––––––––
“Where is she?” John said. “I told her to be here by dusk.”
“Did ye maybe consider that she had some trouble sneaking out of a manor and then catching herself a carriage and riding into town at the last moment? Did ye think that possibly the Laird to whom she’s betrothed didn’t want his bride traipsin’ off after God-knows-what? Did you think of that, John Two-Fingers?” Lynne chided him, then ran her hand down the side, then around the knee and back up the inseam of John’s leather leggings.
“I thought about – ooh! – no, I suppose not. She’ll be here though. I saw the way those two looked at each other. And she thinks I’m he, so I have faith.”
“Aye, she’ll show,” Red Ben said, “I just hope it isna too late for us to do what needs doin’.”
“She has time,” Lynne said. “After all, Gavin’s not to be strung up until five days hence. Four? I canna remember. But it doesn’t matter. This will all be done tonight. It has to be.”
“What? Why? I didn’t know we were on a time table,” John said. “Except for the one where we have to keep Gavin from getting slaughtered and keep Kenna from marrying a toad.”
“I, er, liberated this from the Sheriff last time I went to visit.” Lynne handed a slip of paper to John who passed it to Red Ben with the excuse that he saw better at night due to the lamplight reflecting off his beard.
Red Ben sneered and then laughed. “Right, well, I’ll be over here, under the lamp.”
John and Lynne stood close to one another, watching Red stand in the torch light and puzzle out what he was reading.
“Do you think this is going to work?” John asked, sliding his hand around Lynne’s waist.
“Truly? I think it has a chance. Alan is a cruel man. The closest thing there is to a savage chief, waiting to strike. Macdonald isn’t quite so cruel but he’s more evil than Alan could ever imagine. The money, I think, makes it possible. And then these people,” she tilted her head at the apartment behind them, “they can fund the rest of his awful enterprise.”
“You didn’t answer my question.” He pulled her closer. “In fact, I don’t know what you answered.”
“John Two-Fingers, you are a crass man,” Lynne said with a giggle. “Your best friend is in jail, his lover is...somewhere, and we’re about to break into a heavily fortified prison. There you are, tugging on my clothes. You’re an impossible sort of man.”
“I might be impossible, but you’re irresistible. ‘Tisn’t my fault.” He pressed his lips to the side of Lynne’s neck, brushing them from behind her ear to her shoulder. His hand he slid around to the front of her, fingers curling against her stomach.
“S – stop... oh my goodness, you rogue, what are you doing to me?”
“Hopefully the same thing I did to you at that party, though with you in trousers that should be a bit harder I’d think, unless they’ve a trap door somewhere.”
His hand ran down her slender body and he nipped her where he’d just kissed. John’s fingers moved down the front of Lynne’s leggings, and underneath her underclothes. “What are you doing, milady? I thought you were supposed to be getting ready for a jailbreak and here you are, being naughty.”
She squealed, and then moaned as warmth seeped out of her core and the fingers playing at her tickled softly. “You’re every ounce as evil as Macdonald, you know.”
“Ach, am I?” He pushed harder.
Lynne’s legs began to wobble just a little; she sucked a quick breath and hooked her arm backwards around John’s neck for support.
“Hell of a thing you’ve given me!” Red Ben said. “What in the world is going on here? Plenty of time for that later, but right now we’ve got something more important to do than playing at adults. Now listen.”
He slapped John hard on the back, and when Lynne pulled away from her whip-thin lover, she grasped his, stood close to him and put it around her waist. Her excuse was that he kept her warm. In a way, that was true.
“I had naught an idea that such a thing was to happen.”
“Red, you’ve not told me what it is, yet. You forgot that part.”
“I suppose I did, I might’ve been distracted by you playing with your friend’s cunny.”
Lynne feigned embarrassment with a glance at the ground, but couldn’t keep from laughing.
“Dinna worry, I remember being young and excited about my wife.”
“We’re not married,” John said. “Yet.”
An elbow caught him in the stomach.
“Yet is probably right,” Ben said. “But, listen – this thing she gave me, what I’m sure she’s read already, is a contract.”
Red Ben skimmed quickly back through to make sure he hadn’t missed anything, then summarized it for John.
