Page 36 of Death at a Highland Wedding (Rip Through Time #4)

THIRTY-SIX

“I did not say you could stop.” Müller jerks the rifle again. “Do you see that bag on the ground? That is where you are going. Now move.”

When I squint, I see the bag. Some kind of rucksack.

He’s going to put me in a rucksack?

I continue walking toward it.

Be docile. Be cowed. Don’t overdo it, but let him think he’s in control.

Once we reach the sack, I see it’s not big enough to hold me, and there are objects inside. I hold my breath. He’s going to open it and take something out, and that will be my chance—

“Open it,” he says.

I look at him.

The rifle barrel rises. “Open it.”

I calculate and decide this isn’t the time. I lift the bag. Inside is a length of hemp rope. Seeing it, something in me spasms, thrown back to how I ended up in this world, strangled by a rope like this. But this is several pieces, and in the next moment, I realize what he has in mind.

“Lie on your stomach,” he says. “Place your hands behind your back.”

“Wh-what are you going to do?” I say, injecting as much fear as I can into my voice.

“I do not know the custom in this country,” he says, “but in mine, when you are released from a position early, you are due a payment. Cranston cannot give it to me, so I am taking it. You.”

My reaction must show in my eyes, because he gives a harsh laugh. “Not for that. I said payment, girl. I know people who will pay well to take you. I only need to get you to them.” His teeth flash. “I am certain they will be very kind to you.”

“People in your country?”

Disdain oozes from him. “I do not need to go to my country to find such people. There are enough in yours. More than enough.”

“People you know through Ezra Sinclair. People who share his… tastes.”

“Lie down.”

“He didn’t bring you to Scotland because you’re such a wonderful gamekeeper. He brought you because you share his tastes.”

“Lie down. ”

I lower myself to my knees. “Ezra let you have your way with Lenore. That’s what happened, isn’t it? You two shared her. Against her will.”

“Any woman who would consent to such a thing is a whore. I do not consort with whores.”

“What about the wildcat?”

That nearly does the trick. He rocks back, thrown by the seeming non sequitur. But his hands grip the rifle tighter. Then he smiles. “If you mean Miss Lenore, she was something of a wildcat. So much fight for a lame girl. You would have thought she would be happy for the attention.”

My stomach twists, but I push on. “I mean the wildcat. You poisoned it and put it into that trap.”

His face scrunches up. “Did that slap addle your brain, girl? What does the cat have to do with this? And what is this talk of poison? The beast was caught in the trap.”

“No, it was placed there. After it died of poison.”

More confusion. “I do not know what—”

His grip loosens on the rifle, the barrel dropping just enough. I dodge to the side and grab for the barrel. He’s faster, wrenching it away, and I slash with my knife. The blade catches him on the hand. He hisses, but he doesn’t drop the rifle, doesn’t even loosen his grip.

I pull back my switchblade to stab, but he swings the rifle and the barrel strikes my funny bone. I gasp, my grip automatically loosening on the blade, and my knife starts to drop, but I manage to catch it with my other hand.

That leaves my weapon in the wrong hand. Müller moves, and my gaze is fixed on that rifle barrel, ready for it to swing up. When one hand releases the gun, I lunge to take advantage, which is exactly what he wants, as his fist plows into my stomach.

I fly back, feet scrambling for purchase, but the ground is slick with dew. My boot slips. I go down on one knee, and he hits me again, fist smacking my jaw so hard I fall back.

I twist as I fall, and I manage to flip over.

“Good,” he grunts. “Lie on your stomach.”

I start to lower myself. Then I vault up, and my brain screams that he has a rifle, and running is the last thing I should do. But it’s also the only thing I can do, and as I tear back toward the bushes, I veer a split second before I hear the crack of the rifle. The shot whizzes past me.

I keep running, swerving erratically. I’m almost at the bushes when my damn boot slips again. The rifle cracks. Something hits me hard in the back, pain exploding. All I know is that it staggers me but I don’t fall.

It’s a low caliber rifle. Meant for shooting small game.

I’ve still been shot. Shot .

I dive into the bushes.

Müller fires again, this shot going wild.

I get on the other side of those bushes and then dart across the road to the next row as I struggle to catch my breath. Did the bullet hit my lung?

Keep going!

I dive into the bushes and through to the other side. And on that other side? Wide-open meadow that I can’t cross without Müller seeing me and shooting me dead.

