Page 50 of The Scot Beds His Wife

Smoke had already begun to cloy against the ceiling, spilling in from down the hallway that led to the manor’s deserted living quarters.

Dropping low, Samantha dragged Locryn down with her, but what she’d seen in the racing line of flames didn’t leave her time to think.

Sparks.

Sparks meant gunpowder. And if her attackers had used that to hasten the fire, then they might have stowed some beneath the window, or even the house.

An explosion meant certain death. She had better chances with a rifleman in the dark.

“Go,” she ordered. Pushing Locryn out into the night, she plunged after him, veering right along the house toward the stables and corrals. As much as she didn’t want to, it would be easier to hide her movement in the herd that stood between her and the small copse of dilapidated cottages on the other side of the square.

Small fires surrounded her home, and seemed to be cropping up everywhere, impeding her ability to see past the smoke and flames.

Samantha bent as low as she could, keeping her head down and her body ensconced in what shadows she could find. Though her night rail was thin and white, Thorne’s dark, heavy cloak aided her escape. Her unlaced boots encumbered her speed, but the grasses crunching beneath her footsteps and the cold seizing in her lungs kept her from abandoning them.

In her haste, she tripped over something warm, something that made a very recognizable, very welcome sound of indignation.

“Calybrid.” She gasped her relief.

“Fucker bit me in the side,” he groaned. “Knocked me down.”

“Can you walk? We have to keep moving.”

Locryn swooped in from behind her, and dove for Calybrid. In one shockingly graceful motion, he plowed his meaty arm beneath the prone body, and scooped the man onto his shoulders without seeming to miss a step.

At Calybrid’s howl of pain, he hissed, “If ye doona stop yer havering, I’ll drop ye in a bog.”

An explosion shattered the unnatural quiet of the darkness, and wood splintered behind Samatha, cutting into her calf.

Locryn kept moving in front of her, Calybrid’s thatch of white hair bouncing along with his unsteady lope. Good. The shooter had missed his mark.

And had given away his position.

The shot had come from behind them, back toward where smoke and flames now ate up half of the manor house.

Samantha dropped down to her belly and aimed, hoping to buy the old men some time to find cover.

There.The shadow of a man rushed toward the house, backlit by one of the fires. Samantha pointed her pistol toward the next fire he’d reach if he maintained his trajectory, and only had to wait the space of a breath before his silhouette flashed in front of it.

She squeezed the trigger. He fell. She shot again at the ground for good measure.

She blinked at the route she’d last seen Locryn and Calybrid going, but was unable to find them. The canny Scots were likely making for the dark ridge of the trees, beyond which they could skirt Loch Gorm on their way to Rua Reidh.

The fires had been lit in the direction of Inverthorne, so to attempt escape that way was nothing but folly as they’d be easy marks for any half-decent rifleman.

Had their attackers come from Inverthorne? Had the earl tired of her insolence and decided to lay claim to Erradale by turning it, and her, to ashes?

Her stomach churned at the thought, reminding her just what was at stake here.

Where were her cattle? They were no longer in the corrals. Also, the fire she’d seen rushing toward her back window had come from the direction of Rua Reidh.

Which meant they were surrounded.

Her best hope was to reach the corner of the manor and sprint along the tall grasses to the caved-in outbuilding built into a small knoll. There would be a good place to make a stand.

Surging to her feet, Samantha took off at a sprint.

And crumpled back to the freezing earth.Her calf. The moment she put weight on it, fire had skewered clean through it.