Page 33 of Wed to the Highlander (Impromptu Brides #2)

“You ken that she was, Agnes!” Fiona snapped. The woman defended her even in death. “I saw Isla in the kitchen the day the tea tin disappeared. Maggie had been sick for weeks. She must’ve added more and more when it failed to work. Then hid the tea away in her trunk when she got scared.”

The older woman’s mouth tightened. “If that’s true, the laird’s sassenach bride is lucky Isla was such a poor herbalist.”

“She might’ve lost the bairn,” Fiona exclaimed. “And Maggie could’ve died. You well ken that happens often enough. Even if ye dinna care for them, think what it would mean for the clan if Duncan reached thirty wi’ no heir. That would touch everyone, includin’ you.”

Agnes gave a small shrug. “The inheritance would have gone to the next married man in line with a son. Lachlan would’ve made a fine laird.”

Horrified, Fiona gasped. “You conspired with her.”

Agnes stiffened. “I may not have a likin’ for the English, but I’m no’ a murderer.” When silence stretched between them, brittle as frost, she pressed her fingers to her temple. “I feel a headache coming on.”

When her mother-in-law turned and walked out, Fiona had to bite her tongue to keep from offering a cup of tea.

Alone in the dead woman’s room, the scent of lavender cloying now, like perfume over rot, Fiona looked at the facts from all angles. Something didn’t sit right.

Isla had been envious and bitter, but she wasn’t what Fiona would consider shrewd. And she was exceedingly erratic. This was calculated and carried out over weeks. A challenge for a girl unraveling at the seams.

Fiona knelt by the trunk again, fingers sifting through the debris. At the bottom, beneath a box of hair combs and a tangle of ribbons, she found pages torn from books, a pile of crumpled notes scribbled in a frantic hand.

One sheet listed herbs and their uses. Pennyroyal was underlined three times.

Another detailed how to start a flash fire using oil and dried grain. A crude sketch of a silo followed then a map—rough, but unmistakable—of the east wing tunnels leading straight to Duncan and Maggie’s room.

At the bottom of the pile lay loose journal entries, written in Isla’s unmistakable scrawl. The top one was dated for last April, at the peak of Maggie’s illness, just before Duncan took her back to London.

It hasn’t worked yet, but he says I must keep trying.

If she loses the bairn, there won’t be time for another.

The lairdship will pass to him by right, and the clan will praise him for saving them from ruin.

They will have lost faith in Duncan’s leadership.

He’ll blame the sassenach and send her away.

Then he will be mine, just as he always should have been.

Fiona covered her mouth, nausea rising.

This was proof Isla hadn’t acted alone.

The poison tea, the string of accidents, the whispers and shadows had all been devised by someone far cleverer. Someone who had everything to gain if the bairn never saw Duncan’s thirtieth birthday. And that someone was Lachlan.

She rose unsteadily, heart pounding, clutching the papers to her chest. Her husband’s deviousness and cruelty had left her shaken. Loyalty to him, the father of her children, including the one still growing inside her, clashed bitterly with loyalty to her clan. To truth and to justice.

“I must tell Duncan,” she whispered. The choice wasn’t really a choice at all.

When she left the west wing with the incriminating proof, she didn’t seek out the laird. She headed to the east wing instead.

***

Jamie’s chest rose and fell in the cradle’s dim light, each breath a fragile miracle. Maggie sat nearby, legs tucked beneath her, one hand propping up her head, the other curled around a cup of lukewarm tea she hadn’t touched.

She hadn’t slept—not truly—since that night.

Every time her eyes closed, she saw it again: Duncan with Jamie in his arms, her whole world, swallowed by a black hole.

She blinked hard, willing the image to fade. When will it stop chasing me?

A soft knock startled her.

She was on her feet in an instant, crossing the room before another knock could come and wake Jamie.

Fiona stood in the corridor, pale and wide-eyed, her expression stricken—like she’d seen a ghost. And Maggie knew firsthand how harrowing that experience could be.

“What is it?” she whispered, already bracing. Her gaze dropped to Fiona’s very round belly then flicked back up. “Is it time?”

She shook her head. “I wish it were only that.”

A prickle ran down her spine. What now?

For a heartbeat, Maggie almost wished not to know. Instead, she moved aside. “Come in.”

