Chapter Eight

Luke

It's possible I've downplayed my interest in this castle, just so Kirsty won't think I'm excited by the prospect of staying in a medieval fortress. Yeah, I can tell just by looking at this place that it served as a stronghold. The high wall that surrounds it and the massive gateway attest to that fact, not to mention the turrets that would've made it easier to spot the enemy and shoot arrows at them. I wonder if the castle was surrounded by trees back then, or if it occupied a clearing. I noticed a modern metal gate about halfway up the long, long driveway, so I guess they don't rely exclusively on medieval methods.

Why don't I want Kirsty to know this place fascinates me? Because she might take that as a sign of…something.

Christ, I can't even explain my feelings to myself in my head. Finding out Kirsty knows about string theory and other scientific topics threw me for a loop. A big, sloppy loop that got tangled around my vocal cords. Me, speechless? That's crazy. But I couldn't form a single syllable, much less a complete sentence, when she started talking about theoretical physics.

As we get out of the car, I notice things I hadn't paid attention to yesterday, like the shorter wall that encompasses three sides of the garden while the fourth side is part of the outer wall. The lawn where the wedding reception took place lies just outside that outer wall. I also notice a cottage attached to the garden wall, nestled close to the compound's exterior. There's another building off to the left of the garden, but I can't tell what purpose it serves, though I do see modern-looking metal doors attached to that structure that suggest it might be a large garage.

I tip my head back to study the square turrets, but the glare of the cloudy sky makes me squint.

When we get our luggage out of the trunk, Kirsty tries to carry her own bags. But I suddenly get a macho impulse and can't resist it, so I lug all our bags toward the castle with some of them jammed under my arms and others dangling from my hands. All this luggage is kind of heavy and definitely awkward, but I can't back out now. The macho psychophysicist idiot needs to impress the sexy Scottish girl.

What's gotten into me?

I give up trying to understand myself as Kirsty leads me up a walkway to a wooden door. She swings it open, gesturing for me to go inside. I lug our, uh, luggage across the threshold. Maybe that's where the term luggage came from—people lugging shit around.

My thoughts all fly away when I take in my surroundings. I drop the bags on the floor, and the sound echoes up the spiral staircase that stretches high above my head.

"This is the vestibule," Kirsty tells me. "The entryway, if you like. Rory insists everyone should use the proper term for it, though, so don't call it anything other than the vestibule when he's around."

"I thought we were going to be alone here."

"We are. I meant if you ever see Rory."

"Oh." I can't stop staring up at the three floors above us. "Do I need to carry our luggage all the way up there?"

Kirsty laughs. "Not unless you're wanting to develop a hernia. We can stay in the ground-floor guest wing. It has several bedrooms, and the kitchen is in that wing. Let me give you the grand tour before we worry about the luggage."

"Okay." Not sure I want to slog up those stairs just to get a tour of the place, but she's being nice. I don't want to annoy her again. She might back out of the experiment.

Kirsty leads me up to the first floor. She seems to expect me to be confused by the fact the ground floor is not the first floor, but I've worked in buildings that had a similar layout—only in that they had a ground floor and a first floor above that. I've never been in any other structure like Dùndubhan. Not sure I can pronounce that name right, but I give it a try so I can satisfy my curiosity.

"Is the name Dùndubhan a Gaelic thing?" I ask.

"Aye. It means fortress of the black water."

"Does that mean there's a lake or stream nearby?"

"A river. It's back in the woods, and you can't see it from the house."

"Are you calling this huge castle a house? That doesn't seem appropriate."

"People have always lived here. Even today, Jamie and Gavin stay here most of the time, and Mrs. Brody lives in the cottage attached to the garden wall."

"Mrs. Who?"

"Brody." Kirsty pauses at the first-floor landing. "Evelyn Brody has been the housekeeper at Dùndubhan since Rory first bought the castle. She was Mrs. Darroch back then. Her second husband, Tavish, is the groundskeeper."

"Uh-huh. I guess Rory and Emery lived here back then too."

"Oh no," Kirsty says with a laugh. "He was married to Una at the time. Emery is his fourth wife."

"Fourth?" I probably should've tried to squelch my surprise, but I've never met anyone who was married four times. That's almost as many wives as Henry VIII had.

Kirsty ushers me into the first floor where there's a huge empty space that doesn't seem like just a hallway, but she keeps talking about her family. "Lachlan was divorced once, and Jack divorced Autumn but then married her again. That's the wedding reception you crashed yesterday. Anyway, Jamie was engaged to a British erse before she married Gavin, and—Oh, I shouldn't be havering about this. I'm sorry."

I can't keep up with these Scottish people. Four wives? Divorced and remarried? Mrs. Darroch became Mrs. Brody, and… Damn, I don't think I want to hear all about everyone she knows. The MacTaggart clan is probably as enormous as this castle.

Why, then, do I keep asking her questions? My mouth has a mind of its own.

"How many cousins do you have?" I ask.

She stops us in the middle of the long hallway. "You want to know about my family? I assumed you'd be annoyed that I was havering about them."

"No, it's, ah…kind of interesting. I was an orphan, so I guess I sometimes wish I had a big family. Listening to you talk about yours makes me feel like I'm almost part of a family too."

