Page 83 of The Wolf Laird's Obsession
Ewan leaned close as Rowan turned his horse toward the tree line. “Do ye truly believe him?”
Rowan did not answer at first. His mind was racing, turning over the possibilities and discarding them one by one. If not Kerr, then who? If not the man whose pride had been wounded, then what enemy had he made that would want his wife dead?
Someone who wants to hurt me, who wants to weaken me. Someone who kens that losing her would destroy me.
His blood ran cold as the realization struck him. He had invited everyone to the castle. Every laird of note in the Highlands was under his roof, eating his food and drinking his wine and sleeping in his beds.
And all his guards, even Ewan, were here in the glen with him, miles from the keep, leaving the castle exposed and vulnerable and undefended.
Sorcha. Elspeth. They are alone.
“The castle,” Rowan said, his voice sharp and urgent, nothing like the calm control he had maintained moments ago. “We need to get back to the castle. Now.”
Ewan’s face went pale. “What is it?”
“Kerr didnae poison her.” Rowan wheeled his horse around and dug his heels into its flanks. “Someone else did. Someone who is still in me keep. Someone who is there right now, with me wife and me daughter, while we are standing here in this glen like fools.”
He did not wait for a response. He kicked his horse into a gallop and raced toward the tree line, toward the road, toward the castle that held everything he loved.
Behind him, he heard Ewan shouting orders and the thunder of hooves as the guards fell in behind him. But he did not look back.
He could only ride forward and pray that he was not too late.
CHAPTER THIRTY
The horse’s hooves pounded against the earth beneath Rowan, and still he pushed harder, faster, demanding more from the animal than any man had a right to demand.
The wind whipped at his face, but he did not feel it. The branches of the trees reached for him as he passed, but he did not see them.
He saw only Sorcha’s face, pale against the pillow, while the healer fought to draw the poison from her blood. Sorcha’s face, flushed and wanting in the study, while he had stood there like a coward and then walked away. Sorcha’s face the last time he had seen her, framed by golden hair and blue wool and dying sunlight.
Please be safe.
The gates of the castle rose before him, but he did not slow. He rode through them at full speed, scattering servants, andthe sound of his horse’s hooves echoed off the stone walls like thunder.
He dismounted before the animal had fully stopped, his boots hitting the ground hard, and he was running before his knees had finished absorbing the impact.
The courtyard was in chaos.
Flora stood near the well with her hands pressed against her mouth and her face white as snow. Her red hair was escaping its pins, and her grey eyes were wide and wild with terror.
When she saw him, she let out a sound that was half sob and half scream, and she ran toward him with her skirts bunched in her fists.
“Me Laird! Oh, God help us. Me Laird, she is gone!”
Rowan caught her by the shoulders and held her still. “Who is gone? Where is me wife?”
“I daenae ken! I cannae find her!” Flora’s voice rose with every word, and tears streamed down her freckled cheeks. “I went to her chambers to see if she was ready to go down to the cèilidh, and she wasnae there. I thought perhaps she had gone to find Lady Elspeth, so I went to the nursery, but she wasnae there either. I have searched everywhere. Everywhere, me Laird. She is gone.”
Morag appeared from the direction of the Great Hall, her silver hair escaping its braid and her sharp eyes red-rimmed and swollen. She walked toward him with her hands clasped in front of her, and when she reached him, her composure cracked.
“I went to fetch little Elspeth for the cèilidh,” she said, her voice thick with tears she was trying very hard not to shed. “But she wasnae in the nursery, me Laird. And worse... the bed hadnae been slept in. The room was cold.”
Rowan’s blood turned to ice in his veins. “Elspeth is missing as well?”
“Aye.” Morag pressed her hand to her mouth, and a sob escaped despite her efforts to contain it. “I thought perhaps they had gone for a walk together, or perhaps Lady Sorcha had taken her to the kitchens for a sweet treat, but I have checked everywhere. The kitchens, the Great Hall, the solar, the gardens, the stables. They arenae in the keep, me Laird. They arenae anywhere.”
The words hit him like a blow to the chest. He stood there with Flora crying beside him and Morag trembling before him, and he felt the world tilt beneath his feet.
