“That was my father’s money, not Grandfather’s—” He rolled his eyes. “Stop that.”
Peter laughed. “I just love to listen to you repeat yourself endlessly. You know nothing’s changed. He wants you out and himself installed in your place. How’s that bull’s-eye on your back feel?”
Nathaniel didn’t suppose he was equal to describing it. He sighed. “I can’t deal with this right now.”
“You never have time to deal with this.”
“That’s because it’s total bollocks,” Nathaniel said shortly, “which we’ve also discussed forever. It’s my father’s money, I’m the trustee, and Ebenezer will never prove that I’ve mismanaged the trust.”
“He’s added a new wrinkle,” Peter said carefully. “He wants to challenge your father’s will now.”
Nathaniel dragged his hand through his hair. “Five years after the fact?”
“I didn’t say he had a chance, I just said he was doing it. You can’t not at least respond.”
“He can challenge my father’s will until he’s dead but nothing will change.”
“This conversation feels very familiar.”
“That’s because it is, you punter. What’s it going to take?”
“I’m working on it,” Peter said easily. “I wouldn’t want to reveal any strategies on the off chance our conversation isn’t as private as I would like it to be.”
Nathaniel could hardly believe that he might again have to meet Peter diSalvio on a bench in Central Park with his attorney’s former intelligence service bodyguards keeping an eye on things at a discreet distance, but he had the feeling he was going to be hopping across the Pond sooner than he cared to.
“I’m only calling to get you to book me into your schedule,” Peter continued. “Lord Poindexter has his usual conference room set aside for a mediation session next month.”
“Lord Poindexter,” Nathaniel echoed with a snort. That was the one thing his grandfather didn’t have that he wanted with his entire soul. He’d spent the past thirty years trying to marry himself some sort of English heiress, but all he seemed to come up with were New York socialites. The man was, Nathaniel had to admit, not worth the price anyone would have to pay to live with him.
“I might pop over next week, just to see your place.”
That sounded serious. “If you like.”
“I think I should,” Peter said. “Besides, where’s that famous Highland hospitality?”
Nathaniel sighed. “I’ll dredge some up for you. Give me a couple days’ notice and I’ll come fetch you at the airport.”
“Take care of yourself, Nat.”
“You, too,” Nathaniel said, and he meant it. He couldn’t say he had many things to be grateful for when it came to the business with his grandfather, but having Peter on his side of the table was one of them.
He disconnected the call, put the phone back in his pocket, and took a minute to remind himself where he was and what he was doing. The castle wasn’t exactly grounded in present day, which was a little disconcerting, but the woman standing halfway down the passageway gaping at a tapestry certainly was. He pushed away from the wall he’d been leaning against and walked over to join her.
“They keep this here downstairs,” she said in awe. “Can you believe it?”
He looked at the hunting scene depicted there, then shrugged. “I suppose when you have all this history collected, you have to hang it somewhere.”
She smiled at him and he felt it a bit like a fist in the gut. He didn’t know her, which made it absolutely ridiculous to continue to have the feeling that he’d met her before.
He was going to have to get some control over his life before the utter improbability of it overwhelmed him.
“I think we’re getting a tour of the tree now,” she said reverently.
He frowned. “The tree?”
“The hawthorn, which I’ve just learned isn’t so much a hawthorn as it is a holly tree. They built the castle around it. Cool, isn’t it?”
He agreed it was and allowed himself to be collected right along with her by their guide, who was as full of as much hearty trivia as he could have wished for. A Scottish historian in her element? There wasn’t much he appreciated more.
He walked with Emma down more stairs and into what might have been mistaken for a cellar in times past. In the midst of the floor, surrounded by a railing, was a tree.
“The donkey lay down beneath this very tree,” the guide was saying, “and that was enough to assure the Thane he had fulfilled the inspiration of his dream.”
Nathaniel realized he’d been gaping at the tree in much the same way Emma had been at that tapestry. It also occurred to him that he had missed quite a bit of the tale the guide had been telling them. He looked at her in consternation.
“Dream?”
She smiled. “The first Thane of Cawdor was looking for a spot to build a new home. Legend has it that he strapped a chest of gold to a donkey, the donkey wandered to this tree and lay down, and the perfect spot was thus selected.”
Emma looked at her in surprise. “But this tree isn’t still alive, is it?”
“Sadly, no. Building the castle around it, I believe, was too much for it. I’m not sure we can say with accuracy how long it lived, but they have run tests to verify when they think it was planted.”
“Really?” Emma said. “When was that?”
“I believe the carbon dating puts it about 1372.”
Nathaniel took a breath.
He let that breath out.
Then he felt his world cleave in two.
He clutched the railing, because his alternative was to fall into the pit surrounding that dead tree. He almost went down to his knees, truth be told. It was nothing but sheer willpower that kept him on his feet. That and Emma suddenly standing next to him with her arm around his waist.
