Either way, he would be facing death.
He listened to Simon and Gerald discuss things as if they were standing in a pleasant garden, not a sewer. Gerald’s accent wasn’t terribly good, but his Gaelic was adequate and he freely admitted that he was a MacLeod turncoat. Nathaniel could see why that would send shivers of delight down Simon’s spine.
“Then we don’t really needhim, do we?” Simon was saying.
“Don’t slay him yet,” Gerald said, with surprising deference. “I’ll wring things out of him first. Family things.”
Simon frowned, then shrugged. “As you will. If you can bear being down here for as long as that takes.”
“I live to aid you, my laird.”
Nathaniel had to admit that if there was anything in this world or the next that Gerald MacLeod excelled at, it was sucking up. Nathaniel thought that deference bordered on sycophancy, but what did he know? He was the one, after all, sitting in the muck in chains while Gerald was free and now holding on tohisdagger. Perhaps he should have taken a few cues from his cousin.
A ladder was provided, Simon clambered up it, then Gerald put his hand on the wood to steady himself. Actually, Nathaniel supposed Gerald didn’t fancy finding himself locked below and that was simply a bit of security against the same, but in that he couldn’t blame his cousin. He would have done the same thing in his place.
“Interesting place you have here,” Gerald drawled.
Nathaniel yawned, though that cost him quite a bit. “Thought I would spend a week or so slumming. Local flavor and all that.”
“Oh, I think you’ll be here longer than that.”
Nathaniel looked at him evenly. “What do you want, Ger?”
“That should be obvious, even for an idiot like you. I want everything you have.”
“Don’t you have enough of your own?” Nathaniel asked wearily.
“I want yours.”
“Your father has been dead for years,” Nathaniel said, supposing he would be doing his uncle John a favor by keeping a few details about the man’s whereabouts to himself. “You have all his—”
“Grandfather has all his money,” Gerald spat. “He made my sister trustee.”
“Then you’ll have all Grandfather’s—”
“He madeyouhis heir, you stupid bastard!”
Nathaniel shifted to settle the rat atop his head more carefully, then paused to wonder if his buddy might be willing to venture south and clean out his ear for him because he was just certain he’d heard that incorrectly. “He what?”
“He changed his will! Two bloody years ago. Weren’t you paying attention?”
“Nay, not really—”
Incoherent spewing of curses and slanders and other inarticulate sounds ensued. Nathaniel would have enjoyed thesight of his cousin coming completely undone—Gerald was a first-class prat, to be sure—but things were what they were at the moment. When one found oneself chained to a wall, helpless, whilst facing a madman not likewise fettered, one tended to want to keep one’s damned mouth shut. He supposed telling his cousin that he tried never to open any letters from his attorneys might be a less-than-wise thing to say at the moment.
It made him wonder just why his grandfather continued to try to sue him over his own trust, but he suspected that was less Dexter’s doing and more Gerald’s.
“I don’t want his money,” Nathaniel managed when Gerald paused for breath.
“He won’t care!” Gerald wailed.
Nathaniel had to admit his cousin had a point there. Poindexter MacLeod was a man firmly committed to his own vision. Nathaniel wasn’t sure he had ever known his grandfather to take anyone’s advice but his own, to the endless frustration of his accountants, bankers, and attorneys.
He had to admit, rather grudgingly, that he liked that about the feisty old fellow.
Dexter was also, Nathaniel had to admit as well, a very shrewd judge of character. Gerald was not only a prat; he was an idiot with absolutely no imagination. If he’d been in charge of MacLeod Surety’s billions, he would have made a small fortune out of a very large fortune in no time.
“How did you get here?” Nathaniel asked.