Oh shit. Why did I tell her that? Being around Kirsty gives me verbal diarrhea.

She stares at me. "You were an orphan? Why did you never tell me that when we were together?"

I hunch my shoulders. "Don't know. You talked about your family so much that I guess I felt weird about admitting I don't have anybody."

"Did you grow up in an orphanage?"

"No, I bounced around from one foster home to another."

"Luke, I'm so sorry." She rushes up to me and wraps her arms around me. "I wish you'd told me years ago."

"Not the kind of thing I tell anybody." I twist out of her embrace, taking a step backward. "Could we not talk about that anymore? I'd rather listen to you talk about your family and this castle."

"All right. Let me show you around." She waves at the large space we're standing in. "This is the great hall. And over there, that doorway accesses the old library that's now Rory's office, when he's at Dùndubhan. Let's head up to the second floor."

While we trudge up the spiral staircase again, I can't help admiring her sexy ass. I'm glad she's walking in front, otherwise I wouldn't get such a nice view to keep me going during our epic journey through the castle. My legs are getting a workout for sure. On the second floor, Kirsty shows me the long gallery, which looks pretty much like a regular hallway that happens to be very long. There's a bedroom in the tower, she tells me, though I have to ask what that means.

"You saw the turrets outside," she says. "Those are on top of the tower, and the bedroom is inside there. It's actually between the second and third floors."

"Sure, I get it." I don't, but I doubt it matters if I understand the complicated layout of this place.

Kirsty shows me more rooms, but we don't go inside the master suite on the third floor. That's Rory and Emery's room when they're in residence here. Jamie and Gavin prefer to sleep in the bedroom at the opposite end of the hall.

If I lived here, I'd sleep on the ground floor. Those stairs are murder on my knees.

She takes me back down to the first floor and guides me through a dining room into another hallway. "This is the guest wing. You can choose whichever bedroom you like."

"Ladies first. I'll choose from whichever ones are left after you pick yours."

She blinks several times quickly. "You are being chivalrous?"

Is it really that shocking? Well, yeah, I suppose it is. I've acted like a jerk ever since I showed up at her cousin's wedding reception. Knowing what Melvin wants me to do has played a part in my behavior, but I can't explain that to Kirsty. She'll hate me if she finds out the truth.

Suddenly, I care what she thinks of me. No, I won't examine that too closely.

"Can we eat before we pick our rooms?" I ask. "I'm starving after that long drive and the exercise I got clomping up and down those stairs."

"Let's go into the kitchen."

She waves for me to follow her down the hall and through a swinging door. This castle has a modern kitchen with a granite island and a large refrigerator, not to mention a double oven and a microwave. I see a big stand mixer too. Had I expected to find a medieval oven with flames inside it? Not sure that's what medieval ovens looked like, but then, I'm no expert on ye olden days.

"Will a turkey sandwich do?" she asks as she swings the fridge door open.

"Sure, sounds good." I amble up to the island and lean against it. "Tell me, do you have a favorite cousin?"

Kirsty is bent over, rummaging through the fridge's contents, but she freezes and glances sideways at me. "Aye, I do have a favorite. I love all my cousins, all my family, but I have a special relationship with one in particular."

"A 'special' relationship?"

She puckers her lips and tosses packages of turkey and cheese onto the island, then slings a jar of mayo onto it too.

The jar barely misses me.

"Donnae like what your tone implies," she says. "I'm not shagging my cousin Magnus."

"I didn't suggest you were." But okay, maybe I'd thought that for about a second. But no, Kirsty isn't that kind of girl. "I take it you and Magnus are close."

She relaxes as she shuts the fridge door and grabs a loaf of bread off the counter. "Aye, Magnus has always been my favorite cousin. Everyone else thinks he's dangerous, but I know he's a sweetie."

"Dangerous? What's this guy done to make his own family think that about him?"

"Nothing we know of. It's his profession that unsettles them. Well, that and the way he presents himself."

"What do you mean?"

She points toward a drawer. "Could you please get out a knife? I need to slice the bread. Mrs. Brody baked it fresh this morning."

I snag a knife and grip it in my hand. "Want me to slice? I'm good at that."

"Donnae think being a skilled bread slicer is something worth bragging about."

"Maybe not." I notice a small breadboard on the counter and move it onto the island, then I begin slicing. "So, you haven't explained why everybody's afraid of this Magnus character."

"Because they don't understand him. Magnus isn't around much. First, he was in the army and got deployed to Iraq. Then, he became a bounty hunter."

"Seriously? A bounty hunter. That sounds cool. Will I get to meet him?"

"It's doubtful. He's not home often since he chases fugitives all over the world." She unscrews the cap on the mayo jar, thrusting a spoon inside. "Magnus is a good man, but I think I'm the only one who believes that. He likes to act as if he's a villain, and his tattoos reinforce that idea. I think he likes to have everyone feel that way about him. It's part of his mystique."

"When did you last see him?"

"About a year ago. He only stayed for a day, then he took off again." She spreads mayo onto the slices of bread I hand her. Without looking up, she says, "It's time you told me why you're really here."