Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Scott & Elodie’s cottage
“Do you have any idea how worried we were?”
From his position on the sofa, Luke stared across the room at his daughter, Willa, who paced agitatedly before him. He opened his mouth to reply, but she kept talking.
“You couldn’t have gotten word to me or Scott?” she demanded, her blue eyes flashing in fury as she jabbed a finger at her brother, who sat in a chair to Luke’s left. “I thought you were dead!”
Luke ran a hand through his dark hair that was getting grayer each time he looked in the mirror. Willa had been ranting like this for ten minutes. He didn’t have the heart to tell her that if he hadn’t witnessed Diana Barclay being stabbed by her youngest son, they still wouldn’t know where he was.
Jasper stepped in front of Willa and folded her into his arms. She clung to him, her fingers curling tightly in Jasper’s shirt sleeves.
Luke had had a wee bit of time to watch his baby girl and her beau together.
Willa had found love. And more importantly, that love was returned.
Luke studied Jasper as the man bent his dark head and whispered something in Willa’s ear.
His daughter wound her arms around Jasper, her shoulders shaking as she cried.
It tore him up to see his daughter cry. And knowing he was responsible for her anguish only made it harder to bear.
There was no manual for becoming a parent.
No one had ever warned Luke that the older a child got, the more a parent worried.
And no matter how many times he thought he was doing the right thing, it never seemed to work out as he had hoped.
He drew in a deep breath and slid his gaze to his son, finding Scott’s blue eyes leveled on him. Scott hadn’t said much after their embrace at being together again, but Luke knew he had questions. They all did.
Whether he could—or should—answer them was something else.
When someone touched his arm, Luke swiveled his head to find Elodie setting a steaming mug of tea on the coffee table in front of him.
She gave him a quick smile full of sadness and shoved her long, blond hair over her shoulder as she straightened to take the other chair in the living room.
The five of them had decided to have this gathering at Scott and Elodie’s instead of at Carwood Manor, where everyone would hear.
Luke would eventually have to talk to the rest of the group, but this was for family only.
Luke scooted to the edge of the cushion and propped his forearms on his knees, clasping his hands together. He cleared his throat and said into the silence, “You may no’ agree, lass, but I did what I had to do to keep you alive.” He looked from Jasper to Scott and then to Elodie. “All of you.”
“We’ve been handling things here. Which you would know if we had spoken,” Scott stated.
His voice was calm, but resentment tinged every syllable.
Luke didn’t know what was worse: Willa’s outburst or Scott’s muted restraint.
Both were as biting as blades. Best he started at the beginning, where everything had gone sideways.
All for an ancient book with generations of Druid spells and who knew what else.
“After Willa and I figured out Beth’s routine and made a play for the book, we went after it,” Luke began after taking a sip of tea.
He would’ve preferred a dram of whisky, but he would save that for later.
“Beth was waiting for us. Before I knew it, her two guards were in the room with us. That’s when I shouted for Willa to leave.
We had a plan should anything go wrong. We were to split up and meet back at the flat.
We both got out, but that’s when I realized how easy it had all been. ”
Scott’s blue eyes narrowed in confusion. “What do you mean?”
Luke glanced at Willa to find her watching him.
He would rather go to his grave not revealing the next part, but there was no getting around it.
His children wouldn’t relent until they knew every detail.
Better to rip off the Band-Aid now. “Beth didna lift a finger against us. She held the book to her chest, observing Willa and me fighting her bodyguards, smiling all the while.”
“She didn’t strike you at all?” Elodie asked, her brow furrowed in puzzlement.
Luke shook his head. “We got into her place too easily, and…” He paused and ran a hand over his jaw.
“We got out too easily. I saw Willa leave, and a bodyguard followed. I knocked out the guard coming after me with the intention of catching up to Willa, but I only got two steps away when something took over my body.”
He tried not to think about how effortlessly Beth had used the magic—or how helpless he had been.
Those ninety-three minutes were the worst of his life.
And they still haunted him. Delving into the story and the memories took him back to that night, and the terror that had wrapped its frosty, gaunt hands around him.
And squeezed.
He closed his eyes, hearing the screams as if from a distance, all the while knowing it was his hands hurting others, his body attacking. His eyes watching it all.
“Dad?”
Willa’s soft voice penetrated the memories, making them scatter.
Luke met her gaze as she untangled from Jasper’s arms and came to sit beside him.
She took one of his hands, and he gratefully threaded his fingers with hers.
It had been him and the kids for a long time after his wife died.
Willa and Scott had been his whole life.
Now, Elodie and Jasper were his kids, too.
He would die for the four of them. And in some ways, he wished he had.
Jasper leaned a shoulder against the hearth. “I’ve found it’s just easier to let it out.”
Luke squeezed the bridge of his nose with the thumb and forefinger of his free hand.
Jasper was right. It’d be better to get it over with.
He dropped his hand and paused for another heartbeat before saying, “Beth wanted us to enter her residence because she wished to try a spell she found in the book.”
“What kind of spell?” Elodie asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Luke couldn’t look any of them in the eye. “One to take over another’s body.”
