“So people are expecting me. Mr. McKenzie forgot to pick me up at the station and I was starting to wonder if I hadn’t imagined this whole apprenticeship thing.”
“Oh, yeah. Tav is . . .” Kevyn paused, and in the rearview she could see his brow crease. “Tav is a right bawbag at times. But a bawbag who grows on you, I suppose.”
Portia pulled up her web browser and searched “bawbag scottish slang.”
The term bawbag is a Scots word for “scrotum,” which is also slang for an annoying or irritating person.
She’d had only brief contact with the man who would soon be teaching her the ins and outs of Scottish swordmaking, so she couldn’t agree or disagree with that. They’d spoken briefly on the phone, once, and he’d kept the conversation to a minimum—at the end of the call she’d realized that he’d barely spoken at all. Her other correspondence had been with someone named Jamie McKenzie, who seemed cool or, at the very least, more interested in a two-sided conversation.
“Leaving me stranded at the station is pretty bawbagish, so I have to agree,” she said.
“Aye, this is going to be grand,” Kevyn said, then the car slowed and stopped just in front of what looked like a wooden telephone box, but blue and on steroids. Portia was fairly certain Reggie had dressed up as one of those things for Halloween the year before, with the words police box around the top; it was from a TV show she loved.
“Here we are, Bodotria Armory,” Kevyn said, hopping out.
Portia fought her way out of the backseat, struggling with the front seat that refused to push forward as Kevyn busied himself pulling her bags from the trunk—boot—of the car.
In the picture on the website, the building had looked charming, but in the early morning darkness with mist rolling in from the nearby bay and creeping over the cobblestone streets, it had a distinctly menacing air. It was Georgian neoclassical, if she was guessing correctly, three stories of perfect symmetry and imposing bulk. The gray sandstone was dark and grimy with age and moss grew in fissures between the stones. The windows were all dark, except for a circular Palladian window at the very top floor.
“There better not be any wives locked in the attic,” Portia muttered.
“Maestro Tav is single. No worries there,” Kevyn said cheerfully as he handed off her rolling suitcase. “I’ll wait for ye to get in, lass.”
“Thanks,” she said. Now that she was here, the entire plan seemed ridiculous.
Go to Scotland.
Make swords.
. . . ?
Prosper?
Her parents’ objections replayed in her head.
I could really use a shot or two, for fortitude.
No. A shot wouldn’t do anything but lower her inhibitions. She didn’t need to be fearless, or reckless. She was great at trying new things; it was the finishing that was the problem. Starting was her damn forte, something she had never failed at, and there was no reason to think she would this time. She inhaled deeply for fortitude and began walking toward the front door when a loud cry broke through the fog.
“Oh, stop it, you fucking tosser!” It was a woman, and she was mad or scared or both. “I said cut it out!”
Shit.
Portia’s suitcase clattered to the cobblestone and she looked around wildly, gaze landing on the giant blue box.
Police! Yes!
She ran to it and pulled at the door with all her might, but it was locked tight.
“Oh, those were decommissioned ages ago,” Kevyn said calmly, as if there weren’t a crime in progress. She’d heard the Scots were a levelheaded people, but this was a bit much.
The sound of renewed struggle reached her through the fog.
Portia didn’t think. She jammed her hand into her purse, rummaged around, and then took off toward the sound.
“Och. Wait!” Kevyn called out, but she was already around the side of the building and stepping through the fog into what seemed to be a courtyard. She heard a grunt and the sound of scuffling shoes, then saw movement in the fog. The courtyard was illuminated by a few dim lamps, and she could make out a woman with a crown of pink hair trying to fend off an attacker. He was large, broad-shouldered, and looked like he could bench-press both Portia and the woman at the same time.
The woman kicked out.
“Let go!” she growled.
The man laughed, deep and menacing. “Make me.”
Portia was paralyzed by panic for a moment, but she had taken self-defense courses. She had played this out in her head many times before, what to do if she saw someone being attacked, but she’d never had to act on those imagined combat scenes until now.
She took a deep breath, ran up—holy shit this guy was huge—and rammed into him with her shoulder, bouncing back a few feet from the force of the impact. The blow didn’t seem to faze him, but it got his attention. He turned toward her and had the nerve to look affronted.
His skin was tanned, surprising for all the talk of cloudy days and pasty British men she’d heard. His eyes were a distracting shade of hazel green beneath a fringe of salt-and-pepper hair, shorn on the sides and longer at the top. His face was that of a man too young to be going gray, though rough-hewn, with stubble darkening his jaw.
Portia blinked, and then she saw a flash of metal in his hand and his attractiveness became the last thing on her mind.
He had a knife.
Portia focused on those gorgeous green eyes, lifted her hand, and sprayed like he was a cockroach that had invaded the sanctity of her morning shower.
“What the bloody hell!” There was the clatter of metal hitting the ground and then the man dropped to his knees, the heels of his palms pressed to his eyes. He muttered a string of words Portia didn’t understand, but she was pretty sure that they were invective against her.
“She told you to let her go,” Portia said, feeling a strange light-headedness that was probably an adrenaline rush chased by pride—she’d just arrived Scotland and had already stopped a crime in progress. She was mentally composing the text message to her parents, some variation of See? I can be useful, when she felt a burning that had nothing to do with victory.
“Ow, ow, OW!” She dropped the spray and brought her hands to her eyes, too.
“Did you stand downwind?” the attacker asked. For a moment she thought he’d started crying, but the sound was in fact low laughter. He was laughing. At her. “You did. Oh, you bloody tosser.”
“Tav, are you okay?”
Through her tears, Portia could make out the woman she thought she’d saved run to her attacker and help him up. Her attacker named Tav.
Wait.
“Be a love and go get some milk, Cheryl,” he said, pulling himself to his feet.
“Did you just mace Maestro Tav?” Kevyn had arrived on the scene. Perfect. “Tav, did she? Oh, this is bloody brilliant.”
“Aye, she did. And herself,” Tav added. Tavish McKenzie. Her new boss.
She pressed her palms more firmly into her eyes, waiting for Cheryl to bring the milk or for the cobblestones to part beneath her feet, allowing the earth to swallow her. She’d just arrived in Scotland and had managed to assault the man who would be her boss for the next three months—and herself in the process.
Project: New Portia was off to a fantastic start.
Chapter 2
Tav sighed and removed the cold compress from his eyes, then leaned forward, his office chair creaking under his bulk as it followed his motion. On the other side of his desk, Portia sat with her eyes squeezed closed. He didn’t think she was suffering from the side effects of her attempt at superheroism, judging from the way her eyes occasionally fluttered open to peek at him, then slammed shut. Her whole face was scrunched, like she was caught in a rictus of embarrassment.
He would have pitied her if she hadn’t tried to burn his eyes out without so much as a “Good day.”
“I have . . . questions, but first let me explain something to you,” he said.