Devil in Tartan (Highland Grooms #4)(51)

“What is it Norval?” she demanded.

He shrugged, then glanced over his shoulder toward the ship and said no more.

But as they neared the ship, Lottie noticed that the men—her men, Livingstones—had gathered at the railing. They were watching them approach, which did not surprise her. But something seemed off. And then she realized there was no urgency in their movements. There were no shouts. No calls to them. They were silent, all of them, staring down at her.

She looked at Norval accusingly. “What has happened?” she demanded, although part of her knew. Part of her was melting into palpable pain and dread before words could even be spoken.

A familiar sound reached her ears and her dread swiftly turned to heartbreak. She knew that sound—it was Drustan, crying out in anguish.

No one had to tell Lottie that Bernt Livingstone had drawn his last breath.

She knew.





CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE LIVINGSTONES FELL apart at the death of their chief and their grief put a pall over Aulay’s deck. They stood about with expressions that were a mix of confusion and torment, talking in low voices and glancing furtively over their shoulders as if they expected death to sneak up and take them, too.

Some of them were positively bereft. The actor openly sobbed as he spoke to Iain the Red about the old man.

Aulay made his way to the quarterdeck, unchecked, unchallenged. There was no pretense of captives or captors any longer.

The door to his cabin was open. He could see a small group of Livingstones gathered there, all of them in tears, all of them with a hand clamped on the shoulder of the next, or an arm thrown loosely around the next person’s waist, their heads bowed.

Lottie was somewhere among them.

Aulay would never forget the sound she made when she realized what had happened. It wasn’t loud, it was quite soft. But it was anguish, pure anguish—the sound of a heart breaking. She’d said not a word, but had climbed up the rope ladder like a monkey and disappeared before Aulay and Norval could set the ropes to raise the boat and climb the ladder themselves. Before anyone could say aloud that the old man had died.

Norval trailed behind Aulay now, as if he wasn’t certain if he ought to guard Aulay or help him. Aulay caught Iain the Red’s eye and gestured for him to join him on the quarterdeck. When Iain reached him, Aulay said, “Prepare to make sail.”

“Pardon?” Norval said, looking between Iain and Aulay. Iain brushed past him to begin work. “On whose command?”

“On mine,” Aulay said. “Tell who you must, lad, but heed me—if anyone needs persuasion that we must make sail at once, tell them that your mistress’s scheme to sell your spirits has failed, and now, we’ve a group of thieves on our arse. We’ll be lucky to catch a good wind and outrun them, but we must be quick.”

“What is this about? What is he doing here?”

A man Aulay recognized joined them. MacLean was his name.

“He says we have thieves in pursuit,” Norval said.

“Thieves? Why?”

“Och, for the whisky, man,” Aulay said impatiently. “Did any of you truly believe you might casually sell it without question? Without an agent, without any knowledge but what someone had said in passing? I’d wager that now there’s no’ a man on shore who doesna know what is on this ship and that it is ripe for the picking.”

“This is a trick!” MacLean said hotly.

“A trick?” Aulay repeated angrily. “You think that I would trick my own men out of the pay your mistress promised them? Do you think with a gun pointed at my back that I would somehow manage to unload the whisky from my ship? No, sir—the trick was done to you long ago by a Dane. The Copenhagen Company doesna exist. But what does exist is a den of cutthroat thieves who wish to turn your whisky into their gain. I need every man on deck to set the sails and prepare the guns.”

MacLean blinked with surprise. But then he looked at Norval and said, “Do as he says. We all heard the man say they were looking for Scots on shore.”

Aulay jerked around to MacLean. “What man?”

“The man who came for the physician Duff brought on board. It was too late, it was, as Bernt was gone...but the rower asked if we were Scotsmen and said they were looking for Scots.”

“Have you seen anyone else?” Aulay asked.

The man shook his head.

“Gather your men. Tell them we sail and I am captain and to surrender their arms, aye?”

MacLean hesitated.

“Think!” Aulay snapped. “They are stunned by their loss, you canna sell your whisky, and you need us to sail this ship out of harm’s way, aye? We can move ahead with speed, or we can tarry and engage in another fight, but this time, I assure you, we will win.”

MacLean considered that a moment, then sighed with defeat. “Aye.”

“Where is Beaty?” Aulay asked.

“I’ll take you to him,” MacLean said, and gestured for Aulay to follow him.

*

IT WAS A ridiculously easy feat to overtake the Livingstones. Their fight, so brilliantly displayed when they’d first boarded the ship, had gone out of them with the loss of their chief. More than one merely handed a gun to a Mackenzie and put up his hands. Those in the captain’s cabin didn’t seem to realize what was happening on deck, and none of them ventured out to have a look.