Page 23 of Sadie’s Highlander (Highland Protector #1)
CHAPTER 22
“ O h no.” Sadie pulled Bess up short, suddenly unable to breathe. Disbelief and shame filled her. So much destruction. So much damage. Delia had outdone herself this time. She bit her bottom lip and pressed a clenched fist against her mouth. “How . . . how could she?” she whispered against her cold, trembling hand.
Sadie blinked against a surge of nausea. A dark, sick feeling of overwhelming guilt threatened to topple her from the saddle. What have I done? How could I let this happen?
She turned and frantically searched the woods, a strange mix of panic and relief washing across her when she didn’t see Alec or his brothers anywhere. She’d fallen behind, lost sight of them in the dense thicket of trees, so she’d gone off in another direction. The direction that would take her to the filming crew—or at least where they were supposed to be. They hadn’t been there, so she’d cut through and found her way to the castle.
Sadie hugged herself, digging her nails into her arms. Alec would hate her forever. She had betrayed him and lost him for good.
One entire side of Castle Danu was gone, nothing left but a low, tumbled-down pile of blackened stones and smoldering rubble. Crumbling mounds of shifting earth and splintered trees still creaked and groaned, the heaps of debris occasionally sliding lower to join the avalanche of soil, rocks, and broken logs spilling over all that remained of the wall of the keep.
The landslide had filled what once had been the chieftain’s sitting room—the room with the ingeniously designed hearth containing the hidden doorways leading to the tunnels. The entrances to the passages to the sacred vault were now buried, and the tunnels themselves had probably caved in from the blast. Everything was gone. Destroyed. Hot tears slipped down Sadie’s cheeks. Why hadn’t she stopped Delia?
There was a dark, ragged hole in the side of the mountain just a few yards above the smoldering ruins. The gaping black maw belched out smoke and rock as though the land was sickened by the sight of its precious castle’s destruction. The wide swath of the landslide’s route had ripped through the once lush pine forest. It looked as though the blast had rudely scraped away all in its path, leaving the earth raw and torn.
But the worst sight, the most shocking sight that ripped out Sadie’s heart and tore it to shreds more than any other, was the film crew. Producers, directors, and cameramen were laughing and high-fiving one another. They all stood there surveying the scene while the grips adjusted the booms and lighting to better portray the actors standing in the middle of the chaos. Makeup artists and hairdressers nonchalantly chattered and smiled while they flitted around the actors, touching them up to make them look as though they’d just survived a life-threatening explosion.
So that had been Delia’s angle. Get them all out of the way so she could hold true to form and do whatever it took to film her low grade movie. Sadie slowly shook her head. Heartbroken. Filled with despair. She slid down to the ground and leaned heavily against Bess, praying this was all just a bad dream. How could she have let this happen?
Delia had ruined it all and Sadie had helped her. She’d kept the unsuspecting MacDaras occupied so Delia could trash and burn their land all in the name of cinematic greatness, no matter the cost.
“I shall kill every damn one of ye!” Alec’s roar echoed down from above. He sat astride his great black horse just outside the still smoking hole in the mountainside. He held a sword raised high overhead. Bloody rage and fury emanated from him as he glared down at them all. His brothers flanked him, each of them on horseback wielding his own weapon. They looked like the weapons Sadie had seen on display beside the ancient Heartstone. But how could they have survived the blast? Were those just replicas, or had the MacDara brothers managed to locate the real ones in the rubble? Sadie closed her eyes, then slowly forced them back open. “I hope those are the real weapons,” she whispered to herself.
The four MacDara brothers looked as ominous as the four horsemen of the apocalypse—and even more intent on dealing out death and destruction. Alec moved forward, taking the lead. Teeth bared and the MacDara colors lashed across his chest, his plaid snapped in the wind, goading him on to battle. “Get the hell off my land or surrender yer life to me! I’ll have yer heads on pikes so all will ken what happens to fools when they break their oaths to the MacDaras.”
“Holy shit, that guy’s nuts. Hey Delia!” A middle-aged man that Sadie recognized as one of Delia’s producers from the East Coast scurried past, coming to a halt as he glanced her way and saw who she was. “Hey! You! Do something. You’re his whore while we’re here. Go calm him down. Give him a blow job or something.”
“Where is my sister?” Sadie asked, not giving two shits about the pompous little asshole and his insults. There was more at stake here than name-calling. Too much more. “Where the hell is she?”
