“I don’t imagine I should bother reminding you to take your sword.”
Oliver looked at him. “I won’t need it.”
Patrick sighed lightly and pushed himself to his feet. “I’ll go find you a few other things that might be useful.”
Oliver nodded his thanks, then looked at the phone in his hands. He was accustomed to finding things to help himin situ, but his options in Renaissance Scotland were very limited. He imagined he could make a fairly accurate guess about the number of clan members, and he could certainly speculate about who might have been susceptible to being swept up into group insanity, but that wasn’t useful if they became a crowd that had completely lost its mind. He was tempted to go stand in front of them and attempt a few magic tricks of the sort he’d once dazzled Jamie’s children with—
He froze. Perhaps that wasn’t such a terrible thought after all.
He looked at the phone in his hands, considered a bit longer, then dialed. Derrick Cameron answered on the second ring, which he found somewhat flattering.
“I’m afraid to ask who this is.”
“You should be,” Oliver said curtly.
There was a hint of a brief laugh. “What’s new, pussycat?”
Oliver had to unclench his jaw. “I would kill you, but your wife who is far too good for you just provided you with a daughter who might like to keep you for a few more years.”
Derrick laughed more easily that time. “We’re just taking the piss out of you, lad.”
“I can honestly not bring to mind anything I’ve ever enjoyed more,” Oliver said. “Oh, wait, yes I can. It will be in the future whilst I’m spending a fortnight plotting the demise of each of you. A fortnight for each, not a single fortnight for the whole mangy litter of you ruddy bastards.”
Derrick whistled softly. “Sounds like someone hasn’t been to his mani-pedi yet.”
“No, but I’ve been on a little jaunt to Renaissance Scotland.”
“Find anything interesting there?”
“Someone who needs to be rescued.”
Derrick was silent for a single blessed moment. “What do you need?”
Oliver absolutely refused to become maudlin, but he couldn’t help but admit that he was grateful for a collection of mates who offered aid without question. “I need a distraction.”
“What sort?”
“The sort that will take a gaggle of puritanical nutters intent on burning a woman at the stake and keep them distracted long enough for me to grab her and do a runner. I would, for obvious reasons, prefer to leave nothing substantial behind for them to lose their bloody minds over.”
Derrick didn’t hesitate. “Fireworks?”
“I was thinking so.”
“How soon do you need them?”
“Yesterday.”
“Of course you do,” Derrick said dryly. “I’m at the hall, actually, and you know what we have here in the basement. I’m guessing you don’t want to walk here and pick anything up?”
Oliver couldn’t bring himself to begin to breathe out the threats he wished he could dredge up to leave the man on the other end of the call rushing off to hide in a corner with his thumb and a selection of unfortunately on-key nursery rhymes.
Derrick was also blessedly silent for a moment. When he spoke, it was obvious he’d used his brain for something past inventing ridiculous tasks for a lad just trying to live his best life and help the girl he was fond of do the same.
“Who is she?”
“Daughter of the laird,” Oliver said grimly. “In 1583.”
“Well, I suppose you aren’t looking too far above your—”
