Page 42 of Wild Highland Rose (Time After Time #4)

C ameron leaned his head back against the cool stone wall, and closed his eyes, letting the silence surround him.

The room was dark and more than a little cold, but any discomfort was more than made up for by the serenity it afforded.

He'd never thought of himself as a particularly religious man, but he'd always believed.

And even in the fifteenth century, it seemed a chapel was a place of peace.

His thoughts flashed, briefly, to a trip made as a child.

A trip to New York City. His father had taken him.

A special holiday for a lonely little boy recovering from the loss of his mother.

It had been a short train ride from Boston to New York, but to an eight year old boy it had been a grand adventure.

Among other places, they'd gone to a museum full of religious artifacts from the middle ages. Not exactly the sort of place favored by growing boys, but there had been something magical about it. He frowned, trying to remember the name.

It was one of the Rockefeller museums. The nunnery or something like that. He struggled with the name and then smiled at the sheer joy of trying to remember something as routine as the name of a museum.

The Cloisters. That was it.

It had been a surprise to him. Quiet and subdued, unlike any other museum he'd ever been to. There had been one room, an arched vault of sorts, empty save for some rustic benches. He shifted uncomfortably on the real life version.

He'd sat in that room much as he was doing now, and more importantly, he'd found peace there.

After his mother's accident, he'd felt alone, deserted in many ways.

His father had tried in his own gruff way to help him, but he hadn't been a demonstrative man, and Cameron had continued to feel isolated, devastated by the loss of his mother.

Then suddenly, in that room, at the Cloisters, he had felt comforted. As though God himself had reached down from heaven to embrace him. The moment was as real now as it had been twenty-five years ago. And here he was again, only this time the chapel was the real thing.

He waited in the dark, waited for some kind of sign, for comfort or release, but there was only silence. He sighed. He'd probably had more than enough miracles in one lifetime. He winced. Make that two lifetimes.

"I thought perhaps I'd find ye here."

Cameron turned toward the sound of the voice. The shadows of the chapel hid the owner, but he recognized it nevertheless. "You can drop the accent. I know who you are. Or should I say, who you aren't."

"The accent is real. As real as I am. Dinna forget that I've been here for many years. Whoever I was, she is only a part of the distant past now."

"Don't you mean future?" he asked dryly. He heard her begin to make her way across the room. "You should have a light, it's dark in here."

She chuckled and he immediately recognized the error of his words. "I've no use o' a light, lad." Grania stopped in front of him, resting a hand on his shoulder. "I've been worried about ye."

"Really? And what exactly are you worrying about? The fact that all the inhabitants of Crannag Mhór think I'm a sorcerer? Or perhaps you're concerned that I now know definitively who I am? Or maybe you're worried that I've discovered who you are?" He paused, shocked at the bitterness in his voice.

Grania moved slowly around the bench and settled beside him, a hand comfortably on his arm. "I do care, ye know."

"If you cared so much, why didn't you tell me who you were?"

She sat for a moment and then answered, her voice trembling a little. "I dinna tell ye because I've never told anyone. Old habits die hard, I guess. And you never gave me reason to believe ye knew you were no' from this time."

What she said was true enough. He'd purposefully kept his knowledge of the twenty-first century from her. He felt some of his anger slip away.

"Do ye know who ye are then?"

He sat forward, threading his hands through his hair. "Yeah. I do."

"All of it?" Her voice was at once soothing and probing. "Do ye remember what happened to bring you here?"

He sighed. "No. I have memories from as far back as when my mother died, but nothing at all about what happened to bring me here."

"Your mother died?"

He sat back again, closing his eyes. Somehow, it seemed easier to talk that way. "Yeah, when I was eight."

"I'm truly sorry." She patted his knee. It was comforting in an abstract sort of way.

"It was a long time ago. I've learned to live with it."

"Have ye other family?"

"No." He paused, trying to think how to frame his next words. He'd spent the past few hours dealing with his guilt and he wasn't sure he wanted to share it with anyone else. "My father's dead, too." There, he'd given her the truth, to a point.

"Ah, no siblings I take it."

"Nope. Just me."

"I had five."

"Siblings?"

"Aye, four brothers and a sister. My folks were Irish Catholic. I'm surprised there weren't more."

"It must have been a lively family." He wondered what it would have felt like to grow up with other children. A hell of a lot less lonely most likely.

"I think it probably was. I dinna know really. I ran away from home you see. We were poor and there was always more work to be done. I wanted more for myself and so I left one day and never looked back." There was a wistful note in her voice.

"But you miss them now?"

"Aye, that I do. The folly of an old woman, no doubt." She laughed gently.

"Is that when you came here, after you ran away?"

"Oh, heavens no. I went from home to college, and from there to the home of a wealthy widower." She paused, her voice tinged with embarrassment. Cameron was almost glad the shadows hid her face. "He helped me get into Harvard Medical school."

"And then?"

"Pretty straight forward really. I graduated with honors and decided to be a surgeon."

"Did you specialize?"

"No. It was the fifties. I was lucky to find a general practice that would take me. Women doctors were still pretty much an oddity and in surgery they were definitely a rarity."

"Did you marry?"

"I'd call it more of a business merger. We each needed the respectability of marriage."