Fiona entered slowly, clutching a bundle of papers to her chest. She didn’t sit. She hovered near the bed, eyes darting toward the cradle then back to Maggie.

“It was Isla all along,” she said. “The whispers. The sickness. She put something in your tea.”

Maggie’s breath caught. “You’re certain?”

“Aye. She thought it was pennyroyal. Thank the good lord it wasn’t.”

Even a sheltered girl raised in Mayfair knew what the herb was used for. Her gaze went to her child, peacefully sleeping. How close he had come to never being here. She rushed to her cup and dashed the contents into the fire. “It’s no wonder I lost a taste for tea.”

“I found the tin containing the poisoned tea in her room. Along with this.” Fiona dropped everything she carried on the bed. “There are notes in her handwriting, proving she was behind it all. And someone else.”

“Who else?”

“I need to see the journal to be sure. The one from Anne MacPherson.”

Maggie knelt by the bed and reached beneath the mattress, pulling out the slim, worn volume. She handed it over without a word.

Fiona opened it with trembling fingers, flipping through it to the back, where pages had been added.

The part when her madness had taken hold, the writing so disjointed, practically illegible, so that only bits and pieces made sense.

Maggie looked on as she laid it beside what she brought: notes, a sketch, and a map of the castle.

“They’re a match,” she whispered. She swayed then staggered, gripping the bedpost for balance. “I hoped it wasn’t true.”

Maggie reached to steady her. “What wasn’t?” she asked, her voice low though her heart had begun racing.

Fiona looked up, eyes shining. “Lachlan. He’s behind everything.”

Maggie was stunned—speechless.

“I can’t—I won’t protect him,” she said, wiping away a tear.

“You love him,” Maggie murmured, roiling inside with fear and fury, but understanding the grief her friend was carrying.

“I did,” Fiona whispered. “But I don’t know the man who did this.”

“Neither do I.”

They turned. Duncan stood in the doorway, his face pale, his eyes dark.

“What did you hear?” Maggie asked, fearful of his reaction. Usually calm and cool-headed, when crossed, he was a bear poked one too many times.

“Enough to know my own brother has betrayed me,” he said, his voice icy. “That he tried to take everything from me. You, the clan, and our son before he was ever born.”

He ran a hand through his hair, eyes hollow, already blaming himself. “How could I not have seen it?”

“He fooled us all,” Maggie said.

“Including his wife,” Fiona added quietly.

Duncan crossed to the bed, scanning the evidence. He picked up the map and examined it more closely. Then he turned to the far wall. In a burst of motion, he shoved the writing desk aside, revealing the hidden door. Cold air rushed in as he found the latch and pushed it open.

Memories of the day she’d discovered it herself, made Maggie shiver.

“Lachlan and I played in the tunnels as lads,” Duncan said as he peered inside. “I do no’ recall this room.”

Maggie moved closer to the cradle, instinctively placing herself between Jamie and the door. “I found the journal in there. Lachlan went to great lengths to make me think I was losing my mind—the same as Isla. And Anne.”

Duncan looked at her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Those were early days. I hadn’t come to trust you fully. And I was afraid you might think I really was like Isla and Anne.”

He rose and took her into his arms. “But you trust me now?”

“With my life.” Her gaze drifted to the cradle. “More importantly, I trust you with his.”

“I’ll go gather my boys and my things,” Fiona said on her way to the door.

“You’re not leaving,” Duncan said, his voice firm, every bit the laird.

“I canna stay,” she protested on a broken sob.

“Of course, you can,” Maggie said, pulling away from Duncan to go to her friend. “You brought the truth forward. That takes more courage than silence. You’ve been accepting and kind to me since the day I arrived. And loyal—to me, to Duncan, and to the truth.”

A tear slipped down Fiona’s cheek.

“Stay,” Maggie urged softly. “You’ll need the women of your clan to help you through this.”

Fiona’s gaze went to Duncan’s. “What will you do?”

“Confront him and see that he pays.” His tone was quiet, resolute, which to Maggie was all the more concerning. “I’m sorry, Fiona, but there’s no other choice.”

She nodded. “I understand. I just don’t know how I’ll make my boys understand a traitor for a father.”

Maggie wrapped both arms around her trembling friend, supporting much of her weight.

Without another word, his jaw set with grim determination, Duncan left to deal with his half-brother and second-in-command.