Legacy of the Highlands (30 page)

Alex nodded. “When Will and I were in that
man’s store, he asked if I was Scottish. I said that my family name
is MacBain, and Mackinnon got all excited. He told me my ancestor,
some guy named Gillies Mor MacBain, was a hero who killed a lot of
English soldiers at the Battle of Culloden.”

“Then it seems you’re only in danger if they
decide that you’re pregnant.” Serge directed these comments to
Alex, then turned to Diego. “I thought my mission was to find the
people responsible for the murder and punish them. Has that
changed?” To him, this was simply another assignment. If Diego now
had a different objective, Serge needed to know.

Alex understood that none of this was
personal for Serge. Diego had told her that as a Mossad agent he’d
had to kill without being told why. The old Alex would have been
horrified, but Will’s murder had forced a shift in her sense of
right and wrong. Instead of thinking of Serge as a cold-blooded
assassin, she began to see him as someone who meted out
justice.

Diego’s expression softened as he glanced at
Alex, but then he turned toward Serge and, like a chameleon, he
shifted into the ruthless warrior Alex was starting to recognize.
“No. In answer to your question, nothing’s changed. If Alex went to
Mackinnon now, he’d find out that we know about him and it’s those
fucking killers we’re after. There’s no way in hell that I can let
them get away with what they did to Will.”

“I agree,” said Serge. “Right now, they have
no idea that we’re here or that we know who they are and I want to
keep it that way. They suspect that you’ve left Boston, Alex, but
they have no clue that you’re in Scotland, so you should be safe
for a while at least. And they’d never imagine that there’s another
male Cameron, and a dangerous one at that.” Diego’s blood tie to
Will had dramatically upped the stakes. “And finally, there’s a
very chatty young lady who I’ve…” he hesitated and cleared his
throat. Diego had heard all about the voluptuous Mairi Graham and
his lips twitched watching Serge try to delicately explain this
relationship to Alex. “I suppose you could say the young lady and I
are, uh…close.”

Alex noticed Diego’s grin and wanted to
somehow assure Serge that he could be comfortable around her. “Oh,
you mean you’re fucking her?” she asked sweetly.

Diego howled with laughter and slapped his
startled bodyguard good-naturedly on the back. Serge didn’t join
their mirth, but simply raised his brows and shook his head from
side to side as if they were a couple of playful pups whose antics
he had to tolerate until they could control themselves again.

“As I was saying…the young lady’s family and
the Mackinnons are very close. She even calls the old guy “Uncle”
Jamie. Mairi told me that his grandson — young Jamie — is kind of
like a brother to her. She said he left for America around the time
Will was murdered. When he came back a month or so later, he quit a
good job here in Inverness and moved to the far north of Scotland
to work as a sheep farmer. She also knows Ewen.”

“Who?” asked Alex.

“You know. The man you told us you remembered
meeting in London. The one who sent you and Will to Mackinnon’s
shop.”

“Interesting,” Alex said. “I’m glad I was
able to pull his name out of my brain.”

“Yeah, that helped,” replied Serge. “Before I
came to Scotland, I spent a week in London masquerading as a high
class lawyer. I hung out at the Mayfair pub that you and Will went
to whenever you’d visit London. The barman remembered Ewen. About a
week before the murder, Ewen was in the pub with someone whose
description matches Mackinnon’s grandson. After a few drinks, they
bragged about a job they had in America that would pay
handsomely.”

“So the evidence all points to this young
Jamie person, right?” Alex said.

“Precisely, at least so far,” responded
Serge. “But we can’t act until we’re sure.”

Diego nodded and tented his hands against his
forehead. He slowly rubbed his fingers along his hairline. “We must
find this young Jamie.” He spat out the name with contempt.

“You seem pretty sure that Mackinnon has no
idea that we’re on to him. But if your girlfriend is so close to
his family, can you trust her?” Alex asked Serge.

“She has no reason to lie to me,” he
shrugged. “To her I’m a guy she has fun with — one who has enough
money to keep her interested and who’s dangling a trip to sunny
Florida in front of her.”

“Ooooh, you’re bad,” Alex grinned at Serge.
Although he wasn’t her type, she could imagine a young woman being
charmed by his blonde, blue-eyed good looks and his powerful
build.

