Chapter 6
Violet felt her heart pound harder than usual as she backed away with the baby held tight against her chest.
“Henry?”
He stood three paces from her on the garden path, dressed as if he had stepped out of a London drawing room instead of across the rough outer grounds of Moore Castle.
His coat was cut too finely for the Highland mud, and his boots were polished. A silver-topped cane rested in one gloved hand, though she had never once seen him use it.
His face showed concern, but she knew him too well to trust it.
“Violet,” Henry said softly. “I must say, you led me on quite a chase.”
Her arms tightened around the baby. “What are ye doing here?”
Henry frowned as if the answer to that question was the most obvious thing in the world. “Well, finding my sister’s child, of course. Is that not obvious?”
The baby shifted against her, his small face tucked near the edge of the blanket. Violet turned slightly, placing more of her body between Henry and him.
“How did ye find us?”
“I followed you.” Henry’s mouth curved with faint patience. “It seemed the only way, since Father saw fit to hide matters from me.”
His tone did not sit well with her.
He did not talk about his nephew with grief. He did not ask whether the child had been warm, fed, or held. He spoke of him like something misplaced and recovered through inconvenience.
“Ye shouldnae be here,” Violet said.
“And why should I have left him to strangers?”
Violet took a step back. “He isnae alone.”
Henry’s gaze dropped to the baby. “No. I see that.”
“He is safe.”
“Safe?” His eyebrows lifted. “In a Highland castle with a man who has already trapped you in marriage?”
Violet went still.
What?
Henry’s face softened, which made it worse. “You would be surprised at the things people talk about when you ply them with so much ale.”
Violet exhaled.
Me trick.
The garden path behind her curved toward the castle entrance.
Too far. The study window sat above, high and useless from where she stood.
A guard should have been near the archway, but she saw no one close enough to call without frightening the baby or making Henry move.
So she decided to do what she thought was safest and kept talking.
“If ye followed me, then ye ken I found him,” she said. “Ye can go back to England.”
“Oh, you do not have to talk to him about that. I can take him back myself.”
Violet’s blood ran cold. “Nay.”
“Violet.” Henry sighed, as if she had disappointed him over tea. “Do not make this uglier than it must be. Jane was my sister. Her child belongs with her family.”
“Jane gave him to me.”
His fingers tightened on the cane. “Jane was fevered. She did not know what she was doing.”
“She was his mother.”
“And I am his uncle.”
“Then act like one and stop frightening him.”
His lips thinned. “He is Jane’s child. You know very well how this works.”
“Aye,” Violet said. “And he is mine now.”
At once, Henry’s expression lost its careful grief, and something hard moved beneath it. He stepped forward, and Violet felt her heart drop.
Without a second thought, she turned to shield the baby and tried to retreat, but Henry caught the blanket before she could twist away.
“Give him back,” she snapped.
“You forget your place,” Henry said, his voice low.
“Me place is wherever he is.”
She grabbed his sleeve with one hand and held the baby with the other, but Henry was stronger and ready. He tore the child from her arms with a sharp pull. The baby cried, the sound high and terrified.
Violet lunged for him, but Henry shoved her hard. Her back struck the rough stone edge beside the path, pain splintering across her shoulder. She pushed off it at once, refusing to give up.
“Give him to me.”
Henry held the crying baby against his chest with an awkward, possessive grip. “You have done enough. What is your deal with the child anyway?”
Violet seized his cane and yanked. “He is frightened.”
“Oh, trust me, he will live.”
That did it.
She clawed at his sleeve again, reaching for the baby’s blanket. Henry twisted out of her grasp, and the baby wailed harder.
Then a voice cut through the grounds.
“Take yer hands off him.”
Henry froze, and Violet felt the blood in her veins thicken. She didn’t need to turn around to know who it was.
Connor crossed the open space with Alex close behind him, sword already drawn. His gaze moved first to the baby, then to Violet’s shoulder where she had hit the stone, then to Henry’s hand gripping the baby too tightly. The anger on his face did not burn. It went cold.
“Stay back,” Henry said quickly. He shifted the baby higher, placing the child between himself and Connor’s blade. “You would not risk him now, would you?”
Connor stopped several paces away, and Alex halted at an angle to his left.
“Hand the bairn back to Violet,” Connor bit out.
“Why? So she can keep playing mother?”
“Now.”
Henry laughed, but the sound was strained at the edges. “What are you going to do? Kill me while I’m holding a baby?”
Connor lifted his sword and extended it so it pointed at Henry. “Exactly that.”
