Kiernan’s lips tensed beneath Phoebe’s fingers.
“There will be plenty once we get there,” Alan said. “Just wait. We’ll make that bitch pay for what she and her kind have done to us—to us and every other Highlander.”
“I still say she’s got too much power,” another grumbled. “It won't be so easy.”
Alan laughed, low and cruel. “Even someone as powerful as the Duchess of Sutherland isn't invincible. She's seventy-two. She won't be hard to kill.”
Phoebe jerked. The duchess.
Kiernan pulled her hand to his chest. “Be still,” he hissed.
“Still…” the other man said.
“Are you a coward?” Alan demanded.
“I’m no coward,” he replied, “but I’m no fool either.”
“If you don't have the stomach for it, get out now,” Alan said.
“I didn't say I wanted out,” the accused said sullenly.
A sound like that of a slap on the back was followed by, “It's been difficult, George. You lost the wee one and Shannon hasn't been the same since.”
“I should have left her with her father in MacEwen territory,” George answered.
“We agreed,” Alan said, “no one suspects us with the women along.”
Phoebe drew a quick breath. Kiernan must have understood her horror, for his free hand shot around her waist and he gave her a squeeze. She felt the hard shape of the pistol stuffed into his belt and wished mightily for an opportunity to aim it at the men who sacrificed women and children for their own ends.
“What’s done is done,” Alan said. “It served its purpose.”
Phoebe started at sight of another figure appearing in the doorway through which Kiernan had entered.
He backed her into the corner. “Stay here,” he ordered.
The man in the doorway disappeared as Kiernan hurried back to the door that opened into the stables. He pulled the pistol from his waistband and, in unison with the groan of the main stable doors abruptly opening, yanked open the stall door.
“Lay down your weapons in the name of the Marquess of Ashlund!” a man yelled.
Kiernan lunged into the stables and out of her view.
Phoebe rushed forward as Alan Hay’s voice boomed above the female screams, “Lads! Dinna let them—"
A shot rang out.
She skidded to a halt in the doorway. Mather stood between the robbers and the main stable door, gun raised heavenward, smoke rising from the barrel. Six men in a semi-circle around the robbers pointed weapons at them.
The women screamed again and Phoebe’s snapped her gaze upward. The women cowered away from the edge of the loft. Two of Hay’s men dropped to their knees, their drawn weapons falling to the ground beside them. The man standing beside Alan Hay whirled toward Kiernan. Kiernan halted as the man thrust a hand inside his coat.
Phoebe’s heart leapt. Kiernan leveled his pistol. A heartbeat passed and she thought in that horrible instant that Kiernan had somehow frozen. The man pointed his revolver. She opened her mouth to shout a warning, but Kiernan fired. The man twisted to the side and blood stained the shirt at his shoulder even before he crumpled to the ground. Alan Hay dropped to his knees beside his comrades and Kiernan motioned the women from the loft. They backed away from the edge, but when one of his men moved toward the ladder, the first woman started down.
“Take them to the salon,” Kiernan instructed his men.
Once the women descended, they pleaded innocence for their men. Phoebe glanced left at the pitchfork leaning against the wall and decided it might do for herding them out the door. She froze at seeing the barrel of a revolver suddenly protrude from the stall to her right. Muscular fingers gripped the weapon, and an arm followed, the weapon aimed at her.
She met the eyes of the gun’s owner. His face, devoid of emotion, chilled her. She grabbed for the pitchfork. He leapt forward, knocked the handle from her grasp, and jammed the barrel of the revolver against her neck.
“Nay, lassie,” he said in such a reasonable tone, he might have been cautioning her against paying too much for a scarf at the market.
He snaked an arm around her waist and tugged her close while backing away from the stall and from his comrades. The women were at last being led toward the main door, but Charlotte looked over her shoulder and her eyes widened. Kiernan glanced over his shoulder.
His attention centered on Phoebe’s assailant as he turned and took a step in their direction. “You don’t have to do this, lad.”
“Dinna’ come any closer,” the man warned.
Kiernan halted. A hushed tension hummed through the room.
“Where are you taking them?” The man’s chin brushed the back of Phoebe’s head when he motioned toward the women.
“What do you hope to accomplish?” Kiernan said. “You won't get ten feet.”
“I will get ten feet and more.” The man pulled Phoebe closer. “Me and my friends.”
“Ye tell him, Robbie,” one man yelled before he was silenced by a pistol leveled at his head.