CHAPTER FOUR #4
Tabby wanted to scream as it arced down toward her. Watching that blade descend was the most horrifying moment of her life. She had made a mistake; she was going to die. But it was Angel who screamed, as the sword came between them.
For one more moment, he held her. Then, as Angel’s head toppled away from his shoulders, she was in a headless man’s arms. He collapsed and she was released. The children screamed. Tabby jumped away, shocked.
The Highlander had beheaded Angel while he held her. He could have taken her head, too!
Aghast, she met his gaze. Then she saw the blond sub pointing a big black gun at him from behind.
She gasped as it went off.
He turned, and silver blazed from his hands. The blonde was hurled back again, and this time, as he hit the wall and crumbled to the floor, Tabby knew he was dead.
And then Tabby ran to the children, urging them to crowd around her. “Don’t look over there!” She had never seen a man decapitated before. Of course she hadn’t. This was New York City, 2008, not Scotland in 1550. She choked back bile and fear.
Most of the kids were crying. Bobby Wilson wanted to go home. As they huddled tightly together, several in her arms, she tried to get past her horror and shock. He had saved her life. He had done what he had been taught to do. He was the product of his violent, barbaric times.
But he had beheaded Angel while she was in his arms.
“The fire is spreadin’,” he said, and she felt him standing behind her. “Ye need to take the children from here.”
Tabby turned to look at him, incapable of saying a word, her pulse soaring. She met his dark, intense blue eyes, eyes she had seen at the Met—and in her dreams.
“Ye dinna wish fer me to kill the boys?” His blue gaze chilled. “They intended fer ye to die a verra unpleasant death.”
And that was when she realized he wasn’t the same Highlander—not exactly.
He was the same man she’d briefly seen and touched at the Met, she had not a single doubt.
But he wasn’t blistered and burned. His hard, determined face was scratched from glass, and he had a scar on one high cheekbone, but there were no burns, no blood, no blisters.
In fact, he was damned gorgeous. His tunic was bloodstained, and there were cuts on his arms, face and legs from leaping through the glass, but he had not been in a fire recently. This man had not been at An Tùir-Tara.
Instead, he looked exactly as she had imagined he would before ever being in that fire.
“You’re not from Melvaig or 1550, are you?” she somehow said.
His face tightened with obvious displeasure. “Nay.”
She breathed hard, uncertain. Was he angry? If so, why? She wanted to back up, but she needed to get the children to safety. “Can you get the door open for us?” As she spoke, the school’s fire alarms finally went off.
For one more instant, his gaze held hers, searing in its intensity. Then he strode to the classroom door and wrenched it off its hinges. Tabby somehow smiled to reassure the children and she began herding them quickly that way. Behind her, there was an explosion.
The children screamed but Tabby cried, “Walk, don’t run.
Everything is fine.” The Highlander stepped to the first child and took his hand, restraining little Paul Singh from running, clearly understanding that they must proceed without panic.
She glanced behind her and saw that pieces of pipe and the plaster ceiling had collapsed and fallen to the floor.
In the hall, faculty were evacuating the children, trying to maintain a calm and orderly manner, as if this were a fire drill.
The principal, Holz Vanderkirk, and Kristin came running up to them.
“Are you all right?” Kristin cried, seizing her arm, her eyes wide and trained upon the Highlander. Police sirens sounded, screaming.
Kristin and Holz were clearly assuming that he was the Sword Murderer and a threat to them all.
Tabby wanted to explain that there had been an attempted witch burning and that the Highlander had saved her and the children.
She turned to face him, instead. “It’s all right,” she cried, when she knew no such thing.
His blue gaze met hers. It was the gaze of a professional soldier, devoid of all feeling and all fear. Then he turned and hurried back into the burning schoolroom.
Tabby screamed, “Come back!” She was afraid for him.
He ran into the fire as the ceiling began to fall in. Plaster and pipe hit him, but if the debris hurt him, he gave no sign. She froze in horror as he skirted the blaze, heading for the shattered window. Suddenly the fire exploded again, and then a wall of fire separated them.
Her insides curdled.
Standing on the other side of the fire wall, by the window, he paused and looked at her.
Every horrific emotion she’d felt yesterday at the Met flooded her, incapacitated her. The feeling of déjà vu was intense. There was outrage, fury, there was horror and dread. And there was love—the kind of love she had never felt before, but had dreamed of.
She loved him.
An expression of bewilderment crossed his dark face.
The fire wall blazed between them.
Even if he wanted to, he could not cross it.
He turned and leaped out of the window; Tabby felt her legs give way.