“Tomorrow morning, Macdonald, and the Lord Dorchester are going in together. Throwing all their money into a pot and stirring it up.”
“Are they to boil it? What are you saying?”
“It’s what we thought – they’re going in and petitioning the King to sell them off a big swathe of Scotland. Slice us off like we’re apples or pumpkins or...”
“How’s that possible? How can the land just be sold?” John said.
“It’s...a tricky thing. When the Act of Union was signed forty some years ago, the King of England were made the King of Scotland, aye?”
“Aye, and the Bonnie Prince was to be the rightful heir and was thrown out of his right, but what does this have to do with two noblemen and a pretender to the throne selling off Scotland?”
“It’s the King’s land now,” Lynne said, chewing her lip. “I don’t understand it exactly meself, but that’s how it works. Parts of Edinburgh, and the lands outside are Crown territory. Though he’s never seen fit to do anything with that right, that looks ready to change.”
“But hold a minute,” Red said. “If it’s only a petition, it may still be turned down.”
“Nay, it won’t,” Lynne said. “I’ve been listening to all this come through the Sheriff’s office for weeks. He’s acting as the mediator between the two. It’s all but done. Of course, if one or more of them loses heart and decides to not go through with the plan, the whole thing falls through.”
“What are we to do, though?” John said. “This is a game much bigger than either of us. We’re just three two-bit thieves wandering around lost in the streets thinking that we’ve done something.”
“Five,” Lynne said. “Well, four and one. Do you think she’ll make a good thief?”
John shook his head and rubbed his temples.
“I just...I canna bring myself to realize what kind of play we’re to make. Do we go rescue Gavin and then...kill Macdonald?”
“Well...” Lynne said. “That would certainly keep him from buying anything. But no, I think there’s a way we can manage without having to resort to murder. Though the result may well be the same. Why do you think the King’s considering – or has already made his mind? What’s his biggest fear?”
“Jacobites, supposin’ there’s any still around strong enough to threaten him. But enough riddles, just tell us, Lynne, time’s short.”
“Aye, Jacobites, you had the right of it. And there are those who still support the Bonnie Prince, or at least oppose the crown. They’re up in the highlands. Down here you find ten royalists for every Jacobite. But, and here’s where it gets interesting.”
The two men leaned closer. In the distance, a carriage rumbled down the street, wheels creaking and pitching back and forth on the pitted cobblestones of Queen’s Street.
“Macdonald wasn’t always so loyal to the Crown. We all know this, everyone in Scotland knows. But I’m not so sure the King does. That’s why he’s willing to work with him and all. Macdonald always was quite good at picking winners and sticking with them until he got whatever he needed, then jumping ship.”
“But how could we prove that?” John said, looking up the road at the carriage. “And how do we tell the king?”
“We don’t need to. Macdonald just has to believe that we can. And he’s got enough skeletons in his closet that we can probably do that without much trouble.”
Realization dawned on John and Red at exactly the same time.
“Be careful with this one, Two-Fingers,” Red Ben said. “She’s smarter than you are.”
“Better looking, too,” Lynne said, “but he’s got his good points.”
She looked up at him. Lynne searched the side of John’s scarred face for some hint of his thinking.
“Aye,” he said. “It’s true on all counts. That it is. But we’ve got to do something about Gavin, and I’m starting to get concerned about Kenna.”
The carriage bouncing along the road continued toward the three of them, huddled against the growing chill that continued as the night darkened around them.
“What do you suppose that cart is doing? It’s driving awfully wobbly-like,” John said, squinting. “You don’t suppose we’re about to be joined by a fourth?”
“No,” Lynne said, “looks to be a rather lumpy man driving. And unless my memory is quite a bit worse than I thought it was, Kenna’s not a lumpy man.”
After almost pitching itself over to its side, the carriage righted, and a bundle of laundry fell out the back that the driver didn’t seem to notice, or to care about. And then the wad of blankets and tablecloths began to wiggle a bit.
“Suppose he’s lost a puppy?” John said.
“Well, if’n he did, that’s the reddest-haired puppy that I’ve ever seen. Come on, boys,” Lynne said. “Let’s get busy saving a thief and ruining a day or two.”