Willa squeezed his hand, but Luke still couldn’t meet her gaze.
He’d break if he did. He was barely holding it together as it was.
He focused on the mug of tea that was growing cold on the table.
“She gained control of me. I never saw it coming. It happened before I even realized it. Then she made me do…terrible things,” he rasped, the weight of the words crashing into him.
“I saw it all—heard it all—but I couldna stop it, no matter how hard I tried. For a little over an hour and a half, I was forced to do her bidding.”
His hand shook as he ran it down his face.
If he lived a thousand years, he would never forget the sight of the bodies around him.
“I feared I might run into Willa. I kept praying that she’d made it out and got away.
I did everything I could think of to regain control of my body, but it was like I was a fly trying to knock over a mountain.
Her control was absolute, her power undeniable.
And then, it just suddenly stopped.” He snapped his fingers. “Just like that.”
Scott asked, “How did you finally break away?”
Luke slid his gaze to his oldest child. “I didna. Something happened to her. She doubled over and dropped the book. The moment the link between us was severed, I ran back to the flat for Willa.” He looked at her. “You were no’ there.”
“They chased me through the city. I managed to get out and came here,” she said.
Luke nodded. “I know.”
“How did you know?” Jasper asked coolly.
Scott grunted. “I was wondering the same thing.”
“It took some doing,” Luke explained. “But after I scoured the city and spent days watching both Beth and George, I realized that Willa had managed to leave the city. I was being hunted, which made it difficult for me to reach out. I didna know what was happening on Skye, and I couldna take the chance that someone would be harmed just because I rang my children.”
Willa wiped at her wet cheeks. “You got out of Edinburgh, though. Where did you go? Why not come to Scott and me?”
“I didna leave at once. In my surveillance of George, I discovered that she was taking meetings with the London Druids.” Luke blew out a breath. “I knew something was going on, and I wanted to find out what it was.”
Elodie asked, “Did you?”
“I know George had dozens of meetings with London that no one knew about. There were other meetings with Beth, but not even she knew what George was doing behind everyone’s back.
One night, I followed George to the docks and saw her board a yacht.
Ten people got off while she talked to someone on the ship for thirty minutes.
She left with a smile, and those who disembarked followed her into the city, where she set them up in flats.
I tried to follow them, but they were good at going undetected. Better than most, actually.”
Elodie crossed one long leg over the other. “We’ve known George’s connection to London for a bit. We wondered how long it had been going on, and you’ve now given us a timeframe.”
“I’m no’ sure what good that does. George and the Edinburgh Druids can cause trouble, but London is after much more,” Luke said.
Willa leaned back against the cushion. “And Beth still has the book.”
“Until London tries to get it from her,” Scott said.
Luke shook his head. “They willna be able to. She was toying with me. I doona care to ever get close enough for that to happen again, and all of you should feel the same.”
“We need to figure out how to counteract such a spell,” Jasper said.
Willa twisted her lips. “That’ll be difficult since we don’t know what the spell is. It’s like trying to write a word when you don’t know the alphabet.”
“We have to start somewhere,” Jasper argued.
Elodie propped her chin on her fist. “I agree that we need to have something in place for such a spell. We need to share this with Bronwyn since she’s Beth’s cousin,” Elodie told Luke.
“How long have you been on the isle?” Scott asked him.
Luke had hoped that question wouldn’t be posed, but he had known it was wishful thinking. “Four weeks or so.”
“Four?” Willa repeated, shock raising her voice.
He covered her hand with his. “A couple of the London Druids caught me trailing them. There was an encounter. One of them got away, but I took care of the other. My time in the city was over, but I couldna head straight to Skye. I detoured to a few other places to see if anyone followed me.”
“Did they?” Jasper asked.
Luke nodded. “The first time they attempted to take me back to Edinburgh. The next three, they wanted to end my life. I got away, but no’ without some wounds. I laid low and eventually made my way to Skye. From there, I set about finding you two,” he said, looking from Willa to Scott.
“Where did you stay?” Scott asked.
Luke shrugged. “Anywhere. Everywhere. Mostly, I took refuge in caves.”
Elodie lowered her arm and rested it on the arm of the chair. “Mom said you knew who she was, and that you knew Diana Barclay, as well as her husband’s name.”
“You’d be amazed at the things a person can learn when hiding and listening. One of the London Druids mentioned Diana’s name when I first trailed them in Edinburgh. They also talked about her husband, Reginald. And both her sons.”
“Kurt and Parker,” Jasper said.
Luke dipped his head in acknowledgment. “I slipped into the local library and used their computers to do a little research to discover more.”
“How much more did you find out?” Willa asked.
“Well,” Luke said, “I learned about Scott and Elodie, which led me to the MacLean family.”
Elodie’s lips tightened slightly. “And my mum.”
“Aye. I also learned about Willa and Jasper, as well as his mother, and the fact that he was kidnapped from Skye as a baby.” Luke looked each of them in the eye. “Whether you believe it or no’, I didna stay away because I wanted to. I kept my distance to watch over you.”