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“Mrs. Grouse, we’re home!” And none too soon. They’d only walked a block and Claire felt nearly frozen solid thanks to the wind.

She looked around as she hung up her coat, then shrugged. “She must have gone downstairs. I wonder where Brindle is? He should have been here by now.”

She’d been greatly relieved not to see a cruiser parked out front and the police camped on her couch.

Cam nodded toward the coffee table. “There’s a missive for ye.”

Claire collapsed on the nearest chair and started pulling off her snow-caked socks. “What does it say?”

He turned on a lamp and picked up the letter. “Dear Claire, Mr. Brindle called to say he can’t make it today but would come as soon as the roads were passable and that you are not, under any circumstances—she underlined that—to let MacLeod out of yer sight.” He chuckled. “Trusting soul, that Brindle.” He looked down again. “He also wants you to know that he managed to get the other charges against Cameron dropped, so there won’t be a March trial although why he bothered he can’t imagine and I quote ‘given MacLeod’s penchant for grand theft.’ ” Cam laughed. “Ah, my property will be returned to me. Great news that.”

“All wonderful news.” For a change. It probably also meant she’d get the bond money back, but likely not for months.

He scanned the rest of the letter. “She goes on to say the police havena called nor come by. And her daughter called. She’ll be coming home for Christmas.” Cam dropped the letter onto the coffee table next to the pile of receipts. “That should please her immensely.”

“Yes. She’s probably in a cleaning frenzy as we speak.” Claire rose and not seeing the checks and cash on the table wondered where Mrs. Grouse had hidden them. She went into the kitchen, turned on the tea kettle, then peered into the cookie jar. Nope, not there. She drummed her fingers on the counter. Where would you hide money if you were a bank-phobic eighty-five-year-old woman? She checked the bread box and heaved a sigh of relief. There it all was. Now to check her stores. The power would be going out sooner rather than later the way the snow was coming down, and thanks to Cam, she hadn’t done anything to prepare.

Hearing the TV, she shouted, “Have they found the deer?”

“Aye!” Barefoot and grinning, he came into the kitchen. “The buck and his doe are running hither and yon all over the park with dozens of police chasing after them. Funny to watch, really.”

He would find it funny. “I’m glad they’re okay.”

“The man said a veterinarian is coming to fetch them home. Did ye ken a reindeer can run 50 miles per hour? Aye, that’s what the man said.” Cam shook his head in apparent wonder. “ ’Tis faster than we traveled on the way to Salem.” He pulled a box of crackers from the cabinet. “And I saw myself on teevee and suspect ye’ve been fashing for naught. I wouldna have kenned it was me had it not been for the buck.”

She gaped at him. She could only name one six-and-a-half-foot Scot who could run flat out with one hundred and fifty pounds of wild-eyed, thrashing reindeer on his shoulders.

Growling under her breath, Claire opened the freezer. Two weeks ago, she would have known what was inside down to the last cube without looking. With Cam around, it was anyone’s guess. She opened the fridge. “I hope you like chicken.” If not he was shit out of luck. She had chicken breast, chicken thighs, and a whole chicken in the freezer and leftover fried chicken in the meat keeper.

“I adore it.” He came up behind her to have a look for himself and reached over her shoulder as he moved condiments and plastic containers around.

He’s doing it again, getting in my space.

“The weather person said ye can expect three feet of snow by evening. Ah, look, ye still have some spaghetti. ’Twas verra good, by the way.”

“Thank you.” She did make a mean sauce and he smelled wonderfully masculine as he hovered over her, which she shouldn’t even be thinking about. “We’ll have it for lunch.”

She mumbled, “Excuse me,” to get him to back up and pawed through her junk drawer for matches. “Will you do me a favor and check on—”

Grrrrrrrring, grrrrring!

They both jerked and stared at each other. Claire murmured, “Oh God. What if it’s the police?”

Cam strode into the living room and looked out the windows. “There isna a police car outside and no one is standing on the stairs.”

Grrrrrrrrring, grrrrrrrring!

Cam growled deep in his throat. “I’ll wager ’tis the bloody deevil’s buckies again.”

As he jerked open her apartment door, she placed a hand on his arm. “Promise me you’ll be careful.”

He tapped the tip of her nose. “Aren’t I always?”

“No.”

Blade in hand, his gaze locked on the hooded figure beyond the glass, Cam crossed the darkened shop on silent feet. As if sensing his presence, the figure straightened. Ack, ’twas the Salem witch. But why on earth was she here, and on a day fit for neither man nor beast? His pulse quickened. Had she found the solution to his dilemma? “Please, God, let it be so.”

Hope soaring, he punched in the alarm code and pulled open the door. “Mistress, come in before ye catch ye death.”

“Hello, Mr. MacLeod.” Her expression serious, Sandra Power glided over the threshold.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” As her hood fell back sending a wee flurry over the floor, he rushed to close the door, only to hear a woman behind him squeak, “Not so fast, young man!”

A dozen women covered in a healthy dusting of snow were marching up the steps. Not having kenned their presence, the hairs on the back of his neck quivered. As they filed past and into the shop, he recognized the blind psychic he’d met in Salem who had told him to forgive Mhairie. To Sandra he asked, “Mistress, what goes on here?”

“Patience, Mr. MacLeod.”

When the last woman crossed the threshold, he peered outside to be sure nothing else was heading his way, then closed the door. As he reached for a nearby table lamp, Mistress Power said, “That won’t be necessary.”