Diego stretched his arms toward the ceiling
and yawned loudly. “It’s been a long day,
amigo
, and I’m
hungry. I noticed a restaurant off the lobby when we checked in.
Let’s eat and then get some sleep. As for the rest, it can wait
until
mañana
.”

They were waiting to be seated when a female voice
called to someone named Steve.

“Shit,” grumbled Serge. “That’s Mairi. To her
I’m Steve Spencer from Miami and I own a chain of gift shops.
You’re business associates here on vacation,” he instructed quickly
as she approached.

The contrast between the girl’s creamy skin
and hair the color of an Irish Setter was striking. Alex could see
why Serge would want to do whatever he was doing with her, even if
she had no connection to Mackinnon. The voluptuous girl bubbled
with enthusiasm and was obviously happy to see Serge.

“Mairi! Did we have a date?” he asked and
slipped his arm around her waist.

“No, Steve, we dinna, but I popped by for a
drink anyway. I hoped I might see you here,” she said guilelessly
as her face flushed.

“And you did, so it worked out fine, but your
timing isn’t so good. I’m about to begin a dinner meeting with some
business associates,” he said amiably turning toward Diego and
Alex. “Mairi Graham, meet Barbara and Rick Sloane. This isn’t
social or I’d ask you to join us. I’m sorry.” He drew her closer
and planted a gentle kiss on her temple.

The girl tried, but failed, to mask her
disappointment. Alex smiled warmly and extended her hand. “It’s
nice to meet you Mairi,” she said. Diego’s smile was dazzling as
always. Because Serge introduced them as a married couple, Alex
looped her arm though Diego’s to better display her wedding ring.
The way Mairi was looking at Diego, Alex thought the girl might
like to trade Serge in for him.

“Pleased to meet you both,” she said and
turned back to Serge. “Do all Americans look like film stars or is
it just you three?”

They all laughed.

“And are you in the trinket business as
well?” She directed this question to Diego. Alex had become
invisible.

“No, we’re collaborating on another venture,”
replied Diego smoothly.

“Why don’t you two find our table and I’ll
join you in a minute,” Serge suggested. “I want to put Mairi in a
taxi to be sure she gets home safely,” he said and then hustled
Mairi away.

Serge looked grim when he returned. “I had no
idea she’d be here. I didn’t want her to see the two of you.”

“Why not?” Diego asked. “She thinks we’re a
couple of Americans named Barbara and Rick Sloane. What’s the
problem?”

“I trust Serge’s instincts,” Alex said. “If
he’s upset that she saw us, there must be a good reason.”

“These people are sure they got away with
murder, which works for us. It will make them sloppy. And although
I think Mairi’s only connection to them is that of family friend
like she says, there’s always a chance that she’s playing me while
I’m doing the same to her. Doubtful, but you never know. It
wouldn’t be the first time,” Serge said thoughtfully as he buttered
a warm roll.

“So what are Alex and I supposed to do? Hide
in our room?”

“No. I’m thinking that the two of you could
be used as bait to draw them out, make them nervous. But we can’t
blow the element of surprise yet, so it’s best if I keep Mairi away
from you.”

“It wouldn’t take a genius to figure out just
how you’ll do that,” said Diego grinning lasciviously as he perused
the menu. “I know they eat some sheep’s stomach thing called haggis
in this country, but what the hell do you suppose neeps and tatties
are?”

The sight of the large, white water tower looming
over the prison gates made bitter bile rise to James Mackinnon’s
throat, its foul taste a perfect reflection of his emotions. After
only one year inside the walls of Her Majesty’s Prison Shotts, his
spirited, fun-loving son had become docile, his face pale, his body
thin, the sparkle gone from his eyes. Some men took prison life in
stride, but his boy was happiest hunting, fishing or hill walking;
the regimented confinement of prison life was taking its toll. It
would be another few years before his son would even be considered
for release.

Twice a month Mackinnon dutifully drove the
170 miles from Inverness to the maximum-security facility south of
Glasgow to spend an hour — all the time the fuckers allowed — with
his Jamie. These visits were torture for him and reignited his
hatred for the man who’d caused his son to be locked up in such a
place. Mackinnon’s only consolation was that now John Cameron felt
even more wretched than he did, and he was glad of it.

