Chapter 30

 

 

When Vic picked up her head, solid darkness enveloped the room outside her hiding place. She climbed out and looked around but couldn’t see anything in the night. She groped her way to the window. Stars glittered over the garden. Other than that, the whole landscape slumbered as far as the eye could see. The Guild House stood silent and peaceful, all except for her thundering heart.

She had to get Boyd out of the house. She had to hide him somewhere, but where? The Guild would search for him. Where could she hide him so they would never find him?

The only place she could think of was the bottom of the ocean, but that was….

Was it really as impossible as she thought? How could she transport a dead body many times her own weight across town, to the jetty?

If only she could confide in somebody, she might ask them for help. That was preposterous. Half the inhabitants of this island belonged to Clan Gunn, and the other half were loyal to it—all but Malcolm. She’d made up her mind not to let him know what she’d done, so she ruled him out.

She couldn’t carry Boyd across town. Not in a million years. She couldn’t even lift him. She needed a wheelbarrow. Her head snapped around to the window again. A wheelbarrow! She’d seen one in the garden. She just had to go outside and…

A click echoed through the house.

Vic stiffened to listen. Was someone coming, or was it just the house settling with the chill of the night? Her heart couldn’t survive all this tension and anxiety. She inched toward the door and eased it back, listening one more time. When she didn’t hear anything, she dashed out into the dark corridor and tiptoed to the kitchen. She considered taking another carving knife, but she wouldn’t be able to use it with both hands holding the wheelbarrow.

If she did this right, she wouldn’t need a knife anyways. She could disappear Boyd and be back in the Guild House before anybody detected anything was wrong. Her thoughts whizzed through each step of her plan. Wheel Boyd to the harbor. Dump him in the drink and return the wheelbarrow to the same spot in the garden. Then head back inside, find Malcolm, and get him to send her home. Piece of cake, right?

If she could only still her fluttering heart, she’d be okay. Instead, she gasped for every breath. She seized the back door and burst out into the starlit garden. There was the wheelbarrow, right where she’d spotted it from Boyd’s window.

Thank you, Boyd. That was really helpful.

Christ, she had to pull herself together before she lost it altogether. Tension, anxiety, excitement, and terror combined into a kind of madness that erased all sense of proportion. She wanted to scream and laugh and burst into tears all at once.

She raced between the herb beds to the wheelbarrow. It might be a little bit small to carry a man as big as Boyd, but it was the best she could come up with at short notice. She took hold of the handles, lifted it up, and wheeled it around in a circle. She leaned forward to push it back to the house, then froze in horror as her worst nightmare materialized before her eyes. Two men on horseback cantered into the garden through a gap in the hedge. They scanned the garden but didn’t notice her as they trotted up to the open kitchen door.

One of them said to his comrade, “I’ll go in and find the Guild Master. Ye guard the door, Tavish. Give the signal if anyone follows us.” He flung his leg over his mount, alighted on the kitchen step, and disappeared into the gloom.

The man he spoke to nodded, then pulled a rifle from the scabbard at his saddle and laid it across his lap.

Vic’s soul plummeted into her shoes. They would discover Boyd was gone, but at least they wouldn’t see his dead body hidden under the bed. She had to act fast before they raised the alarm, while she still possessed the element of surprise.

She lowered the wheelbarrow back to the ground and sank to her knees, getting as close to the ground as she could to conceal herself in the dark. She needed a weapon—and fast. She scanned the garden in her mind. The tool shed stood a few paces away, but she didn’t look forward to facing two armed Highlanders with a shovel or a rake. What else?

Then she remembered. When she’d helped get Noah through the bushes, she’d spotted a woodpile beyond the trees and a chopping block out in the open, in front of a three-sided shed stacked with split wood.

She crawled between the planters, stopping more than once to check her position, but she scurried as fast as she dared to the edge of the garden before jumping to her feet. She tore her dress to shreds but didn’t care about that now. She dashed to the chopping block where the ax sat propped up at an angle.

Boyd had turned her into a killer, and there was no going back. If she didn’t see this through, she’d be killed. She couldn’t let that happen, especially not this close to going home. A burning and feral survival instinct had taken hold of her, though she didn’t know where it had come from. The ax felt good in her hands. It wanted blood, and she would give it what it wanted. She felt in control, but of what she wasn’t sure. She’d changed in Scotland, in ways that felt like deep, long buried memories struggling to come forward and consume her. But she didn’t have time to ponder these things now.