“Right here, baby sister. Help you with something?” Delia picked her way out of the woods overlooking the wreckage, arms calmly folded across the front of her flawless silk blouse. She smiled proudly as she demurely flicked a finger toward the assembled actors below. “That scene was perfection!” Gingerly working her way across the rough ground, Delia stopped and hugged herself with a delighted shiver, then turned and winked at Sadie. “And I saved about half a mil by pulling it off here instead of renting a closed set and hiring a team of pyrotechnics specialists. Even after I pay off the MacDaras for the damages, it’ll still be way cheaper.”
“How could you?” Sadie charged toward her sister. “I’m going to kill you . . . I’m going to fucking kill you!”
Delia’s eyes widened and she stumbled backward, jabbing a shaking finger at Sadie. “You’d better calm down and remember who signs your paycheck.”
Sadie drew back and unleashed the rage-infused uppercut she’d been holding back for years. It felt so right when her fist connected solidly with Delia’s chin and knocked the vicious bitch backward, sending her tumbling down the hillside. Sadie rushed after her. No way in hell was she even near finished kicking Delia’s ass.
Delia floundered to her hands and knees, weaving and skittering sideways like a wounded crab. “I’ll ruin you!” she shrieked. “I’ll make you wish you were never born!”
Sadie grabbed Delia by the hair and jerked her to her feet. “You’ve already ruined me!” She wrenched Delia back and forth like an under-stuffed rag doll, backhanded her hard across the mouth, then slung her across the clearing. “I fucking hate you!”
Slapping away the hands of the film crew trying to help her regain her footing, Delia stood half bent over, gasping for air. She pressed trembling fingers to her already swelling mouth. Her hands shook even harder as she stared down at her blood-splattered palms. “Call the police,” she said in a low, murderous hiss. “And call my fucking lawyer,” she added.
“Cops are already here. Look.”
Sadie turned and looked in the direction the hairdresser was pointing. Blue lights flickered in a long line through the trunks of the trees lining the narrow dirt road. Sirens wailed and fire engine horns wah-wahed through the once serenely quiet forest. The beating rhythm of a helicopter thumped high overhead, whipping what was left of the leafy treetops back and forth in an angry whirlwind.
“Ye will all rue the day ye broke an oath to a MacDara!” Alec and his brothers pounded around the clearing, using their horses and weapons to herd the scattered crew of Realm Spinners Productions into a cowering cluster in its center. Alec had fully reverted to the unrelenting warrior he’d once been. Enraged man and monstrous black horse moved as one. Vengeance flashed in the deadly glint of Alec’s sword and fiery bloodlust shone in his face.
“Gather’m up and get’m in the cars, boys, before Mr. Alec kills’m all and we have to fill out all that damn paperwork. I ain’t in the mood to have to arrange shipment of a bunch of city folks’ bodies back to Hollywood.” Brady’s sheriff stomped out from behind a thicket of thorny blackberry bushes, motioning toward Delia, the film crew, and Sadie. He pointed several of his men toward what was left of the keep. “And don’t forget the real stupid ones. The ones that think we didn’t see’m run inside the castle and try to hide.” The sheriff gave a disgusted shake of his head. “Damn disrespectful dumb-asses.”
“I’ve already called my lawyer!” Delia’s voice grew shriller as she snapped around and glared at a young deputy attempting to move in behind her and pull her hands around to her back. She motioned at Sadie with an angry jerk of her head. “And I want to file assault charges against that bitch over there. Look what she did to my lip.” Delia leaned closer to the matter-of-fact officer cuffing her wrists. “And look at my face. I think she fractured my chin. And-and maybe even chipped one of my teeth.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the deputy answered in a politely bored tone that conveyed he really felt that Delia deserved whatever she got. “Watch your step, ma’am.” He took Delia firmly by the elbow and nudged her forward.
“I’ll need to cuff you, ma’am.” One of North Carolina’s finest stood beside Sadie, calmly waiting, a set of handcuffs dangling from one hand.
They’d called the state troopers too? Delia’s crew must’ve panicked when they saw her kicking Delia’s ass. Sadie held out her hands and tucked her chin. Life as she once knew it was now over, but at least she had beaten the shit out of Delia first. Sadie sniffed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered to the officer.
“Yes, ma’am. Come with me now.” The state trooper took her arm and firmly walked her along beside him.
“County jail or . . . uhm . . . city?” Sadie swallowed hard against the knot of emotions choking her. What the hell difference did it make? From now on, wherever she was, she’d always be alone. Just like old times.