Page 72 of Hit Me With Your Best Scot
Coll took a breath, waiting for the cat to extend a paw again, then shot his hand forward to grab it by the back of the neck.
Rolling onto his feet, he took another glance at the door. Flames curled up along the doorframe. They wouldn’t be leaving that way. With the black cat a coiled ball of claws and teeth and tail, he wouldn’t have much luck climbing down outside, either.
He could toss Hades down and the cat would likely land on his feet, but then he would flee, and they’d never set eyes on him again. Clenching his jaw, Coll turned the beastie to face him. “We’re getting down now. I’m saving ye, damn it all, so dunnae kill me.”
With one hand, he freed the bedsheet from beneath the quilted bedspread. Moving as swiftly as he could, he bundled up the cat and his hand and arm, all the way to the elbow. Then he let go of Hades and yanked his arm free, closing the opening with both hands.
With the sheet writhing in front of him, he knotted it, making a sling that he could put around his head and one arm. Claws poked at him, and the beastie hissed like the devil himself, but it would have to do.
Ducking back outside, he took a trio of steps before his left foot went through the roof. Heat licked at him as he caught himself with his hands and freed his shoe again. He’d picked one hell of a time to wear proper shoes rather than sturdy boots.
“Coll!”
He looked down to see Niall on the ground, along with Gavin, Wallace, and a half dozen other men from Aldriss Park and Oswell House riding up to join him. Unslinging the sheet, he held it up. “Catch the cat!”
With as gentle a toss as he could, he sent Hades over the edge of the roof, toward the ground. Niall caught the bundle in his arms, then yelped as claws caught him. Once he’d set the squirming sheet down and taken a step backward, he nodded. “Get down here!”
With fire licking up over the edge of the roof and pouring up through the growing holes around him, it looked as if he wouldn’t be escaping with any more dignity than Hades had. The shingle sagged beneath him.
Taking a breath, he pushed away and jumped.
He hit the ground hard with his right shoulder and rolled, just as the second floor collapsed into the first with a thunderous, spitting roar.
All of Temperance’s work—six years of her life—lost. No. Taken from her.
“That was too damned close,” Niall said, offering him a hand.
Taking it, Coll climbed to his feet. “I couldnae save anything for her.”
“Ye saved her cat. And ye’re nae dead, which I reckon is a good thing.”
Coll gazed at the burning wreckage. She rented the place, he knew, but that didn’t make the loss of all her belongings any less. “It’s nae enough,” he muttered. “I had two lads here, watching, and someone still managed to burn it down.”
“M’laird,” panted Charles Pitiloch, Clan Ross piper, coming forward. “I reckon ye need to sack me. I heard someaught around the side of the house, and I went for alook. When I came back, the front window was open and the sitting room was on fire.”
Swallowing his own anger and frustration, Coll clapped a hand on the smaller man’s shoulder. “The lot of ye keeping watch forced ’em to wait until the lass was away,” he said, though he wasn’t certain that was true. “Ye did all I could expect of ye.”
“It doesnae feel that way,” Charles said grimly. “I dunnae like getting outfoxed.”
“I dunnae either.” Releasing his grip, Coll walked over and gingerly picked up the bedsheet. “Find me a basket with a lid, will ye? I reckon Hades will be through this cloth in less than a minute.”
“Aye, m’laird.” With a swift nod, the ginger-haired piper trotted off toward the gaggle of neighbors.
“Someoneistrying to kill that lass, then,” Niall said, lowering his voice. “I thought mayhap ye’d made that bit up.”
“I wish I had.” Coll turned his gaze from the burning house. “Thank ye for coming.”
Niall shrugged. “Nae MacTaggert stands alone, whether ye’ve lost yer mind or nae.”
“I may see fit to remind ye of that soon.”
“She’s a lass in danger, Coll, and ye’re a man who likes to fight. Ye were bound to like her. But ye do recollect that she’s an actress. Are ye certain all this is real? Might she have had her own house burned, so she’d have nae a place to go and only ye to help her?”
If he hadn’t known what he did about Temperance Hartwood, it did almost seem like the plot of some play in which Persephone Jones would play the damsel. But he did know who she was and how she’d come to live in that wee, quaint house outside of Mayfair, and why she never went riding in Hyde Park and wore a different-colored wig every day.
Of course, he couldn’t disclose any of that to Niall or the rest of his family, but in the end, it didn’t matter. “She didnae have a thing to do with this. I’ll swear that on a Bible.”
Niall took a breath and let it out again. “Then what are ye going to do with her? She’s pretty enough and has a manner that doesnae seem any different to me than any aristocratic lass in Mayfair, but she’s nae that English ‘lady’ ye’re to wed. Amy says she’ll nae be invited anywhere proper, or be asked to stand for any charity or church. Do ye reckon ye’ll be enough for her?”