"Sounds like my family. My mom was a doctor, too, and my dad was a lawyer. He came from a prominent Boston family." They sat for a moment enjoying the shared intimacy. "Did you have children?"

Grania was silent for a long while, and when she finally answered, Cameron could hear the agony in her voice. "Aye, I had a son."

He wondered what it would feel like to live in a world where your son hadn't even been born yet.

"Do you miss them?"

"I dinna think of my husband much. He was a good man, but we never shared anything more than a desire to make it big in the world."

"And your son?"

She sighed, the soft sound heart wrenching. "I miss him every day. I regret that I wasna much o' a mother to him. I was too involved with my career. I'd give my soul to have a chance to set things right."

Uncomfortable with her obvious pain, he tried to find words. "I'm sure he remembers you fondly." The words sounded trite. He wasn't good at comforting people.

She squeezed his hand. "I hope yer right, but I'd imagine 'tis more likely he doesna remember me at all."

"Was he young when you…" His voice trailed off.

"Came here? Aye."

"What happened?"

"To bring me here?"

"Yeah."

"There was a terrible accident. I remember searing pain.

I thought surely I would die from it." She smiled, her teeth white in the faint light.

"I guess in some ways I did. Anyway, suddenly the pain was gone and there was a flash o' blinding white light and then I was here, wandering about the country side in another woman's body. "

"Did you try to get back?" He sat forward on the bench, intent upon her answer.

"Every day at first, but when the years kept passing and I was still here, I began to realize that maybe I was meant to be in this time."

Cameron uttered a frustrated oath.

"I know 'tis no' what ye want to hear, but ye need to face the truth o' it. 'Tis possible you, too, are meant to be here."

"Impossible. I have a life in Atlanta. I have a practice and a house and a…." He stopped, letting the sentence dangle between them.

"A wife?"

"No." He hesitated, guilt cresting. He wanted to stop there, to avoid saying it out loud., but he wasn't a man to shirk responsibility. He turned to face her. "I have a fiancée, Grania. Her name is Lindsey Bowden."

"I see. And now yer feeling guilty o'er yer feelings fer Marjory."

Cameron groaned. The woman could read his mind. "Yes. In a crazy kind of way I've betrayed them both." Grania's sightless eyes seemed to search his. He had a sudden urge to throw himself on her lap and sob. He blinked and pushed the thought aside, embarrassed. "I have betrayed them."

"Not knowingly."

"But how could I possibly have forgotten something as important as a fiancée?" The images of his dream ran through his mind, the little voice inside him saying that he hadn't forgotten, just repressed the memory. His guilt intensified. "I've got to get back there. To make things right."

"Are ye so sure that's where you belong?"

An image of Marjory, flushed from their lovemaking, popped into his head.

Suddenly, her dark hair faded to gold and her eyes changed from blue to green.

Lindsey. He buried his head in his hands.

"I've made promises there, in Atlanta. And I think," again images of the dream flashed through his mind, "I think, that Lindsey needs me.

What kind of man would I be if I abandoned one woman for another? "

"A human man." He felt her arm around him.

He leaned into her and felt the tears begin to flow.

'Stop those tears, this instant.' He could hear his father's voice, disdainful at any sign of emotion from his young son.

With a gulp, he pulled away from Grania's embrace, humiliated by his display of weakness.

"Never be afraid to show ye care, lad. 'Tis the man who canna share his feelings that is to be pitied, no' the man willing to bare his soul.

" She paused and then apparently making up her mind about something, stood and placed both hands on his shoulders.

"I never knew exactly where it was I arrived here.

'Twas somewhere in the woods on the far side o' the loch, but I never did find the exact site. "

Cameron sobered instantly, all emotion gone. "What are you trying to tell me?"

"I'm telling you that just because I couldna get back doesna mean that the same will be true fer you. Ye know where ye were when ye awoke, and more importantly, ye have good reason to go home."

"I don't understand. You had good reason, too. There was your little boy."

"Aye, but that wasn't the overriding reason I wanted to return. At least no' in the beginning."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying that my reasons were selfish. I wanted my life back. No' my marriage or my son, but my life, with all its wealth and privilege. I'd worked so hard to get it and then just as I was finally feeling like I'd made it, I landed here in the lap o' poverty again."

"But you said that you prefer it here, now." He stood, too. Her hands dropped to her side and she tipped her face up toward his.

"I do. God moves in mysterious ways and I've come to realize that the things I valued then were worthless.

What matters is the people you love. Here, in this time, despite everything, I'm at peace.

And I wouldn't trade that fer anything in the world.

Except perhaps to see my son again." She sighed, then squared her shoulders, obviously pushing the past behind her.

"Marjory tells me yer real name is Cameron. "

"Yeah. My first name is actually Robert, but I never use it. Always preferred Cameron." He didn't add that he had started using his middle name when his mother had died. Somehow he couldn't bear to be called Robert anymore. It made her death seem more real.

As if sensing his discomfort, Grania reached for his hand. "We've said enough for tonight. Yer tired and in need o' a good night's sleep. Things will look better in the light o' a new day."

He nodded. He was tired, and frankly, bed sounded like the perfect way to escape all of this for a little while. He squeezed Grania's hand, then released it and walked away without another word.