By the time Ian finally neared the shore below his parents’ home, the muscles of his arms and shoulders felt ready to tear from the bone. He narrowed his eyes to peer through the freezing rain still pelting his face. Someone was on the beach waving his arms.
It was Niall. Ian’s heart dropped to his boots. Teàrlag was right. Something had gone wrong. He jumped out of the boat and splashed toward shore, hauling the boat with him, as Niall waded into the rough surf to help.
“They’ve got Sìleas,” Niall shouted over the wind and rain whipping around them, as he grabbed the other side of the boat.
“Who has her?” Ian shouted back.
“The MacKinnons and her step-da,” Niall said, and Ian could see that his brother was near tears. “Angus was with them.”
Ian slammed his fist against the boat. God, no!
As soon as they had lugged the boat above the tide line, Niall told him in a rush of words what had happened.
The MacKinnon devils had taken Ian’s wife—and almost killed his brother.
“I tried to save her,” Niall said in a choked voice.
Ian clenched his jaws against the rage surging inside him and squeezed his brother’s shoulders. “I know ye did.”
“Ian! Niall!”
At the shouts, Ian looked up to see Gòrdan running toward them along the path above the shore.
“Tell me the MacKinnons did not take her,” Gòrdan called out, as he scrambled down the bank to them.
How did Gòrdan know it was the MacKinnons? Murder pulsed through Ian’s veins. He pulled his dirk and started toward Gòrdan. “What do ye know of this?”
Niall held Ian’s arm. “Gòrdan wouldn’t harm Sìleas. Let him talk.”
Gòrdan had the wild eyes of a distraught man, and he had come to find them. Ian lowered his dirk, but he did not put it away.
“When Sìleas came to talk to me last night, my mother thought she was making plans to leave ye—to marry me,” Gòrdan said, looking pained. “She sent the boy who works for me out in the night to Knock Castle. She gave him a message for Murdoc, telling him that the four of ye had brought Sìleas back from Stirling and were here at your folks’ house. The boy just told me about it now.”
After Niall told Gòrdan what happened, Gòrdan sank to the wet sand and held his head. Ian left him on the beach without a backward glance. Damn Gòrdan and his mother.
“Murdoc will have Sìleas inside Knock Castle by now,” he said to Niall, as they headed up to the house. “I’ve got to get her out.”
Ian clenched his fists, remembering the scars Murdoc put on her back. He was going to kill him, regardless. But if Murdoc had laid a hand on her, he would tear him limb from limb.
“Ian,” his brother said, turning worried eyes on him. “She let Murdoc believe that ye don’t care for her and that ye never… well, that your marriage was not completed.”
Ian waited for the rest.
“He intends to wed her to Angus.”
The thought of Angus’s meaty hands on Sìleas’s delicate skin made his own hands shake with fury. He had to rescue her—and quickly. If he did not save her before Angus raped her, he would never forgive himself. Never.
He could not allow his rage to cloud his thinking. He forced himself to focus his thoughts on the problems before him. The first thing he had to do was make a plan to get Sìleas out of Knock Castle. Then, once he had her safe, he needed to save his clan from Hugh. With the others injured, there was no one else to do it.
He took what comfort he could from her whispered message to Niall. Tell Ian I’ll be waiting for him. She believed he could not fail her.
He’d always had Connor, Duncan, and Alex at his side. As bairns, they played together. As lads, they learned to sail and to swing their first claymores together. As men, they fought side by side. Through the years, they had taken countless foolish risks together and saved each others’ lives. They watched each others’ backs.
Now, when Ian needed them more than ever before, he was on his own.
“Ye have me and da,” his brother said, as if reading his thoughts.
Ian almost laughed. If he added Father Brian, he’d have a new foursome. But a one-legged man, a fifteen-year-old lad, and a priest were poor substitutes for experienced Highland warriors in their prime.
“Should I gather what men I can?” Niall asked.
“Men were willing to fight with us because they believed Connor could be our new chieftain,” Ian said, shaking his head. “Hugh will be spreading the word that Connor is dead or gone. Until Connor is on his feet again, it would put him in danger for us to let it be known he survived the attack.”
“Then what will we do?” Niall asked.
“We’ll do what Highlanders always do when our enemy is stronger,” Ian said, meeting his brother’s eyes.
“What’s that?” Niall asked.
“We’ll use deceit and trickery, of course.”