Calum froze and listened. “I don’t hear anything.”
Eachann held up a hand. “Quiet.”
They both stood there, but there was no sound.
“I guess it was nothing.” Then Eachann frowned and added, “I thought I heard the front doors close just a moment ago.”
“I doubt those two women would be foolish enough to come back.”
Eachann crossed the room and pulled a gun from a rack on the wall. He tossed it to Calum. “Here. Take this and I’ll get some lanterns.”
“A gun?” Calum stared at it, then looked up at Eachann. “Are you daft? I’ll not be shooting any poor scared women, even if one of them did crack me over the head with a whisky glass.”
Eachann was fumbling though a closet and he stopped and looked at him. “We can’t go out there unarmed. Your bride took a pistol with her.” He turned back and began to jerk things from inside.
“She won’t shoot us. And she’s not my bride. I have no plans to marry anyone, which you and I will settle between us later.”
“There’s nothing to settle. Your bride—”
“She’s not my bride.”
“A woman who tied you up with a bow is carrying a loaded gun, which should be enough reason for us to be armed, but she’s also frightened and somewhere out there in the fog.”
Calum supposed he had a point.
“Here.” Eachann shoved a lantern into his chest. “Take this and let’s go.” He crossed the room with long determined strides. “We need to find them before they walk off a cliff and we have no wives.”
“I’ll not be marrying anyone. Eachann? Eachann!” But Calum was talking to an empty doorway.
The front door slammed shut with a loud thud.
Calum shook his head and moments later he crossed through the same doorway with heavy steps and a strong feeling of impending doom.
Chapter Sixteen
Two old crows sat on a fence rail
Talking of effect and cause,
Of weeds and flowers,
And nature’s laws.
One of them muttered, one of them stuttered,
Each of them thought far more than he uttered.
—Vachel Lindsay
Do you think this place is safe?” Amy looked around the dark and dank cave while Georgina set the lantern on a nearby rock ledge.
“Safer than being locked in a room with the oaf and his brother.”
The more Amy looked around, the less safe she felt. However this dark wet cave was better than trying to find their way in the dense fog. “I suppose you’re right.”
She scanned the low rocky roof of the cave where the mist from outside hovered like smoke in the low dark crevices. Behind her was the constant dripping of water as it plopped into a small pool under the rocks.
Out of the corner of her eye, Amy caught a small flash of shadow. Her breath caught in her chest, made it feel tight. She whipped her head around. The shadows were nothing too ominous; they were only the black sea crabs scurrying to hide in between the wet rocks. She exhaled, but for a few lingering seconds her heart still felt as if it had a butterfly trapped inside of it.
