company.
Leaving us, his dragon mourned. The way we once left her.
“I’ll never leave you,” she whispered, making his heart skip.
But the words were aimed at Mungo and muffled by her hug.
Stupid dog, Lachlan’s dragon sniffed.
Lucky dog, Lachlan couldn’t help thinking.
Holly straightened and read on.
Second, my tireless housekeepers, Mrs. Killin and Mrs. Baker. They took good care of my family — and of me, especially in my darkest days. I never thanked them enough, but please assure them they have been provided for in my will.
Third and last, I ask you to scatter half my ashes here at Creag Aerden after you return from Gleninnis. You know the place — up on the hill, so I can join my beloved Ava and my dearly missed son.
Holly’s gaze went to the window, and Lachlan’s did too. Yes, he knew the place. Generations of Stuarts had had their ashes scattered there.
That is all for now, my dear. I am eternally grateful, as always, for your help.
Yours truly,
Trevor
A tear slid down Holly’s cheek as she folded the letter — a tear she didn’t bother wiping away. “So sad.”
Lachlan looked toward the family photos Trevor kept in the study. There was a black-and-white shot of a dashing young Trevor and a laughing Ava from their first days together. Another photo showed Trevor beaming with his arms around Ava, who cradled a tiny bundle — their son. A third photo captured Trevor fishing in a river with a young boy. Again, the son. Terence.
Those pictures, and others like them, took up two-thirds of the shelf. The remaining space was given over to more recent, color shots. One showed Trevor with Holly and a couple who had to be her parents, standing proudly in front of a barn — or rather, the distillery in Wyoming, judging by the vat visible through the open barn doors. Next to that was a shot of a girl on a horse — Holly, at about age ten, Lachlan guessed. Then there was a photo of Holly as a baby, and young Holly smiling out the open flap of a tent…
Hell of a lot of pictures of Holly, his dragon mused.
Lachlan supposed it made sense. From what he’d heard, Trevor had left Scotland when Ava died of grief a few years after losing their son. Somehow, Trevor had stumbled across a distillery in North America and fell into a business partnership — more on a whim than a firm business plan. Over time, those partners had become a surrogate family to an old man who had lost his own.
“Did you ever meet him?” Holly whispered. “The son, I mean.”
Lachlan shook his head. “I was only a baby when he died. I know he left Scotland before I was born, but the details…” He motioned vaguely. “My grandfather and Trevor were close friends, and their sons were friends. But no one ever talked about it much.”
Holly’s brow furrowed. “Trevor’s son was friends with your father?”
He nodded. “As children, yes — the closest of friends. But when they grew up…” He frowned, remembering his father’s anger the few times he’d mentioned his childhood friend. “Terence was reckless. A rebel. The one who refused to do as duty dictated.”
Holly frowned. “What duty?”
Lachlan shrugged. “Just the usual. Upholding family traditions, providing an heir, becoming a Guardian…”
Then he trailed off, realizing how closely those mirrored the expectations piled on him.
Holly snorted. “In other words, not thinking for yourself?”
“There’s thinking for yourself, and there’s turning your back on your family. Terence left home and followed a wayward path, getting mixed up in one misadventure after another…”
There was a woman, too, but Lachlan left that part out. Some kind of bad influence who’d been the last straw. From what Lachlan knew, his father had traveled in a last-ditch effort to convince Terence to straighten out and come home, to no avail. Terence had been in too deep — in love and in trouble.
Holly’s cheeks flushed. “It all depends how you view things. Maybe Terence was adventurous, not reckless. Maybe he wasn’t wayward, just following his own path.”
Lachlan considered. He’d only ever associated Terence with terms like ungrateful, unruly, or selfish. Refusing to conform — that was another one. On the other hand, none of that fit the bright-eyed boy in the photos. But who knew? People changed with time.
All in all, Terence was a person Lachlan had never really thought much about. But now, the gears in his mind turned, and his dragon growled.
All his fault.
Lachlan stared into the