“As ye lust.” He stepped into their midst. While his gaze raked over the women ranging in age from lasses to crones, from beauties to plain, each studied him in turn. Recognizing a woman of middle years whom he’d consulted with just days ago and who’d told him precisely what Mistress Power had, he scowled. “My lady.”

“Mr. MacLeod, good to see you again.”

He seriously doubted it, given he’d stormed out of her establishment.

“Mr. MacLeod,” Mistress Power said, drawing his attention away from the last psychic he’d visited, “Discretion is paramount to us, but not apparently to you. Learning you’ve been running from pillar to post, from frauds to witches with your tale is alarming enough, but to see you on television …”

Humph! “If ye’re here to chastise me or to tell me to cease—”

Both her hands flew up, palms to him, as did those of the women on either side of her. Within a heartbeat, the air felt charged as if before a powerful storm. The crystals on the chandelier above his head rattled and the hairs on his arms and neck immediately rose. Sensing imminent danger from all quarters but most strongly at his back, he spun and found the women behind him also had their palms to him. One, the crone, was scowling at him.

A heartbeat later all returned to normal and Mistress Power said, “Mr. MacLeod, you can relax. We mean you no harm.”

Keeping the auld woman in his peripheral vision should she take it into her head to lunge, he muttered, “And why should I believe ye?” Every instinct within him warned otherwise.

“Because many of us empathize with your plight and the rest simply believe it’s safer for all concerned if you’re where you belong. What you see before you are the most gifted in the craft, of our kind. Like a rope made up of multiple strands, we’re hoping to be stronger together than we are as individuals. What you just experienced was a collective energy. Are you ready?”

“For what?”

“To experience our full power, to return from whence you’ve come if it’s at all possible.”

“Now?” But he’d not said goodbye to Claire. He couldn’t simply disappear without a word. She’d fash herself sick wondering what had happened to him, and he had yet to tell her how much she’d come to mean to him, how much he truly appreciated all she’d done for him. That he’d grieve the loss of her, miss her more than he would have ever thought possible just weeks ago. “I need to say my fare—”

“Now or never, Mr. MacLeod.” She cast a wary glance at the other women and he followed suit, only to realize that some were here under duress, that they’d just as soon walk out the door.

He took a deep breath. ’Twas, in fact, now or never. “Ye’ll tell her what happened? That I care deeply and shall miss her?” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cards and the check. “Please give these to her. And tell her to keep her trust in Victor for he loves her like a brother. And … tell her to get a cat. Lovely and honest, gentle and kind, she’s still …” His voice cracked. “She’s still lonely, mistress.”

Sandra Power’s features softened. “I will.”

“Then so be it.”

Who was he talking to?

Praying it wasn’t the gang who’d been tormenting her, Claire edged in behind the open storage room door and pressed an eye to the crack between the frame and door. Recognizing Sandra Power, her heart began to hammer. Then she recognized two others. The blind psychic and a young girl they’d met in Salem. My God, there were twelve of them!

“Now or never,” Sandra told Cam.

“Ye’ll tell her what happened?”

Oh dear God! Had they come to grant his wish, answer his prayers?

“That I care deeply,” Cam continued, “and shall miss her?”

Ooh, he cared deeply? Then why the hell hadn’t he said so before now? Here she’d been thinking the worst. Augh!

Oh, and he thought her lovely as well?

The blind psychic suddenly looked her way. As the sightless black eyes narrowed, Claire’s heart—already going insane with what she was seeing and hearing—slammed against her ribs. Had the woman sensed her presence? Panic closed Claire’s throat as an invisible band tightened around her chest and caused her heartbeat to grow ever more erratic. Black spots started dancing before her eyes.

Do not panic. It’s just the stress arrhythmia. Take a deep breath.

Praying the woman hadn’t sensed her—that whatever the witches were doing in the shop would continue for Cam’s sake—Claire backed away from the door, pulling deeper into the shadows toward the stairs.

Oh God. This was really happening. He really was leaving her. Now, before she’d had an opportunity to tell him she loved him. Every fiber in her wanted her to make herself known. To go into the shop and put a stop to whatever Cam and the witches were doing. But would he willingly remain—turn down the witches’ help—if he knew she loved him? Or would he still go despite knowing?

She’d never know, because she wasn’t running in there. He’d been too distraught learning about his family, had begged for help. And here it was in the form of twelve witches.

At the foot of the stairs, she hesitated, listening to the odd droning. She took a deep shuddering breath, tasted ozone, and looked back over her shoulder. Yes. Better that she not know if he’d remain or go.

The tears that had been building coursed down her cheeks. This was his wish, his life, not hers. And his leaving without him knowing the hopes and fears she harbored meant she could pretend that Cam would have remained had he known she loved him.

The drone followed her up the stairs growing louder instead of softer as she climbed. As she rounded the second-floor landing, the light above her blinked erratically and her footsteps faltered. Please, God, keep him safe. He’d be going into battle if he couldn’t dissuade his father, would be one of thousands joining the Jacobite cause. The thought made bile rise in her throat. Even she knew all had been killed on the field of blood called Culloden.

She slipped into her apartment and quietly closed the door. Her heart skipped, then thudded as the lamp blinked out and a deadly silence descended. She grabbed the teddy bear sitting on the coffee table, all she had left to remember him by, and curled into a ball on the couch, her sobs coming in wracking keens as she buried her face in the soft plush. Oh God, Cam. I’m so frightened for you.