A Very Highland Holiday - Kathryn Le Veque Page 0,62

secret out of her. Perhaps later, in a dark chamber, with the door locked …

A distinct presence made itself felt—or smelled—at his side. Both women winced, and even Stuart took a step away. Gair rarely bathed, and the heat of the close room made him ripe.

“The question I ought to ask,” Fiona said, pretending to ignore Gair. “Is why are you in such disreputable company?”

“Ah, she breaks me heart,” Gair said with a dry chuckle. “We’re saving his life, lass, is the answer. Spiriting him across the land to his home.”

“Spiriting?” Una wrinkled her nose. “Ye couldn’t spirit anything but whisky, Gair Murray. From the smell of things, ye’ve had a lot of it.”

Gair laughed without malice. One thing Stuart liked about the man was that he knew exactly who he was and had no aspiration to be anything else.

“A fine reunion ye’re having,” Gair said. “But it’s time to pay the piper. Not that I play the pipes. Can’t abide the things.”

Stuart straightened in puzzlement. “I paid ye, Gair. In advance. Every bit of silver I had. Ye insisted, I remember.” He still felt the sting of handing over the last coins he had in his sporran. He hoped the king’s armies hadn’t stolen the rest of what he’d stashed at home.

“Aye.” Gair returned the look without shame. “That was my payment. Now for Padruig.”

Bloody man. Stuart had always known he couldn’t trust Gair. To smuggle Stuart into Scotland and across the country without betraying him, yes. With his money? No.

“Ye don’t share your take with Padruig?” Stuart asked, as though surprised. “I’d reconsider, Gair. He’s a dangerous man.”

He and Gair glanced as one at Padruig. The man leaned his left elbow on the table near a large tankard of ale, while he amused himself twirling a dagger in his right hand. His lank and long hair, worn leather eyepatch, and the concentration in his good eye did not lend reassurance.

Gair’s humor didn’t fade. “Oh, he’s happy with what I give him. This is something special, he tells me.”

The innkeeper had vanished, tending to whatever innkeepers tend to, but the common room remained crowded. A few lads ran about serving the loud Highlanders, while the window grew dark with the cold midwinter night.

Stuart smothered a sigh and gave Fiona and Una a truncated bow. “Excuse me, ladies.”

Gair guffawed and followed Stuart across the room to the table. Padruig flipped the blade through competent fingers and let it land, point down, buried a half inch into the wood.

“The landlord won’t be happy with that,” Stuart remarked as he slid onto a stool.

Padruig said nothing. Where Gair could talk the hind leg off a mule, Padruig was silence itself.

“What do you want?” Stuart asked him. “I’ll have no more money until I reach home, and even then I might have nothing. The bloody English will have confiscated everything.” Possibly not the cache of jewels he’d hidden well before he’d left to join the Jacobite army, but Stuart wasn’t fool enough to mention jewels in front of Gair. “Take your share out of Gair’s hide.”

Gair went off into gales of hilarity, but Padruig’s face remained impassive.

“’Tis nae coin I want.”

Padruig so rarely spoke, that when he did, he drew attention. Even Gair ceased his laughter. Padruig opened the tankard and took a loud sip of ale.

“What then?” Stuart asked impatiently.

Padruig sipped again, set down the tankard, and wiped his mouth on his sleeve.

“A sgian dubh.”

Stuart’s brows climbed. “A knife? Is that all? Cumberland’s men might have taken all of those from my home as well, but likely I can find one stashed somewhere.”

“No.” Padruig’s harsh word dried up Stuart’s relief. “One particular sgian dubh, lost at Culloden Moor. Bring me that, and your debt to me will be paid.”

Chapter Two

Fiona neared Stuart’s table in time to hear Padruig’s words. She ought to have remained quietly in the corner—Una hissed for her to remember what they were there for—but Fiona was drawn to Stuart like an arrow to its mark.

Even hunched into his coat, his hat restored over his awful hair, he held a power that filled the room. Fiona could no more keep from him than she could cease breathing.

“Oh, aye?” Stuart demanded as Padruig studied him. “Ye wish me te crawl about on me belly in the grass at Culloden, pushing aside the bones to look for an eating knife?”

“Perhaps it is special to him.” Fiona slid onto a stool next to Stuart’s.

Stuart jumped, but Gair and Padruig, who’d seen her