“I know which inn they are staying at,” Huntley said. “We’ll slip in, kill them, grab the boy and leave. I’ll take you all to the continent with me. I have friends there who will help us.”

Sounded like a right pleasant alternative to being hanged in the morn. “Very well, my good man. Point the way.”

***

Gwyneth lay wrapped in Alasdair’s arms, dreaming of fairytales and happily-ever-after when something woke her. A sound that prodded her to full alert. The candle on the bedside table flickered low. She tried to sit up but Alasdair’s heavy arm prevented it.

“What was that?” she asked.

He shifted. “What?”

“I’m sure I heard something. Rory.” Icy fear poured down from her head to her ankles. “Rory called my name!” She struggled naked toward the edge of the bed and shoved her arms into her smock.

Alasdair yanked on a pair of trews. Bare-chested, he unsheathed his sword and strode toward the door. Hands trembling, Gwyneth snatched the sgain dubh from her corset lying on the floor and followed. Oh dear heaven, please let Rory be well. She never should’ve left him with the maid in a room down the hall.

“Stay behind me,” Alasdair whispered.

“Yes. Hurry.”

A pistol fired and a section of door around the lock splintered. They jerked back. The surge of fear near chocked her.

“Get down!” Alasdair urged her backward. “Stay in the corner.”

Who was that, and what was going on? With her back against the wall, she gripped the knife, her pulse roaring in her ears.

The door swung back. Her distant cousin John MacIrwin stood in the opening, sword raised. Good lord, he’s escaped! He was supposed to go on trial tomorrow, along with Donald—his father—and several other clan members. Where was Donald? Please God, don’t let him hurt Rory.

John’s wild blue gaze lit on Gwyneth. “Da! The whore is in here!”

Alasdair darted forward and knocked the broadsword from John’s hand, then bashed his hilt against John’s head. He crashed against the wall and slid to the floor. Another kilted MacIrwin leapt into the room and engaged Alasdair in swordplay. Steal clashed and tinged, deafening in the close space.

Alasdair faked out his opponent and stabbed his blade into the MacIrwin clansmen’s gut. “Omach!” The man doubled forward, and pitched to the floor, howling.

John finally recovered his sword, pushed to his feet and launched an attack against Alasdair. The whacking blades smashed into each other by the second as the two men thrust and blocked.

John’s blade nicked Alasdair’s forearm and blood ran forth. Clearly, it was more than a nick.

No! God, I beg of You, protect Alasdair. Near frozen in place, Gwyneth bit into her fist.

John’s foot bumped into his dying comrade on the floor and he wavered, almost losing his balance. Alasdair took advantage of this weakness and sliced his blade across John’s throat. Gwyneth closed her eyes against the spurting blood.

Swords clanged out in the corridor, amid a din of shouting, cursing and crashes.

“Stay here!” Alasdair leapt over the two dying men and charged into the corridor.

Had he gone mad? Rory needed her. She jumped over the MacIrwins lying in pools of their own blood and chased after Alasdair.

“Ma!” Her son’s cry sounded as if it came from the same room where she’d left him with the maid earlier. She prayed no one had gotten to him.

“Rory?” She tried to dash past Alasdair.

He flung his arm out and held her back. “Wait!” He darted a quick glare of warning her way, then faced the enemies again.

In the dim corridor before them, lit only by two near burned-out candles in wall sconces, Padraig fought a MacIrwin she’d seen but didn’t know. Further along, Angus rained a flurry of sword strikes against Donald’s blade.

She had to move past them to reach Rory.

“MacIrwin!” Alasdair yelled in a dangerous tone of challenge.

The enemy closest to them faltered and cast a glower at Alasdair. In that instant of distraction, Padraig’s blade struck the man’s chest. Blood spread through the white linen of his shirt.

Cursing, he attempted to block Padraig’s next blow, but the move was useless. Padraig’s sword shoved through muscle and ribs with the sickening sound of bone breaking. The man screamed out and slid to the floor.

Gwyneth covered her ears, hating violence as much as she always had. “I must get to Rory!” she told Alasdair. “Will you help me?”

“Out of our way, MacIrwin.” Alasdair advanced.

“Go to hell! And take that traitorous whore with you!”

Alasdair raised his sword and drew a small but threatening circle in the air. Donald’s eyes widened when he realized he was blocked, with Angus behind him and Alasdair in front.

“’Tis not a good time to be insulting my future wife. Would you rather hang tomorrow or die by the sword tonight?”

Madness entered Donald’s eyes. He rushed Alasdair, shoving his sword upward and knocking Alasdair’s blade aside at the last moment, though he retained his grip on it.

Gwyneth flattened herself against the wall. Donald lumbered past her. Alasdair switched places with her, and faced Donald again.

Seeing her chance, she darted along the passage. “I’m going to Rory.”

“Let me finish him, lad.” Angus stalked forward. “I’ve wanted to do this for your father since the day the MacIrwins murdered him. And I owe this pile of cac for the death of my son.”

“Aye, me, too,” Padraig seethed, his arm and chest bleeding.

“See that you do the job well.” Alasdair’s footsteps thumped behind Gwyneth as she dashed along the corridor.

Rory’s shrill cry sounded behind the door where she’d left him earlier with the maid watching over him. Terrified of what she’d find inside, Gwyneth paused outside the door and grasped the knob.

Alasdair nudged Gwyneth aside and, shielding her with his body, flung the door open.

A dagger’s blade glinted at her son’s throat. And Maxwell Huntley, the former marquess of Southwick, held it there in a gloved hand. How could he? That was his son.

Paralysis gripped her, forcing all the breath from her lungs. Darkness threatened.

Alasdair grabbed onto her and brought her to her senses.

Rory is not hurt yet. I must get him away from that devil.

“Ma! He killed Anna!” Rory pointed toward the bed in the far corner and the still form covered in a blanket.

Their maid. “God help us,” Gwyneth whispered.

“What do you want?” Alasdair demanded of the knave.

“Your black heart on a golden platter,” Huntley sneered.

“Let the wee lad go and I’ll fight you, man to man.”

“First, I want her dead.” He sent a poison glare at Gwyneth. “You steal everything I have and give it to her.”

“Nay, the king gave the estate to your son, as you wanted.”

“It is not what I wanted now! Fifty years down the road, yes. He’s still a sniveling child. Besides, my title that I wanted him to have is forfeit. And her… What a whore you are, my lady.”

“Unhand Rory this instant! He’s an innocent child.”

“But you are not—innocent, that is. You have just come from swiving the filthy Scot.”

Rory slammed his foot hard against Huntley’s toes.

“Ouch! You little shit!”

Alasdair rushed forward. He grabbed Huntley’s knife hand and shoved him against the wall.

Rory tumbled forward into Gwyneth’s arms. Oh, thank God. She dragged him away.

Alasdair’s sword clattered to the floor as the two men fell.

She glanced up to find them rolling on the floor, grappling for the dagger in Huntley’s hand.

“Heavens!” She pushed Rory into the corner beside a chest. “Stay there.”

Refusing to let Huntley have the upper hand, and with Alasdair’s arm injured besides, she gripped her sgain dubh and moved Alasdair’s sword from her pathway. She had saved his life once; she would do it again.