I struggle for breath.

The bullet hit my lung, didn’t it? I can localize the pain now. It’s the right side of my back, about halfway up. Where the bullet could pass through my ribs and pierce my lungs.

Don’t think about that. Think about the guy who still has the gun, the one chasing you.

I try for a deeper breath. It hurts, but I manage it. Then I creep along the bushes, knife gripped tight as I look for a spot to hide. I find it just in time, and I wriggle in carefully, all too aware of Müller’s heavy breathing only a few meters away.

A grunt tells me he makes it through the bushes just as I get hidden.

I slow my breathing.

Keep walking. Just keep walking.

He doesn’t, though. Müller is a hunter, and I have the feeling he hunts more than deer. He knew how to subdue me. He has experience at that and probably experience at chasing prey that has fled his grasp.

He takes two steps from the row of bushes. I can see him there, through the branches, as he looks around.

He knows I didn’t run across the meadow. He’d see me if I did. It’s too far to the nearest shelter. I couldn’t have made it in time.

He looks both ways. I’m in the bushes. He knows that. But to his left? Or his right?

I reach in my pocket for something to throw the other way. There’s nothing, and even if there was, I’m not sure I’d dare. I’d be more likely to hit the branches with my swing.

I hold my breath, fingers playing with the switchblade handle. I need to be ready. He will come this way and—

He turns the other way.

I grip the knife even tighter as I weigh my options.

No time, my brain screams. I’ve already paused long enough, thinking when I need to act. This hedgerow isn’t that long. He’ll reach the end and come back.

I slide out, breath held, back throbbing. I roll my footsteps as I try to see where I’m placing my boots, but it’s too dark and I can only brace, ready for attack if so much as a twig scrapes under my boot.

I have to fight the urge to run the rest of the distance. He’s ten feet away, nine, eight. When I hit four, he’s too close to the end of the row. He’ll turn around at any second.

I charge and slash at the only exposed piece of skin I see. The side of his neck. I don’t cut deep enough to kill him. I don’t think I could do that unless I was absolutely certain I had no choice.

The blade splits the skin, and he howls. He starts to spin, and I grab the gun barrel. A shot fires, white hot as it rips down the barrel.

I force the gun up. I’ve still got my knife in hand—no time to put it away—and it keeps me from getting a good grip on the rifle, but blood flows from the side of his neck and panic floods his eyes.

We’re locked in a standoff—me awkwardly holding the barrel, switchblade still in my hand, him clenching the gun but all too aware of blood gushing down his neck. When I yank hard, he loses his grip. Then he punches me, another of those no-holds-barred blows that sends me flying. I manage to keep the gun, but my knife falls. He dives for it. The rifle is too big for close-quarters combat. I pitch it aside as far as I can manage.

I get to my knife first. Then he runs for the gun, and I do the same. We reach the rifle at the same time, but my injured back seizes, and I stumble, hissing in pain. I slash at him as he goes for the gun. My blade catches his arm, but he’s wearing too many layers for it to do any damage.

I kick the rifle. It’s all I can manage. My back is on fire, my stomach screams from the earlier blow and my head pounds from the other two. I can’t keep fighting or I will lose. All I can do is kick the gun and then run.

I race for the house. Behind me, Müller fires once, but I’m veering too wildly for him to hit me. At first, his footsteps pound behind me. Then they slow. Then they’re erratic, and I risk glancing back to see him staggering, hand clamped to his neck, rifle lowered in the other hand.

I run straighter now. I try to run faster, too, but my entire body is screaming for me to stop. There’s a moment when the world seems to dip, and like Müller, I stagger and stumble. As I get my balance, I look back to see the gamekeeper on his knees, both hands to his neck, rifle forgotten.

I slow then. I have to. The world sways, and my head throbs, and my lungs burn.

The house is there. It’s right there. I can see a light in one of the windows. Someone is up. I just need to get to the house. Another hundred feet. Less than a hundred steps. I can do this. I—

My foot slides. It doesn’t even slip. It slides in slow motion, and I fall, hard enough to gasp.

I’m on my knees, pain matched by exhaustion, as if I’ve run ten kilometers instead of a hundred meters.

Get up. The house is right there.

I can’t pass out. It’s still the middle of the night, hours before even Gray and McCreadie will be up for their dawn departure.