He realized the tour guide was peering into his face, but he couldn’t find the words to tell her to stop.
“Are you unwell, sir? Is he unwell, miss?”
“I’m fine,” he rasped, heartily alarmed by how difficult it was to get the words out. “Fine.”
He thought he might be ill. Those numbers weren’t his usual ones, to be sure; those numbers were a thousand times worse. It was as if the whole world had shuddered.
“I’ll go find you some water,” the guide said. “Miss, if you want to come and sit on these stairs with him, he might be more comfortable.”
“Nay, we should go,” Nathaniel ground out. It was honestly all he could do not to fling himself over the railing and hope he knocked himself unconscious. It would have been the kindest thing he could have done for himself.
“I’ll run fetch help, then,” the woman said, sounding profoundly alarmed. “Sir, you look very unwell.”
He felt very unwell. He simply closed his eyes, because he didn’t have the energy to argue with her. He put his hand over his eyes as well and left it there until he thought he could pull it away without the faint lights in the cellar blinding him.
That took substantially longer than he thought it might.
“Nathaniel?”
He forced himself to pry his eyelids apart and look at Emma. He focused on her until there was only one of her standing there.
“Did she say something upsetting?” she asked, her face full of concern.
“History is full of startling things,” he said, grasping for the first thing that came to mind. “I think I might be getting a migraine. Nothing more dire than that, I promise.”
“Want me to ask them if there’s somewhere you can lie down?”
“I’d rather get home as quickly as possible, if it’s all the same to you,” he said thickly. “We’ll return.”
She didn’t press him. She did, however, pull his arm over her shoulders and nod toward the stairs.
/>
“I can’t carry you, but I’ll make excuses to get us out of here if you can walk on your own.”
“I can do that,” he managed. “Thank you.”
She didn’t say anything else, but she did give him another look of concern. He smiled, sickly no doubt, and didn’t even attempt a nod. He was fairly sure where that would get him.
1372. It should have meant nothing, but the terrible shudder in the world that had accompanied hearing that year had been undeniable.
What in the hell was going on?
“Sorry to ruin the day,” he managed at one point.
“You didn’t, of course,” she said with a smile. “Just keep going before we run into anyone who’s going to want details. I can’t fake your posh accent which means we’ll be completely busted.”
She said nothing else, but he didn’t miss how loudly she was thinking. He didn’t want to imagine what those thoughts might be. For all he knew, she was wondering if the lads down at the pub should have added nutter to the list of things they called him.
He managed to get up the stairs and back through the castle before they unfortunately encountered their benefactors. He would have tried to bluff his way out the front door, but he found it was all he could do to stand there and breathe.
He was fairly sure Emma had blamed his sudden paleness on bad eggs, but he wouldn’t have been able to swear to it in court. He managed a garbled Thank you, then listened to Emma extricate them from any displays of concern by accepting a business card. He realized only then that her accent was as crisp as that of any London socialite he’d ever been scolded by. He tucked that away to chide her about later, then listened to her promise to absolutely get their host’s card to Nathaniel’s grandfather. Her thanks were just the right amount of effusive.
The next thing he knew, he was standing in front of the passenger side of his car.
“Keys?”
He managed to get them to her, half surprised he’d been successful in keeping them on his person during the previous hour. He didn’t protest when she tucked him into the seat and leaned in to buckle him in safely.
“That accent,” he wheezed.
“I watch lots of British television.”
He laughed a little, but it was a fairly miserable sound. He managed to uncross his eyes long enough to look at her. Avoiding sicking up his breakfast all over her was yet another success for the day.
“Not a trace of identifying markers in that accent,” he said hoarsely. “And that can’t possibly come from too much telly.”
“I think you’re too sick for details.”
“Distract me.”
She shut him in, then walked around to climb into the driver’s seat. She started his fairly abused Range Rover up, pulled out of the car park, then paused to set the navigation system.
“Let me know if you need help,” he said faintly.
“I think what I need is for you to close your eyes before you barf all over me.”
He leaned his head back very carefully against the seat. “Can you drive this?”
“I can drive anything.”
He smiled. “Can you indeed? Where did you learn?”
“Same place I picked up the accent.”
“Are you going to tell me where that was?” he asked.
“When you stop moaning every time you breathe, sure,” she said easily. “Wouldn’t want to give you any reason to express surprise and admiration when you can’t give it your best effort.”
He smiled in spite of himself and was extremely grateful when she drove carefully enough not to cause him any added distress. It only took him a few minutes before he realized that she was indeed as competent a driver as she’d claimed. His poor head agreed thoroughly.
It did, however, take him until they were well past Inverness before he managed to stop wheezing, but that seemed to be enough for her.
“One of my father’s under-chauffeurs is former MI6.”
He opened his eyes and hazarded a glance at her. “You’re not serious.”
“Oh, I am,” she said with a brief smile.
