantly, always aware, still watchful even as they were almost there.
Elena had just begun to think it excessive—surely no raiders would dare come this near a Scots’ keep again, not so soon—when Jacob stopped dead.
Jacob had her tucked tight behind the tree, his body angled in front of hers, one hand braced against the trunk as he leaned out just enough to see.
She could feel the tension in him—coiled, ready.
“Hold there!”
The voice came through the mist ahead. Elena’s breath caught, her fingers curling reflexively into Jacob’s sleeve.
He peered out from behind the tree.
Then he straightened a fraction and called out, his voice steady and carrying. “Jacob Jamison,” he said clearly. “With me, Elena MacTavish.”
For a heartbeat, nothing happened.
Then the riders moved forward at once, and Elena tensed. But Jacob did not. His tension eased completely.
He exhaled once, slow, and turned back to her. “It’s them,” he said quietly.
Before she could ask more, he stepped out from behind the tree, drawing her with him into the open.
Only then could she see what he had.
The colors struck her first—plaids unmistakable even in the gray light, Jamison and MacTavish both, riding together. And then she saw him.
Her father sat his horse like a man carved of iron, his posture fierce, his gaze already locked on her.
He did not wait for the animal to stop. He swung down in one fluid motion, boots hitting the ground hard as he strode toward her, his expression unguarded now, raw with something that made her chest seize.
“Elena.”
She tore her hand free of Jacob’s and ran.
The sound she made surprised her—broken, breathless—as she collided with her father, his arms closing around her with crushing force. He held her as though she were still a child, lifting her off the ground, his breath shuddering against her temple.
“Sweet Jesu,” he said, the words breaking apart as they left him. “Thank God. Thank God.”
Elena pressed her face into his shoulder and sobbed, finally, the sound wrung from her by exhaustion and relief and the fierce, undeniable truth of him. She clung to him as she had not since she was small, sobs wracking her body.
Behind him, Gabriel Jamison had dismounted as well, his expression rigid with control until his gaze found Jacob. Something unspoken passed between them—relief, gratitude, and the hard acknowledgment of what had been borne without witnesses.
“We were just riding out,” Gabriel said hoarsely, as if he needed to say it aloud to make sense of the timing. “Third day searching. Thought we’d missed ye again.”
Liam drew back at last, though his hands did not stray far from Elena’s shoulders, his fierce eyes scanning her face, her posture, as if cataloguing every sign of harm. Whatever he saw there nearly undid him again. He took a steadying breath, then turned sharply toward Jacob.
For a heartbeat, he only looked at him, his lips moving with emotion.
Then he stepped forward and seized Jacob by the forearm, his grip iron-hard, the gesture as much a warrior’s clasp as an embrace.
He drew him in once, briefly but powerfully, a collision of shoulders that spoke more plainly than any words might have.
“Ye brought her back to me,” Liam said, his voice rough, unpolished with emotion he did not bother to hide. “I will remember that as long as I draw breath.”