I rise slowly, pushing with everything I have. I peer at the house. It’s only a hundred feet, but it seems an impossible distance.

Just move. One foot in front of—

“Mallory!”

My head jerks up. Someone is running from the house, and I can’t see who it is, but I know that voice.

“Duncan?” I croak.

It can’t be. I’m hallucinating. He’s asleep—

No, the light in the bedroom. That’s why it caught my eye. It was his room.

I take one staggering step. Then my legs give out, and I crash to the ground.

“Mallory!”

Gray’s voice pierces the fog. I haven’t passed out, but I’m dangerously close, struggling to get my eyes open, struggling to speak. His arms are around me, and then he’s lifting me, shouting for help as he runs toward the house.

“No,” I croak. “Müller.”

He slows, and I sway in his arms. “Müller did this?”

“Behind me. Passed out, I think. Might wake up. Escape.”

A strangled sound, more gasp than laugh. “That is the last thing you need to worry about.”

“Gotta stop him. Not dead.”

Gray’s voice is tight and hoarse. “If he did this, then he may well wish he were.”

A shout comes from the direction of the stable. A groom. Gray quickly tells him that Müller is passed out on the road and to get help to restrain him.

I keep sliding close to unconsciousness and then forcing myself back.

“Needs medical attention,” I say. “Cut his neck.”

“He will get it after you. If he gets it at all.”

“Duncan…”

A low muttering. He’s walking fast, carrying me, and as I jostle, pain rips through my back.

Shit.

“Shot,” I say. “Shot me. In the back.”

He stops so abruptly, I nearly fly from his arms. He manages to keep his hold and lowers me to the ground. He puts me down in a sitting position, but I start to fall, and he lowers me gingerly onto my stomach. Then he sucks in breath, and there’s a rip of fabric.

I’m wearing a corset, of course. But he doesn’t try to remove it. His fingers move over the spot, and he exhales. Is that relief? I’m too woozy to focus. Everything feels surreal. Even the pain from his fingers probing the wound barely registers.

Shock. I’m going into shock.

He says something I don’t quite catch. Ribs? That the bullet passed through my ribs? No, he sounds too relieved for that. Did it hit my rib? Is the breathing pain only from the impact?

I dimly feel him turn me over, lifting me to sit again, but the darkness threatens. I want to sleep. Suddenly, all I want to do is sleep.

Time stutters, and the next thing I know, I’m propped against a wall and Gray is crouched beside me, his fingers on my jaw.

“ Mallory, ” he says, his voice sharp with panic. “Stay with me.”

He said the bullet hit my rib, right? So I’m okay. Just let me sleep.

Another time jump, and now Duncan’s in front of me, hands cupping my cheeks, his face so close to mine, I can feel his breath, warm on my lips. My eyelids flutter open to see his dark eyes bright with panic. I want to tell him I’m fine, but I can’t form words. My eyelids flag.

“Mallory, please. Stay here.”

Just need to rest. Give me a moment. I’m fine.

“Mallory.” His hands grip me, and I can dimly sense his face over mine. I struggle to open my eyelids and manage to see his eyes, burning with intensity.

“I’m sorry,” he blurts. “The proposal. As I said in the letter, I would never trap you like that. I only thought… I thought you might come to… to care for—”

My eyelids flag. I want to hear what he’s saying. I need to hear it. But I can’t keep my eyes open.

“Mallory. Don’t go. Please.” His voice cracks. “I do not think I can bear it again.”

Bear what? Go where?

A sound in the darkness. A beeping. Familiar, but wrong. I focus on the noise, and harsh light blasts through my eyelids. Then the beeping, slow and steady.

The beeping of a hospital monitor.

I’m sliding back into my old body. The one lying comatose in a twenty-first-century Edinburgh hospital.

I yank myself back so fast I gasp, gulping breath as my heart races.

“Here,” I say on an exhale. “I’m here.”

His arms go around me, pulling me to him in a hug fierce enough to stop my breath. There’s a moment of complete silence, as we stay there, both of us just breathing. Then—

“Dr. Gray?” a voice says.

Gray makes a noise in his throat, lets me go, and turns to a groom asking what to do with Müller.

“Put him in the stables,” Gray says. “I will tend to him after I have seen to Miss Mitchell.”

“Do you need help carrying her—?”

“No, I do not,” he says, and scoops me up and continues on toward the house.