Michael drove through the village, circled around, and parked on a quiet side street. Tired of waiting to hear from his brother Nick, he pulled out his cell phone and called him.
While Michael was talking to Nick, Isabel scanned her surroundings. There was a church across the street. The beautiful building had a regal bearing, with a steeple that reminded her of a bishop’s miter. She wondered how old it was. Age had given the structure a greenish-blue patina. She pushed the button to bring the window down so she could read the name etched in stone above the doors: THE
MAGDALENE.
Isabel wasn’t paying any attention to what Michael was saying to his brother. The church held her full attention. She wondered if the doors were locked. She could run up the steps and find out. She really wanted to see inside.
Michael must have read her intention because he grabbed her hand and shook his head. The message was clear. She wasn’t going anywhere.
He ended the call a minute later after assuring Nick that Isabel was fine.
“Noah and my brothers are worried about you,” he remarked as he started the engine.
“Why?” she asked, genuinely perplexed.
He laughed. “There’s a killer out there searching for you,” he reminded. “They think you might be worried about your situation.”
“Why would I worry? I have you.”
It had been a quick automatic response on her part, and it was only after she said it that she realized once again how true it was. She didn’t have any reason to worry as long as she was with him. She hadn’t said anything he didn’t already know. Michael would watch out for her just as she would watch out for him. As far as she was concerned, it was a no-brainer.
His reaction to what she said was surprising. He looked stunned, but only for a second or two, and then his expression changed to arrogant satisfaction. “Damn right.”
She rolled her eyes. “What’s the plan, Einstein?”
“We’re changing cars.”
An hour later, following directions Nick had texted, they pulled into a garage tucked behind an auto repair shop, parked their car, and carried their bags to an older SUV. The car key was under the floor mat along with a room key to the hotel where they were staying for the night. Nick’s connections had come through again. There was also a key to the hotel’s back door. They could go in that way, take the back steps to their room, and hopefully no one would see them.
“We’ve been lucky so far,” Isabel remarked. “I don’t think anyone has been able to track us.”
“We’ve had a lot of help. Nick has a friend with MI5 who hooked him up with an inspector in Inverness. His name is Knox Sinclair, and he’s now the man in charge.”
“In charge of the investigation?”
“In charge of finding the bastards who want to kill you.”
“There’s more than one?” She was stunned. Everything was escalating, and she was having trouble dealing with it all.
“That’s just it. We don’t know. The redhead you saw is involved . . . but how? Our best guess is that he and Jacoby were hired to see that you didn’t get Glen MacKenna. We know the redhead is still out there, but we don’t know if there’s someone else behind him. Nick’s heading up a team working on it.”
“Then I guess we’ll find out soon enough.” She tried to sound as though she were taking it all in stride and knew she’d failed miserably. Even she could hear the panic in her voice. She took a deep breath. She was not going to let this horrible situation overwhelm her. No matter what. She was a strong capable woman, and she could handle whatever came her way.
The pep talk didn’t help much. “I’m betting Harcus is behind this. It would be easier for him to claim ownership of Glen MacKenna if I weren’t around.”
The tension was getting to both of them. Neither one spoke for a long while as they drove through the countryside. He kept picturing Isabel walking into that police station covered in blood. Then he once again replayed that god-awful video in his mind. It was a miracle she was still breathing.
What in God’s name were they doing? He should have put Isabel under lock and key surrounded by guards until Wednesday, when she would walk into Donal Gladstone’s office, open the damn envelope, sign the papers—after he read them, of course. What they shouldn’t be doing was driving all over the Highlands talking to people. It wasn’t safe, but that didn’t seem to matter to her.
They were pushing their luck to the limit. It was only a matter of time before the bastard . . . or bastards . . . caught up with them.
It was as though she had just read his mind. “At least no one knows we’re here.”
“Yes, they do know,” he countered. “At the airport you signed autographs and those teenage girls took photos with their phones. By now they’ve posted your photo all over the Internet. I’m sure they’re searching for you.”
“Is there a chance they might have given up?” It was a stupid question, but she felt compelled to ask.
“You’re worth a hundred thousand. They won’t give up.”
“Don’t you mean dead I’m worth a hundred thousand?”
“Yes.”
Isabel felt responsible for every bit of this mess, and she couldn’t understand why she felt that way. None of this was her fault. But dragging Michael into the middle of her problem had been a huge mistake. If anything happened to him while he was protecting her . . . the mere thought made her sick to her stomach.
All this time she’d been thinking she needed to get away from him to protect her heart. Now she realized he needed to get away from her so he could keep on breathing.
If she told him what she was thinking he would become angry and get his back up. Then they would argue, and she knew exactly how it would go. Didn’t she have any faith in his ability to protect her? he’d ask. Sure she did, she’d respond. She just didn’t know how she could protect him. That answer was sure to rile him.
Michael glanced at her, took in her dark expression, and asked, “What’s going on with you?”
“We’re having an argument.”
“We are?”
“Yes, and I’m winning.”
“Of course you are. What are we arguing about?”
She didn’t want to explain. “Nick seems to have connections all over the world. Is it because he’s FBI?”
“Partly,” he answered. “Since we were kids, Nick and Alec had a knack for collecting friends and making connections. Nick is more experienced now and has more”—he paused for a second while he searched for the right word—“finesse. Yeah, he has more finesse, but even so, Alec has him beat. Name a city anywhere and he’ll tell you he knows a guy. Nick has had to ask Alec for help on more than one occasion.”
“What about you? Did you have a lot of friends growing up, or were you a loner?”
He laughed. “It wasn’t possible to be a loner in my family.”
She tried to imagine what it would be like to be part of such a big, boisterous family. It would be loud and chaotic, she supposed, but fun, too.