Violet’s breath caught. Henry believed him. She could see it in the flicker in his eyes, in the way his mouth tightened, in the way his grip shifted around the baby.
“Alex,” Connor said.
“Aye?”
Henry’s eyes darted between them. “Do not come closer.”
“Ye came to me home,” Connor said. “Ye touched me bride, and ye held me bairn like a shield. Ye lost the right to give orders.”
Alex moved, slow and measured, toward Henry’s weaker side. Henry saw him and jerked back. Connor stepped in at the same instant, his blade angling high toward Henry’s throat. Henry flinched, but then Connor’s sword swung down.
The cut opened across Henry’s forearm, shallow, precise, and brutal enough to make his fingers loosen. He cried out, and Alex moved before the baby slipped, catching him cleanly against his chest and turning away.
The baby screamed once against Alex’s plaid.
“Take him inside,” Connor ordered.
“Aye, me Laird.”
Violet started toward them, but Connor’s hand lifted once, warning her back without looking away from Henry. Alex carried the baby toward the castle, one broad hand supporting the tiny head with surprising care.
Henry swung the cane, and Connor caught the blow with his forearm, stepped inside it, and struck Henry across the jaw with the hilt of his sword. Henry staggered backward as a thin blade slid free from the cane with a metallic hiss.
Violet’s stomach dropped.
Thankfully, Connor saw it and moved first.
The sound of steel clashing against steel immediately rang through the air. Henry’s hidden blade clattered to the stones while Connor drove him backward with two fast strikes, then hooked a boot behind his ankle and sent him down hard.
Henry landed on his back with a wheeze, his bleeding arm clutched to his chest. Connor pressed the sword’s tip to his throat.
“Wait,” Henry gasped. “He was my sister’s child.”
“Then ye should have honored her wishes.”
Henry scoffed, a bruise darkening on his jaw. “Oh, please. You know nothing about Jane, you brute.”
Connor stepped forward. “I ken the society that shunned her willnae raise her son.”
Henry’s face twisted. “You cannot keep him from his own kin.”
Connor’s blade pressed hard enough that Henry stopped breathing for a moment. Violet stood rigid beside the stone edge, one hand braced against it, her shoulder throbbing and her arms empty.
Connor looked down at Henry.
“I will treat this as grief this time,” he said. “I will let this slide because I want to believe ye are hurting. Come for him or Violet again, set one foot on Moore land again, and grief willnae save ye.”
Henry swallowed. “You have no right.”
Connor lowered his sword by an inch. “I am a Highlander, sir. Having a sword is enough.”
Two guards came running from the archway, and all the while, Connor did not look away from Henry.
“Escort him out of here,” he ordered. “One of ye will follow him until he crosses into England. If he turns back, bring me word.”
Henry pushed himself upright with a wince, blood staining his sleeve. His eyes found Violet.
“This is not finished,” he spat.
Connor stepped between them as the guards hauled him up and dragged him toward the gate. He watched until they had him moving, then turned away before the man disappeared from sight.
Violet stared at the door through which Alex had carried the baby.
Henry’s voice still scraped at the edges of her mind, and the baby’s cries lingered worse, even though he was nowhere around. She could feel the sudden absence of him in her arms, the empty curve where his small weight had been, and her fingers curled uselessly into her gown.
Connor turned toward her with his sword still in his hand.
“Are ye hurt?” he asked.
Violet shook her head. “Nay.”
“Look at me when ye answer.”
She dragged her gaze from the door to his face. His eyes were dark and fixed on her with the same sharp attention he had given Henry, only a bit softer now.
For some reason, that made it harder to breathe.
“I am nae hurt,” she said.
Connor looked at the guard behind her. “Ye.”
The guard straightened near the archway. “Me Laird?”
“Go to the nursery. Bring news about the bairn.”
“Aye, me Laird.” The guard left almost immediately.
At that, Violet decided to turn. “I should go in meself.”
“In a moment.”
She exhaled. “I need to see him.”
“And ye will.”
Violet stood steady, despite the pain throbbing in her shoulder. “I need to see him now.”
Connor’s gaze moved over her face, then to her shoulder where it had hit the stone. “Walk, then.”
Violet swallowed. Suddenly, the pain grew twofold, and her vision blurred at the edges.
Connor remained where he stood, watching her with narrowed eyes. It was as if he were waiting to be proven right.
She was going to prove him wrong.
She took one step forward, and almost immediately, the ground tilted beneath her feet. She caught a flash of stone, the sleeve of Connor’s shirt, the harsh line of his jaw. Then his arm came around her waist, hard and sure, stopping her before her knees gave way.