Cameron’s perfidy had set off a chain of
events that ended with Jamie’s arrest. Mackinnon himself had faced
expulsion from the Group of One Hundred, which long ago banned the
use of violence to achieve a free Scotland. They’d made him swear
on his son’s life that he knew nothing of the plot, and he did as
they’d asked. If he’d refused, he and his would have been cast out
forever. He would rather die than be the first Mackinnon in 700
years to be expelled from the group and humiliate his clan. Yet
he’d willingly risked that very thing once more when he and his
friends concluded that Cameron had to pay for his sin. If word of
Will Cameron’s execution ever reached the group, his brethren
wouldn’t hesitate to bring the law down on his head. “Fools,” he
muttered.

He was enraged that his boy Jamie had been
vilified as a threat to society, when he should have been hailed as
a hero for building a bomb that would have hurt those who continued
to regard Scotland as a fiefdom. If the explosion had killed the
innocent, well, it was war, wasn’t it? The English devils would
learn that Scots could be as ruthless as the Irish in the pursuit
of freedom.

He’d get some satisfaction from telling his
son that their kinsmen had made John Cameron pay for his treachery.
He’d not reveal that it had been the hand of his grandson — young
Jamie Mackinnon — that plunged the knife into Will Cameron. The lad
might be proud of his son’s skill and courage, but it would also
worry him and prison life came with enough worries. No, for now
he’d keep that part of the tale to himself, although it pleased him
to see the youngest generation pick up the sword.

The elder Mackinnon was accustomed to the
prison’s drill. As required, he’d booked his visit in advance. An
officer met him on arrival, ticked his name off a list, and he was
then subjected to a security search more thorough than those done
at airports. Once cleared, he took his place on a hard chair in the
unheated, windowless visitors’ waiting room until a staff member
finally came to fetch him to spend his hour with his son, Jamie.
The place reeked of the disinfectant used on its worn, but
spotless, floors and he knew the sharp odor would linger in his
nostrils on the return trip to the Highlands.

“James Mackinnon,” a matron’s officious voice
boomed, “come with me.” Hunched with sadness and fatigue, he
followed the woman’s stocky figure down a brightly lit corridor.
Today’s news would do nothing to improve his son’s conditions, but
he hoped the lad could find some comfort in knowing that the
traitor Cameron had finally paid, and paid dearly.

After the chance encounter with Mairi in the hotel
lobby and a quick dinner, Diego and Alex fell into bed, too
exhausted to do more than exchange a chaste kiss and sleep.

When she woke the next morning, Diego’s naked
body was spooned against her back, his hand cupping her breast. He
was still soundly asleep and she wondered when in the night they’d
sought each other out. His skin was warm and smelled of man and
when she felt his arousal she had to fight the urge to turn toward
him for some lazy, morning sex. She checked the clock. 8:30 a.m.
They’d arranged to meet Serge in his suite for breakfast at nine.
Desire would have to wait.

“Wake up. It’s late,” she whispered to Diego
and threw off the covers.

He mumbled something unintelligible as he
extended an arm to draw her back against him. “Come here Alex, I’m
cold.”

“Tempting, but no. We have to meet Serge in
thirty minutes. I’ll shower first since it takes me longer to get
ready.”

“You’re no fun,” he grumbled as he slitted
one eye open.

“That’s not what you said two nights ago,”
she teased and quickly turned away before the impulse to run her
hands over his chest overwhelmed her. The blanket only covered him
to the waist and his biceps flexed as he smiled at her and
stretched lazily. She wanted take everything he was offering and
reciprocate just as generously. Instead, she told herself what
she’d told him — tempting, but no — and ordered herself away from
the bed and into the shower.

They polished off the coffee and scones Serge had
ordered from room service as they sat near the suite’s bay window
and watched pedestrians briskly cross the River Ness’s bridge to
the shops and businesses of the city center. The bright sunshine
made the water appear to be studded with silver sequins.

“I still don’t like that Mairi saw the two of
you,” Serge began. “I should have told you to walk away the minute
she spotted me so I wouldn’t have had to explain who you were.” A
dust cloud rose when he slammed his fist angrily into the arm of
the green velvet sofa. “Shit! I know better than to screw up
something so simple.”