“I’m not sure if I’m more surprised by the lad’s former employer or that your father has an under-chauffeur.”
“Life is strange.”
He started to shake his head, but suspected that wouldn’t go all that well for him. He reached for her hand instead and squeezed it briefly.
“I want the details,” he managed, “but you’re right about my potentially not enjoying them properly right now. You could give them to me tomorrow perhaps, after I’ve recovered enough to cook you breakfast with things Patrick MacLeod will no doubt continue to provide.”
She glanced at him. “You sound terrible.”
“I feel worse. Thank you for the hasty exit.”
“No problem.” She paused. “That tree was odd.”
“Aye,” was all he could manage.
That tree had been odd, but odder still had been his reaction to that date. He swallowed with more difficulty than he would have liked, but he felt as if his body were utterly deserting him. He had never swum through molasses, but he thought he might be able to describe the sensation well enough just the same.
1372. He had never been so far back in time, never had any but his usual numbers come up and tap him on the shoulder. It had begun with 1382, of course, a number he’d seen on a receipt for a pub tab his uncle had stuffed into his golf bag. At the time he’d been rummaging through those clubs for clues, he’d been appalled to realize his father’s brother had spent well over a thousand pounds on one bottle of whisky in one afternoon. It hadn’t occurred to him until later that he and his uncle had been holding on to that bag together as they’d bolted for cover.
He’d discovered eventually that time had marched on in the past apace with how it proceeded in the future. What 1372 boded for him, he absolutely couldn’t say.
All he knew was that he had to get home, and quickly. Or, rather, he had to get Emma home, then himself back to his house before things spun out of control. He had never, not once in his five years of the madness that was his current time-traveling life, felt anything akin to how the world had just shifted.
Just what in the hell had he done?
Or had time taken note of Emma?
He wasn’t sure he wanted to know the truth of it. He just knew he needed to solve it, and quickly.
Chapter 9
Emma had thought there were strange things happening just on MacLeod soil. After her midday stroll through Cawdor Castle, she was starting to think the whole of Scotland was a hotbed of paranormal activity. Maybe it was time to meet the whole thing head-on and go on a ghost walk, just to see what the country really had to offer. A guided walk, though. She wasn’t about to just venture off into the wilds and see what sort of paranormal activity she ran into on her own.
She suspected she might be sitting next to enough of it as it was.
She put that thought on hold for a moment or two as she negotiated the road through a small village. Nathaniel’s SUV wasn’t new, but it drove well and boasted a first-rate navigation system. All she had to do was follow directions and remember what side of the road to drive on.
But once they were again on a road that wasn’t quite so congested, she realized that her passenger was asleep and she had nothing else to do but use all that free time for what it was designed for, namely poking her nose into mysteries that definitely weren’t her own.
Something was Definitely Up. She didn’t believe in paranormal kinds of things, but she had to admit there had been something extremely odd going on back there in the castle. She would have taken the time to examine just exactly how odd that something had been, but it had been immediately clear that she’d needed to get Nathaniel out of there before he fainted.
What had he seen that had set him off that badly?
&n
bsp; She glanced at the man whose car she was driving. It was a bit hard to look at him, actually. He looked like he should have been on the cover of some magazine for Scottish gorgeousness, but he was so oblivious to the looks women gave him that she suspected if he knew what he looked like, he just didn’t care.
At the moment, he looked like he was about to lose his lunch.
“Eyes on the road,” he said, not opening his eyes.
She pursed her lips. “I wasn’t looking at you. I was looking past you to admire the scenery over there.”
He groaned. “Of course you were. I suspect the truth is that you wanted to make sure I wasn’t on the verge of sicking up lunch in your lap.”
“That thought had crossed my mind.” She watched the road for a bit, then stole another look at him. “You look awful.”
“Thank you.”
Too bad it didn’t detract all that much from his appallingly good-looking self. She drove for a bit longer, then glanced at him. “Do you ever look in the mirror?”
“Every morning, darling.”
She smiled. “Do you frighten yourself?”
“A better question is, do I frighten you?”
“I am unintimidated by you or your pretty face,” she said archly. “I didn’t mention this before, but my undergrad is in art. I’m used to drawing perfect specimens while ignoring their accompanying egos.”
He wheezed, but it sounded a bit like a laugh. “I will model for you any time you like if it means I can stare at you soulfully whilst you’re about rendering my spectacular features on paper.”
She couldn’t help but smile. “You aren’t really that conceited, are you?”
“If I am, I’m paying a heavy price for it at the moment.” He shifted, then groaned again. “Thank you for driving.”
“My pleasure.” She paused. “Migraine or food poisoning?”
“Take your pick,” he said grimly. “At the moment, it feels a bit like both. Are you all right to drive home?”
“Absolutely. At the very least, I’ll just follow your navigation’s calm, soothing voice and ignore you while you’re heaving your guts out the window.”