“If methodically studying the position of every man inside the MacLeod keep so I might avoid their swords and remain alive long enough to bolt out their front door counts, then absolutely.”
“Close enough,” Patrick noted. “Where’s your copy of my brother’s map?”
“Tacked helpfully to my fridge at home.”
“Then you’d best hie yourself down the meadow and get another one.”
Oliver thought that might be a very good idea indeed.
“I’ll meet you here at three tomorrow. Don’t be late.”
Oliver nodded, then watched Patrick pick up his sword and walk off with a spring in his step he couldn’t help but envy. Oliver watched him go for a moment or two, then remembered a most pressing item.
“Does this count as meditation for today?” he called.
Patrick’s succinct two-word answer in the negative was unfortunately very clear.
He smiled to himself, then gathered up his own pair of knives and trudged through the forest to what actually seemed like a spa-like retreat. At least he had a decent shower and a bed to look forward to, no matter how inadequate the latter might have been.
Bobby was waiting for him near the doorway, take-away bag in hand. Oliver took a deep breath, then sighed happily.
“Smells delicious.”
Bobby held it out. “Enjoy.” He turned away, then turned back. “Spend a night out in the wild, did you?”
Oliver nodded. “Got lost.”
Bobby snorted, then walked away, making no further comment.
Oliver found the door unlocked, which was slightly unsettling, but none of his gear had been taken, which was deeply disappointing. His clothes were flung everywhere, however, and one of his trainers had landed in the kitchen sink, but since he’d been the one doing the flinging, he wasn’t surprised. He made a thorough search of the premises and found everything else still in its place. Perhaps Patrick had assumed he’d been through enough that day without having the contents of his extended stay holiday let ransacked.
He considered what to do first, eat or shower, though he was half tempted to eat whilstinthe shower to save time. He decided he hadn’t become quite that desperate yet, so he ate half his supper, then went to wash off the Renaissance grime he’d acquired.
An hour later, he was sitting in front of the fire, meditating on things he was certain the lads couldn’t have possibly predicted. He’d taken one of the longest showers of his life, had a marvelous second half of his supper, and washed the remains of soup out of his medieval gear whilst being grateful that the fashions in the north hadn’t changed all that much over the centuries.
And that led him in a less-than-roundabout way to contemplating his trip back across those centuries and considering what he’d found there.
He hadn’t asked the exact date, but if James had been king of Scotland, it had to have been late 1500s. He suspected he might have to check Jamie’s history for the particulars, but having a pair of Cameron clansmen breaking bread with MacLeod clansmen who hadn’t slain him on sight had certainly been something he hadn’t expected.
The daughters of Ranald MacLeod had been, he had to admit, stunning. He had dated his share of very beautiful girls, true, and not because of anything he’d done. Being associated with Robert Cameron had left him encountering all sorts of people as he orbited around that family. Perhaps he wasn’t entirely ugly, because it was for damned sure those modern women hadn’t been dazzled by his conversation. His parents had, at least, provided him with straight teeth and funds for whatever sport he’d fancied at the time which had left him fit and acceptably kitted out.
Those girls back in the past, though, whilst astonishingly pretty had left him enormously uneasy. He hardly knew what to say to a modern bird. Trying to make inane small talk with a vintage Scottish lass had been beyond him.
And then there had been that girl who had spilled soup on him. He had spent more of his time watching her than was polite, but that was likely because he was almost positive he’d seen an echo of her the morning before—and ifthatwasn’t something to jot down in his book underParanormal Happenings I Should Have Extra Credit For, he didn’t know what was. Perhaps he would add his own section and demand something very dear for it.
He propped his elbow onto the arm of a ridiculously comfortable overstuffed chair, rested his chin on his fist, and allowed himself to contemplate things he suspected he shouldn’t.
He couldn’t help but wonder a bit about that woman who’d ladled his supper right onto his leg. He’d fully expected thelaird’s son to make her pay for it, which had left him easily absorbing that piece of hot-tempered backhanding. It had taken a surprising amount of self-control not to flatten the man, never mind the woman’s place in the house. Perhaps back in the day there wasn’t much distinction between servant and member of the family, not that he would have hesitated to step forward and defend her either way.
The one question he couldn’t answer was who she was and why the hell she seemed so ridiculously familiar. He would have said it was because he was fairly certain he’d seen someone just like her out of the corner of his eye, but he was also profoundly sleep deprived and very much out of his element. For all he knew, the spirulina powder he’d inadvertently sniffed the morning before whilst about his fridge investigations had left him hallucinating.
But perhaps more importantly, why was a woman that twelve of a dozen men would have looked past without hesitation have to be the one he hadn’t been able to stop watching himself? He could think of all the reasons why she wouldn’t been have found beautiful by modern standards, especially compared to the laird’s daughters, but he could think of a dozen reasons why she was far more lovely than that trio. All those things began and ended with the smile she’d given those cheeky little yobs he suspected were the laird’s grandchildren who’d mobbed her for sweets after supper.
He also suspected it might take him a while to forget the sight of it.
He realized he’d been dancing around what bothered him about the whole venture and that hadn’t been winding up in 16th-century Scotland on a whim. Something had felt… uncomfortable. Like a thunderstorm brewing that simply wouldn’t break. It was none of his affair, of course, but he couldn’t help but feel a little bothered by it just the same.
How James MacLeod managed to never get involved in any of the historical happenings he witnessed was a terrible mystery he didn’t want to solve.
