Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Scottie
The vibrations of her kiss with Michael and the dance at the Belly of the Beast lingered with Scottie as she got on with the business of being with her mother and stepfather, enjoying afternoon walks across the grounds before afternoon tea, dining in Monarch One, followed by reading and listening to music in the Queen’s Library.
She’d not seen Michael since leaving him on the edge of the woods. Apparently, he’d gone to Port Fressa to see his nephew’s soccer game. She was sadly relieved yet oddly missing him. Still, she determined to regain her focus, which was not Michael Cross and his kisses but her mother’s love.
Friday afternoon Scottie’s calendar reminded her of the O’Shay executive team Zoom call, so she popped in to hear how the end of the fiscal year was shaping up.
Dad, Jack Gillingham, and Cousin Blake were in the office, while CFO Doug Langford and Vice President of Sales, Tricia White, were in Boston.
Everyone was surprised to see her. Odd. Why shouldn’t she attend a senior staff call?
“I’m still a member of the executive team. I’ll be home in a few weeks.”
The meeting seemed rather benign until Jack leaned for his coffee cup and Scottie saw a reminder on the meeting board.
Fairness Option—Revised
Goldman / Morgan call Tuesday 3 p.m.
“Dad, Doug,” she said. “Why are we revising the fairness option?”
Dad shot Jack a stricken glance, making a face. “Routine, Scottie. The board asked for one.”
“Routine? That’s a three- or four-hundred-thousand-dollar ask for nothing.”
“Scottie.” Doug Langford leaned toward his screen. “We noticed Boston Brothers is now our third-largest shareholder. The fairness option is the board’s way of letting them know they don’t have the funds to buy us out.”
Scottie exhaled at that point. “They tried this before. Why aren’t we buying them out?”
“We’ve talked about it,” Dad said. “How’s Lauchtenland? How’s my princess?”
“Dad, please, I’m not a princess. I’m thinking how one day O’Shay Shirts will own Boston Brothers.”
On Sunday, she picnicked with Kate and Edric, Arabella and William, and Rachel and her new male friend, Constantin von Thalberg, a handsome aristocratic friend from the Duchy of Hessenberg.
Any remaining cares of why Dad okayed a new fairness option blew away with the North Sea wind. As they should. Initial reports indicated O’Shay Shirts was set for record profits.
What didn’t blow away was the memory of Michael’s kiss and how easily she returned to that moment in the secret passageway. She felt his hand around her waist as they danced under the LED stars wrapped around the beams of the Belly of the Beast.
A few more days and she might rid herself of her feelings for him, but he messaged her Sunday night about a trek up to Wenthelen Chapel to find some forgotten documents.
Michael: We might find evidence for or against Fickle. I’ll go alone if you don’t care to hike up the side of a mountain. I’m leaving at six a.m.
Scottie: I’ll meet you in the Grand Foyer.
No way was he making that trip without her. She ignored the twist of excitement at seeing him again.
The car ride up was comfortably quiet with Michael filling her in on his father’s discoveries and what they could expect from the chapel.
“It might be a heap of stone, rotting wood, and broken glass for all we know.”
He was easy to be with as always, but there was a cool distance about him. They stopped at the one and only outfitters at the base of the mountains for food and water, ruck sacks, hiking shoes and poles for Scottie, head lamps—“Do we really need these?”—a machete and shovel, matches and socks.
The climb began easily enough but as the late morning sun hit its peak, she was hot and tired, climbing through an overgrown trail with Michael in the lead, his arms taut as he swung the giant machete through brambles and branches.
“Hey, Cross,” she called, reaching for a low branch, minding where she planted her foot. “Go ahead and confess. Hamish Fickle paid you large sums of money to kill me.”
She paused to rest against a tree, adjusting her heavy rucksack. The climb had started at about a twenty-five-degree angle but increased around each bend.
“We’re off to solve the Fickle mystery as you requested. Carry on, Lady Royal.”
“Michael?” He paused to look down at her, his expression serious.
She smiled, dismissing what she wanted to say.
That in another world, under different circumstances, she’d fall madly in love with him.
But they weren’t in that world. They were in this world, under these circumstances. “Thanks for helping me do this.”
“Of course.” He faced forward again, the muscles in his shoulders shifting as he sliced another vine out of their path. “Take care on the rocks. They’re slippery.”
She leaned on her trekking poles and planted her next step. “Do you think this will give us any clues to the Fickle mystery?”
“I have minimal hopes, Lady Royal. But it’s a good place to start.”
