“Peter!” She couldn’t believe her eyes. Fia’s beloved stood in the doorway with a tray of food in his hands.
“Aye, Milady. I have food for ye and His Lairdship to break yer fasts.” He tried to peek past her into the room, so she stoodaside and ushered him in, closing the door behind him. Peter looked toward the privacy screen and raised his eyebrows. The wariness in his eyes told her he’d been dealing with Balloch long enough to know him.
“Nay, Peter. He is not here. I confess I have killed him.” She sat in the captain’s chair and waited for his judgment.
Peter’s eyes flew wide and he struggled to keep hold of the tray, so he hurried to the table to set it down, then scanned the room. “Are ye certain, my lady? Where is…?”
“In the bellies of half a dozen sharks, I hope. I pushed him out the window. When he tossed my bloody gown into the water, he claimed it would attract the beasts. Only he could have said whether he was right about them. He did have a kerchief stuck in his sleeve with my blood upon it…”
Peter scurried around to the window and peered out nervously, as if the monster might just climb back inside. After a moment, he turned back with a grin. “My lady, tis a fine day indeed. No doubt many lives have been saved. Likely mine and Fia’s among them!”
“The captain and his men will pronounce me a murderer.”
“Far be it fer me to counsel ye, Lady Kenna. But he would have found a clever way to murder ye, soon enough. It is what he does. Did. But no more!”
“What are ye doin’ here? Last I saw ye was at Gowry’s.”
Peter knelt on one knee and told her everything that had happened to him and Fia since the day she’d been rescued from the previous monster. He had no details of where Fia was now, “but I have been indentured on this ship until she has finished the task he assigned her. Now, with him gone, he can escape and find her.”
“If I survive the crew, I will help you.” It seemed ages since Gowry’s, and she missed her nervous maid dearly. “I have a new friend who will aid us, if I ever see him again.”
The two of them decided to stall for time. Peter said a few more hours would see them anchored near Edinburgh. She wrote a message for the captain, as Balloch, instructing the man to send Peter to him when the city was in sight, but until then, he did not wish to be disturbed. The crew was free to go ashore and leave him and his bride to disembark at their leisure.
Peter returned long enough to inform her that the captain had been neither surprised nor suspicious of the message. Then he was gone.
All that was left was to plan a way to get safely off the ship, and Peter with her.
The half-constructed Edinburgh Castle,that same morning…
Leland and the MacCurrachs had been introduced to the imposter as friends of Sir Tearloch who were to witness his wedding. They hovered around the woman like they were heartily impressed with both her beauty and her royalty. This gave the king a chance to distance himself from the woman he had preened over for a sennight.
He still doted on her when necessary and Tearloch whisked him away on pretenses every time the king became terse. The woman never suspected a thing. Nor did she care that Tearloch sought no private discussions with her. They didn’t suit, but that rarely mattered in a marriage of alliance.
At the midday meal, Malcolm couldn’t help himself. “Would ye care to go riding, sister? I’ve been told how much ye like to ride with no saddle.”
Tearloch choked on his food, but quietly, and the woman never noticed because she was choking on her own.
“Nay, Yer Majesty. I slept oddly and me back is ailin’. I just may need to spend the rest of the day in a hot bath and preparing myself for the morrow.” Her eyes widened. “By yer leave, of course.”
Malcolm smiled and inclined his haughty royal head.
Tearloch was more pleased each time it was re-confirmed that this complaint-ridden woman was not the king’s sister to whom he would be happily wed as soon as Fate would allow.
After the groaning, limping, deceitful imposter left the table, a rougher than usual Duncan was ushered in. When he caught sight of the disappearing redhead, Tearloch hurried to distract him before he could give up the game.
“Duncan, ye old sot. We have been praying mightily for yer success.” He glanced back to see that the imposter had gone, then looked for Kenna in the empty doorway. “Tell me ye have our lass with ye.”
Tearloch took an inner blow to his chest when he read the look on Duncan’s face.
“Nay, my laird. Yer Majesty, that woman isnae Kenna Carlisle.”
“Yes, Duncan, we know. Your messengers arrived with time to spare. We have never been so grateful. But that one musn’t suspect we know the truth until we help save a mon from Gair Balloch.”
“Ye know not the half of it,” Duncan said, turning back to Tearloch.
And Tearloch knew. “Balloch has my lass.”
“Aye, he does.”
