Page 82 of His Secret Highland Bride

“She didn’t come down the stairs,” Joshua said.

“But she ran this way and did not come back up,” the laird said.

“Christ save us, the witch moves like a specter,” the other guard said while crossing himself.

Lindsay didn’t believe such a thing. She tried to think of what Deirdre would do next. She must have slinked past them in the hall while they were dealing with the fire.

“Where is her chamber? She won’t want to leave the rest of the money.”

Lindsay followed the man down the corridor toward Deirdre’s chamber as Joshua ordered the warriors to search every room.

Halfway down the corridor, she saw Deirdre fumbling with a key in a door. Lindsay assumed it was her bedchamber. Of course she would have kept the room locked. She wouldn’t have trusted a maid to clean it and find all the loot she’d hidden inside. A thief afraid of being robbed. It was poetic that it kept her from getting to the money herself.

Lindsay rushed forward with the laird and the guard pushing closer. She saw the fear in the woman’s eyes when she realized she wasn’t going to retrieve her spoils. She raced in the opposite direction, just as Meaghan stepped out of a room at the other end of the corridor.

Pulling a dirk from her waist, Deirdre grasped onto Meaghan and held the blade to her throat. Meaghan’s hand went instinctively to the slight bump of her stomach where her child grew.

“Stay back or I’ll have no choice but to kill her,” Deirdre said as Meaghan stared past Lindsay with fear in her eyes.

Joshua gasped and held his arms out, blocking anyone from moving forward. “Hold. She has my wife.”

Lindsay watched in horror as a drop of blood welled on her cousin’s neck when Deirdre attempted to pull Meaghan toward the steps on the far side of the castle. They had to get Meaghan away from her before she was harmed. Deirdre was desperate for escape, her eyes flicking from side to side as if searching for a way out.

Lindsay remembered her training with her father’s retainers. When they’d left Riccarton for Cluny, her guard had told her to fall or fake a swoon if she were captured. It was more difficult for someone to lift dead weight.

“Meaghan, I hope you don’t faint!” Lindsay shouted her hint to the other woman.

A warrior behind Lindsay sniffed as if she had lost her mind. “Why would ye say such a thing? It’s clear she’s already frightened.”

But Joshua understood and nodded.

“Aye. Should you need to swoon, I’d understand,” he called.

Awareness flared in Meaghan’s eyes, and with a quick nod, she went slack and slipped down Deirdre’s body to slump on the floor. Deirdre tugged at her arm, but when Meaghan didn’t move, Deirdre realized her only option was to flee. She turned to run as Joshua flicked a blade through the air. It caught Deirdre in the arm, causing her to cry out, but she kept running. The men continued on down the stairs after Deirdre while Lindsay stopped to see to her shaking cousin.

“Are you hurt?” Lindsay asked.

“Nay, but I was so afraid I’d be killed.” She pulled in air, her eyes pooling with tears. “All I could think about was the babe.” She placed a loving hand on her stomach.

As she held her cousin and tried to soothe her rattled nerves, Lindsay considered her own situation. Seeing her cousin rounded with child had caused a small flare of jealousy, but it was quickly pushed away by her joy for Meaghan and Joshua. But now she thought of the last time she’d had her courses. Could she be…?

Lindsay was helping Meaghan to her feet when Joshua rushed to his wife.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, his eyes frantic.

“Nay. I’m fine. Did you get her?”

He shook his head and fisted his hand in anger. “She must’ve been prepared for a quick escape. She slipped away into the woods. We found a place that had been dug up.”

“The money,” Lindsay whispered. “I must check her room.”

Joshua called for a man to send the chatelaine, who pulled the chain of keys from her waist and made quick work of opening the door. Lindsay coughed from the smog of heavy perfumes in the room. It looked like the room of a queen. Ornate gilding, jewels, and silks gave the impression that someone of great wealth stayed there rather than a vicious criminal.

They searched the room.

Under the bed, Lindsay found two leather bags, heavy with coin. She closed her eyes in relief. She guessed it wouldn’t all be recovered; some of it had surely been buried in the hole they’d found in the woods. But to recover anything pleased Lindsay. The money would be returned to the MacPhersons so the clan would have enough food for the winter. Did that mean she’d be returning to Cluny as well?

One of Joshua’s men came in to give him a report. “She stole someone’s horse and ran. Six warriors are giving chase.”