“Exactly. If I hear a scream followed by a thud, I’ll know to step over something.”
I shake my head but step inside. The air is cool, damp, heavy with the scent of old stone.
“This is fascinating,” I murmur, running a hand over the rough masonry. “These walls have probably seen generations of McGregors plotting against the McKenzies.”
“And vice versa, I imagine,” Keira adds, closing the door softly behind us. “Schemes and grudges—it’s a shared family tradition.”
She switches on a small flashlight, its narrow beam guiding us forward.
“Why all the secrecy, Keira? Why not just bring me in through the front door? I’m supposed to be your fiancé, after all.”
She slows, answering in a low voice. “No McKenzie has ever been allowed into the family archives. It’s one of the few places my father considered truly sacred.”
“Then why bring me?”
She stops and turns to face me. In the dim light, her expression is both serious and vulnerable.
“Because I think what you found in your archives might connect to something in ours. And because… I trust you. As strange as that sounds.”
The admission hits me harder than I expect. Me—a McKenzie—trusted by a McGregor with access to their most guarded secrets. If our ancestors could see this, they’d probably choke on their whisky.
“I won’t betray that trust.”
I surprise myself with how sincere I sound.
“You’d better not. Or I’ll tell the entire world that the great Alistair McKenzie sleeps with a nightlight.”
“Very funny.”
“I’m starting to figure you out. You’re too easy to provoke.”
The passage opens into a wider corridor inside the castle. Keira switches off her flashlight—the dim wall sconces are enough.
“The archives are on the second floor, east wing,” she explains. “We cross the main gallery and take the grand staircase.”
“Simple, fast, discreet,” I mutter. “What could possibly go wrong?”
“Follow me—and act like you belong here.”
“Hard to do when every portrait on these walls looks like it’s silently saying ‘McKenzie, leave.’”
“They do that to everyone—even me,” she says. “The McGregors mastered the art of disapproval long before photography.”
We move quietly through elegant corridors, Keira leading with ease. Unlike the modern McKenzie home, everything here breathes history—dark wood paneling, ancient tapestries, weapons mounted on the walls. It’s like walking through a history book where my family plays the villain.
We near an intersection when Keira suddenly freezes.
“Someone’s coming,” she whispers, grabbing my arm and pulling me into a side corridor.
I’m pressed against the wall beside a particularly menacing suit of armor, Keira tight against me in the narrow space. Her scent—heather and something indefinable but unmistakably her—wraps around me, making the proximity far more distracting than it should be.
Footsteps echo closer.
“Mademoiselle Keira?” calls Jamison’s refined voice. “Is that you?”
Keira shoots me a panicked look, then composes herself and steps slightly forward, leaving me hidden.
“Jamison!” she says with forced brightness. “What a surprise to see you at this hour!”