They climbed higher as Michael cut a path around the hill. When they broke into a small clearing where the sunlight fell through the trees, she said, “Can we stop for a second?”
Leaning on a sizeable rock, she took a long drink from the very fancy water bottle the saleswoman sold them.
“All this gear and we’ve not crossed one stream or powered on our headlights,” she said.
“We might need the torch on our way down. Or even in the chapel.” Michael bent to move a large rock and when he did, a river of smaller rocks cascaded downhill. “Scottie, stand clear.”
She tried—by leaping to the next boulder, but it was still slick with morning dew and moss. She stumbled backward, her right foot landing on the rolling stones. Arms flailing, she caught herself on a cut vine as her left foot slipped into a crevice between the rocks and thick, bulging tree roots.
“Michael, wait, I’m stuck.” She tried to ease free from the trap as the last of the rolling pieces collected in the wedge.
“Scottie, are you all right?” He dropped his rucksack and machete, and his professional distance, and landed belly down by her leg.
“Oh man, it hurts.” Scottie tried to work her leg from the trap.
“Be still, lass.” Michael’s strong hands gripped her calf, then slid down to her ankle, checking for broken bones or cuts.
Then in masculine silence, he cleared the rocks holding her captive, one-by-one, tossing them into the forest. Perspiration collected on his smooth forehead and high cheeks, and the muscles in his arms strained against his shirt sleeve. “Can you move your foot, love?”
“I think…a little.” Scottie breathed against the pain as Michael slid his hand down to her ankle, still unable to free her foot.
“There’s a large rock in the way. It’s wedged but with wiggle room.” He unhooked the shovel from his rucksack “Our fulcrum.” Our. She liked hearing the plural pronoun. It meant they were a team again. “When I tell you, move, carefully, and breathe through the pain.”
With that, Michael leaned against the shovel’s handle, his whole body taut.
“Move, Scottie.”
She moaned as she pulled free, her ankle scraping a sharp edge.
“Gently, love. Gently.”
With a final pull, she freed her foot. Michael caught her hand before she fell back, then held her against his chest.
“Are you all right?” he said.
“I think so.” She breathed in, listening to the sound of his heartbeat, then remembered herself and her rules, and sat forward. Mercy a mighty, this relationship was complicated.
“Give me your hand. Let’s see if you can carry on?” He peered into her eyes. “Or if I’ll have to haul you round on my back.”
“Michael, I’m sorry—”
“The rocks are slick. I almost took a tumble myself.”
“No, about the other night. The kiss, the Belly of the Beast, my rules speech. I was—”
“Never mind, lass, you brought me back to reality.” He bent to inspect her calf and ankle. “There’s a mark but no blood. Your trail shoes saved you from a more serious fate.”
“I promised my dad I’d come home the same girl who left.” Was she informing him or reminding herself? She looked up, into his blue eyes. His granite features were set with the expression of one carved from a thousand-year-old family devoted to the service of others.
“Then you must do as you promised.” He returned to his professional demeanor. “Can you walk? How’s the ankle?”
Scottie hobbled forward where the ground was level. “It’s sore, but as my basketball coach used to say, ‘Rub some dirt on it and get out on the court.’”
He laughed softly. “I truly understand you a bit more now, Lady Royal.”
“Does that mean we’re friends?” She glanced up the hill, then back at Michael.
“Of course we are friends.” He offered his hand as she took up her trekking poles. “Tally ho, up the hillside we go.” Michael retrieved his rucksack, secured the shovel, then took up the machete. “We don’t have all day.”
“We literally have all day to accomplish this mission.” Scottie grinned, leaned on her trekking poles, and started up the path. “But you’re the boss, Officer Cross.”
High and higher until it seemed like they’d never arrive at the mysterious Wenthelen Chapel when around the next bend, they broke into a clearing of thick green grass, perfectly maintained with every blade the same height.
A stone path cross the lawn and along the side of weathered grey stones stacked unevenly and laced with ivy.
The high-pitched roof was covered with slate tiles and supported a tall filigree spire.
“Michael—” Scottie stepped onto the stone path and into an aura she’d never encountered. A rich, thick peace perfumed with a sweet fragrance. As if the fairylands told in stories had come to life.
“It’s safe to say someone has maintained the chapel,” he muttered, tucking the map into his rucksack. “How does the Royal Trust not know what’s going on here?”
The surrounding forest was wild but stopped on the edge of the lawn as if by an invisible barrier.