She puffed a quick breath into her cheeks and turned around. Rather than crawl back to the house, she walked there, upright, determined, single-minded, deadly. She broke through the trees and cast one look around, seeing exactly what she wanted to see. One man sat astride his horse, still looking toward the kitchen door with his back to her.

She swung the ax up and over her shoulder, letting her hands slip to the handle’s very end and extending her arms high over her head, and then she let the ax head fly. Its weight carried it in a smooth arc.

The movement caught the man’s peripheral vision. He glanced back just before the ax head embedded in his neck. His head flopped forward, and the ax dropped out, falling to the ground. Startled, his horse lurched backward, but the man didn’t fall. He slumped in his saddle. The next instant, the horse settled down, took a step to one side, and stopped.

Vic didn’t wait around. She lunged forward to grab the ax from the ground, patting the horse’s side as she neared him to keep him still and quiet, then dashed behind a nearby bush as she heard footsteps coming from the open doorway.

The first man who’d entered the Guild House returned. His voice boomed across the garden, “He’s no’ here. Roust out and find— Tavish!” The man rushed to the horse’s side and then stepped back when he saw all the blood. Gathering his wit, he grabbed the man’s shotgun and turned to scan his surroundings.

The inevitable had happened, but Vic couldn’t deviate from her plan now. Her only hope lay in silencing this man before anyone inside heard him. She stepped out of the bushes with her weapon poised and gauged her position down to the micron. She glided around in a curve, then turned on her heel by the kitchen door and swung.

The ax thudded into the man’s chest, sending him flying back. Vic approached him, staring down in disbelief at her handy work. Quickly realizing he was dead and she needed her weapon in case any more surprises came along, she gave her ax a vicious tug. She couldn’t free it, but terror and a blank drive to save her own life propelled Vic onward. She tore her ax out of the man’s chest and spun around, then snatched the dead rider by the sleeve and dragged him out of the saddle. He collapsed onto the path as she dodged around behind him, her teeth clenched in determination.

Vic hustled into Boyd’s apartment and hauled the body out from under the bed. She damn well wouldn’t trundle the thing across town in a wheelbarrow, just waiting for someone to catch her. Her legs burned from the effort of dragging the body, but she reveled in her newfound strength. She bounced the body down the steps, grabbed a length of rope hanging from the soldier’s saddle, and tied one end tightly around Boyd’s waist. She jammed the ax into the saddle strap and, still holding the other end of the rope, jumped up into the saddle.

The animal purred through its nostrils at the new rider, but she soothed it in a quiet voice. “Easy, boy. We’re just going for a little ride.”

The creature stamped a few times but responded to her directions with no trouble.

She hadn’t ridden a horse in years, but forgotten instincts came back to her in the blink of an eye. She used to ride every day in her younger years. She used to compete in barrel racing but gave it up when she went into business with Ree and her friends. Why hadn’t she kept doing it?

She’d forgotten how much she loved feeling a horse between her legs. She savored the deep communication between horse and rider. She used those skills now, radiating calm and confidence to her mount.

The animal sensed right away that she knew what she was doing and obeyed her like they were born of one flesh. Her thighs hugged his ribs. The slightest touch on the reins and he reacted. This horse was bred for combat. He knew how to behave when the chips were down.

Vic touched her heels to his flanks, and he rocketed forward on the wind. The chill breeze whipped her hair off her face, and her spirit soared on wings as she rode easily on the animal’s rhythm. She steered him through the hedge and then north, away from town, dragging Boyd’s body along with them. She didn’t have to worry about anybody catching her up here. The night spread its black cloak far and wide as she left Stromness far behind.

She rode up the hill to the high cliff where she’d watched Noah cross the channel. Faint lights of distant towns winked on the other Orkney Islands. She slid to the ground and untied Boyd. A sheer cliff plummeted away just a few steps from where she stood. She caught her breath for a moment before she started rolling the body toward the edge. With one final heave, she pitched it over the side.

It made no sound. Only the moaning wind spoke to her. She was alone on a remote cliff top, far from anyone or anything she knew. Boyd was gone—gone for good. She took hold of the horse’s reins, and he stood for her while she mounted up. She gave the seething black ocean one more fleeting glance, then tightened her hands on the reins when she heard a low rumble in the distance.

She looked over her shoulder. Out of the deep gloomy night, a waving line of shapes blacker than the night itself emerged. The stars illuminated the surrounding terrain just enough for her to make out several horsemen pounding up the hill toward her.

Her eyes bugged out of her skull, and her throat went dry and tight. They’d found her. How didn’t matter anymore. She gave the reins a hard yank to one side and spurred her mount into a headlong dive down the mountain.