“Yeah?”
“Thank you. For doing this for us.”
She leaves before I can answer.
I sink deeper into the couch cushions, exhausted and sore, but with the strange feeling that something important just shifted.
That crossing the invisible line drawn by the McGregor twins and their accomplice sheep wasn’t just a test of endurance.
It was a test to see whether I was willing to fight for something real.
CHAPTER 18
MARY
The Garden Massacre
(Or How Three Sheep Destroyed Forty Years of Work in Fifteen Minutes)
Dinner actually starts off pleasantly enough.
I’m seated between Finn and Callum at the massive dining table, surrounded by the entire McGregor family. Callum and Jane are discussing preparations for the Highland Games. Keira and Alistair are debating the merits of different whiskies. Lachlan and Emma are bickering affectionately about some obscure piece of Scottish history. Nate and Lily are telling a story involving a staircase and Christmas lights.
Finn, seated to my left, is making heroic efforts to participate in the conversation despite his obvious exhaustion. The twins literally dragged him across the Highlands this morning, and he looks like a man who survived active combat. His shoulders are tense, his eyes slightly glazed over, and I’ve already caught him suppressing at least three yawns since dinner started.
Maggie, meanwhile, reigns at the head of the table like a queen observing her subjects with the satisfied expression of a woman whose plans are unfolding exactly as intended.
Which, in my experience, is always a terrible sign.
Soup has just been served when Jamison rushes into the dining room.
Jamison never rushes.
Jamison glides silently.
Jamison appears magically.
Jamison materializes with the elegance of a well-mannered ghost.
But right now, he is absolutely rushing.
And his face—normally as expressionless as stone—is pale.
The kind of pale that announces large-scale catastrophe.
“My apologies for the interruption,” he says, his voice trembling slightly. “Madam, there is an urgent problem in the garden.”
Maggie frowns and delicately sets down her spoon.
“What kind of problem, Jamison?”
“The sheep, Madam. Your herb garden... I’m afraid it has been…”
He never finishes the sentence.
An enraged bleat explodes outside so loudly it rattles through the windows.
Then another one.
