The Raider (Highland Guard #8)(36)

Malcolm, Roger, and Lady Rosalin were gone. Letting off a string of oaths, he ran. If she’d tricked the lad again and tried to escape, he was going to tie her up for the rest of the journey and throw her back into that sack.

He was halfway there when he saw Roger Clifford emerge from the burned-out shell of a longhouse-style building. The boy’s eyes stuck out like two white discs in his soot-streaked face, and his golden hair that was so like his aunt’s was matted to his head. He was wheezing heavily as he stumbled toward him. “Hurry!” he managed in a cracked voice. “N-need help.”

Robbie grabbed him by the arm, more to hold him up than in anger. “What happened? Where are your aunt and Malcolm? Are they in there?”

The boy nodded and Robbie took off into the burning building, a flurry of expletives firing in his head. His ears were pounding with a sound he didn’t recognize. It took him a moment to realize it was his heart.

What the hell could have possessed her to go into that building? He was furious. Beyond furious. Out-of-his-mind furious. But most of all he was bloody scared. Enough to admit it.

He ducked through the doorway into the smoky cavern. Covering his mouth with his arm, he blinked through the black haze, his eyes immediately tearing.

“Rosalin! Malcolm!” he choked, trying to see through the maze of smoldering destruction. It looked as if one of Sutherland’s black powder explosions had gone off in here.

“Here!” a distinctly feminine voice replied. “We’re back here.”

Ploughing through the stacks of beams and posts as if they were twigs, he made his way toward them. It wasn’t difficult. All he had to do was follow the line of flames that seemed to be heading right for them.

For as hard as his heart was pumping, his voice came out remarkably calm when he looked down into her tear-stained, soot-streaked face. “What happened?”

His voice didn’t sound like his own. He hadn’t known it was possible for him to speak so…tenderly.

Her tiny chin trembled and for a heart-wrenching instant, he thought she might fall apart. If she had, he knew he would have pulled her into his arms. He wouldn’t have been able to stop himself.

But she took a deep breath and held her emotions in check. “I heard a man crying for help, and when we came in to help him, Malcolm got stuck when a beam fell on us.”

It was strange how a heart that was pounding so fast could suddenly come to a dead stop. He waited a beat or two for it to start again. He wouldn’t think of her lying under that beam crushed. He wouldn’t. But he started to get a sick, twisted feeling in his gut anyway. He felt something he’d never felt before: weak-kneed.

“Captain? Is that you?”

Malcolm’s voice brought him back. “Aye, lad. I’ll have you free in a minute.”

She looked behind him. “Did no one else come with you?” Her voice shot up in panic. “We aren’t going to be able to move it in time.”

Obviously, she’d been trying to do just that.

“Move back.” He quickly took stock of the situation and realized he needed to have care. One wrong move and the entire pile of rock and beams would come down on Malcolm, crushing him instantly.

Turning his back to the beam, he grabbed the squared edge and using his legs, started to lift. But damn, the thing was heavy, even for him. “See if you can scoot out from under it,” he said from between clenched teeth, every muscle straining.

“Almost,” Malcolm said. “Another inch or two.”

Robbie clenched harder and lifted. His arms burned against the weight. But Malcolm was able to slither his way out. Very carefully, Robbie lowered the beam back into place.

And not a moment too soon. The flames were only a few feet away now. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.”

“But what about the man?” Rosalin said. “We can’t just leave him.”

Robbie clenched his fists, fighting the anger and fear that made him want to lash out. “Where?” he said tightly.

“Behind that wall.” She pointed to a space that had obviously been built into the wall as a hiding place. Suspecting for what, and exactly why the man was there, Robbie was tempted to leave him for being so reckless. But a few moments later, he’d moved the debris out of the way enough to drag him out. Not wanting to tell her that it was too late, he lifted the dead man over his shoulder with one arm, and with the other wrapped around her waist tucking her up tightly against him—trying not to notice how good she felt—he led them out of the burning trap.

As soon as they hit the fresh air, Malcolm collapsed on the ground coughing. Rosalin stayed on her feet but bent over to do the same, while Robbie let his arm slide from her waist and dropped the body of the villager, then grabbed on to the nearest tree so he didn’t topple over. His lungs and arms were on fire.

Seton, Fraser, Callum, and two more of his men were almost on them. The lad had obviously managed to alert them to the danger. Seton immediately rushed forward to assist Lady Rosalin, as did Callum with Malcolm. “What happened?” his partner asked.

For once, Robbie wasn’t annoyed by his solicitousness. The lass needed tending, and he could barely stand.

It took a few stops and starts for the story to come out. But between Malcolm, Roger, and Rosalin, the details began to emerge. It was hard enough to believe she’d raced in to try to help someone she didn’t know, but when Lady Rosalin reached the point where Malcolm became stuck behind the debris, the men looked at each other in astonishment.