Chapter Fourteen #2
“Very well. Dirk is not well enough to go as he’d planned.” His injury deeply concerned Keegan.
“We know most of the clans between here and Murray’s holdings. We can easily secure lodgings each night of our travels.”
“’Twould be a great help to us.” Keegan had never before traveled this far south on the mainland and had met none of the chiefs or their men. If he was to be Dirk’s tanist and right hand man, he had to make good connections.
Plus, he would need all the help he could get to convince Seona’s father to allow them to wed.
∞∞∞
Seona threw off her arisaid and climbed into the high, four-poster bed.
She snuggled down and drew the covers over her head, her face still burning.
Heavens! What had just happened to her? Isobel had been right—Seona could’ve never imagined such intensity of sensation and carnal pleasure was possible.
’Twas almost like magic when Keegan had touched her.
And he hadn’t even made love to her. He had simply used his hands and his mouth.
Surely, the full bedding experience would leave her passed out on the floor.
But to have Fraser catch them… how humiliating. He must think her a harlot. She hoped he would tell no one, else she would be in deep water.
Seona wished she could talk to Keegan now and ask him about what she’d experienced.
She was certain he would be patient in explaining the sensations and teach her how lovemaking worked.
He’d already taught her shocking things about her own body.
She had not known she was capable of feeling such things.
Her physical body had been dormant and asleep until he’d awakened it with a simple touch.
Feeling calm and satiated for the first time ever, she floated off to sleep, only to be awakened what seemed a moment later by loud knocking on the door. But it couldn’t have been a moment, for bright sunlight beamed through the small window.
Saints! Had she slept half the day?
∞∞∞
Haldane MacKay and his remaining ten men had spent all night traveling from Kyle of Loch Alsh, where they’d disembarked from a galleon.
He’d had a devil of a time securing passage in Ullapool.
Linden MacKenzie certainly wasn’t going to allow it.
In fact, he’d sent the constable after Haldane and his men.
They’d escaped and hidden out for several hours.
Then, the night before, Haldane had paid a captain employed by a different shipping company a handsome sum for passage.
That bag of gold and silver McMurdo had lifted from Dirk’s tent was proving useful.
Haldane had hired several men with it, though he hadn’t paid them in full yet.
They’d have to complete the job first. But he was well aware he had to watch his back closely or any of the new men might murder him for the pouch of money.
Haldane doubted McMurdo would kill him, because he knew if Haldane was dead, his chances of securing the burial spot he coveted within Balnakeil Church would be nonexistent. In fact, McMurdo seemed like his own personal bodyguard.
Haldane grinned as he climbed the bush-covered hill near the edge of Loch Long, McMurdo scrambling up behind him.
Once they’d ascended far enough to see over the trees, the top of a gray stone castle came into view over the hilltop.
Once they climbed higher, Haldane could see that the castle stood on a tiny island at the point where three lochs met.
“Is that it?” Haldane asked.
“Aye. ’Tis Teasairg Castle.” McMurdo breathed hard from the exertion.
“It appears they have strong defenses,” Haldane muttered, watching the guards stationed on the wall-walk and the battlements.
“Without doubt. MacKenzie is a powerful chief.”
So… that’s where Seona and Dirk were. Since Dirk was injured, he was unlikely to show his face for a good long while… if he survived the wound.
Soon, several of the MacKay men would take Seona and her aunt home, toward the east. Haldane would grab her then and head back to Durness, by ship or birlinn if possible, to make it quick.
Once he reached Dunnakeil, he and his men would take the castle.
The only task left at that point would be killing Dirk.
He was still counting on McMurdo to figure out a way to take care of that problem, if an infection hadn’t already.
After descending the hill and rejoining the other men, they hid in the bushes and watched the crofter’s cottages along the edge of the loch.
Several of them showed no signs of activity this morn.
Likely, the inhabitants had taken their sheep to the high pastures on the mountains. Some wouldn’t be back until autumn.
He and his men slipped to one of the cottages near the edge of the wood, and he forced the door open.
He was right. No one inside the fully furnished home.
No food either, unfortunately. He and his men would sleep a few hours, then head out later.
He didn’t look forward to hiring a boat or ferry to take them across the loch.
’Twas money he’d rather spend for something else, but the loch was named Long for a reason, McMurdo had told him, and going around it was out of the question.
Haldane wasn’t daft enough to storm Teasairg Castle. They’d merely wait until the party escorting Seona emerged, then follow and find the best opportunity to snatch her.