“What?” Charlie felt his voice grow cold. “They left the road?”

Mrs. MacLeod put her hand to her mouth. “I suppose they did. All the locals know the shortcuts. It never occurred to me to worry.”

“They’re on the mountain.” Fear ran its cold finger down Charlie’s spine. Something wasn’t right.

“Get all the men outside,” he told the women surrounding him. “Tell them we need to find Daisy. I’m leaving now.”

And he raced outside. He’d have to do this fast. If Mona attempted any sort of escape from Glen Dewey after wreaking havoc, there was no one in the village to stop her on her way out—except old Mrs. Buncombe, who was feeble and half blind.

But knowing Mrs. Montgomery, Charlie thought she was so off kilter she might just want revenge—and to hell with escape.

He would check his and Daisy’s special spot first. The Stone Steps. They were on the way up the mountain, and if Daisy were in any sort of trouble, he hoped she’d try to make her way there.

And then he thought of the bog.

No. She was too wary to go near it. Thank God for the Highland summer nights and their light. She’d know that copse of trees, and she’d steer clear.

He hoped.


Once she’d caught up with her stepmother and stepsister, Daisy quickly gave up trying to convince them not to go to the ceilidh. Neither one was listening to her anyway.

“Ouch,” Mona said after a few minutes of bickering with Perdita, and began to hobble.

“We should stick to the road,” Daisy said. “You’re less likely to get injured.”

They’d come to the Stone Steps.

“I’ll sit here for a moment,” said Mona. “And then we’ll be on our way again.” She winced. “I think I twisted my ankle.”

Daisy crouched before her. “Let me see.”

And was suddenly lifted up like a sack of flour and thrown over Perdita’s shoulder so hard, she felt one of her slippers fly off her foot.

“What are you doing?” Daisy cried, upside down. The blood immediately began to pound in her head.

“Ssshhh!” Perdita said. “No yelling.”

“Of course, I’m going to—”

But Mona wrapped a gag around her mouth so fast, Daisy nearly choked. And when the shrew tied it in a tight knot at the back of Daisy’s head, she felt the first stirrings of genuine fear overwhelm her fury.

Mona wanted to hurt her. This wasn’t a prank.

Daisy knew this without question.

Perdita strode forward, her grip tight on Daisy’s legs, and try as Daisy might to beat her with her fists, she could get no traction as she bounced along. Her flailings didn’t make a dent in Perdita’s determination to hold her fast.

And then Mona deftly slid a noosed rope over her hands and pulled it tight, effectively tying her hands behind her back.

Daisy did her best to scream with the gag, but the sound was muffled and came out weak. No one at any distance would hear her.

She bucked and writhed, but Perdita merely held her tighter and kept walking.

Daisy was getting dizzy. Spots of red and black appeared before her eyes.

“Hurry,” Mona hissed at Perdita. “We’ve only a few minutes before the sun goes down.”

“I’m hurrying,” Perdita said. “Why can’t we just kidnap her and sell her as a slave?”

A slave?

“I know what I’m doing,” said Mona. “A slow death by bog will give me great pleasure. And there will be no evidence.”

All Daisy could see was down. And below her, the ground turned from grassy and rocky to bracken covered. And then there were tree trunks.

This was the copse not far from the Stone Steps. The one with the dangerous bog.

Binney’s Bog.

Daisy kicked and screamed to no avail.

Mona laughed. “You’re angry. Well, now you know how I feel. For twenty years I’ve endured you, and I’ve had enough. Hurry, Perdy. If we’re going to make a run for it, you’ve got to do this fast. I’ll wait for you in the village.”

“No!” cried Perdita. “Aren’t you coming with me?”

“I said I’ll wait for you,” Mona said through gritted teeth, and left without even saying good-bye.

Perdita hurried, which meant Daisy was scratched by twigs and branches. It got darker and darker in the woods. Finally, Perdita put her down. Daisy’s chest heaved as she tried to inhale through her nose.

Don’t panic, she told herself.

Perdita was breathing hard, too.

Daisy blinked over and over. “Please,” she tried her best to say. “Please.” And then she looked down at the gag on her mouth.

“You want to talk?”

Daisy widened her eyes and jumped up and down.

“I’ll let you say one thing,” Perdita muttered, “but that’s only because a prisoner usually gets one last chance to say something. I read that once.”

She looked away from Daisy and gave what sounded like a snort. And then suddenly a series of sobs erupted from her homely face. “Daisy, I don’t want to do this. But I’m scared she’ll kill me if I don’t. I’m scared of her.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “If I let you talk, do you promise not to yell for help?”

Daisy nodded her acquiescence.

Perdita stuck her finger between the gag and Daisy’s cheek and pulled the cloth away from her skin for a brief second.

“The Highlander would never do something so cowardly,” Daisy said quickly.

Instantly, Perdita scowled. “I’m no Highlander. Just ask the Spanish marquis. He hates me for pretending to be one. And it’s all your fault.”

She tightened the gag, and now Daisy was the one to cry.

Perdita took a moment to wipe her nose on her skirt, then suddenly her shoulders sagged, her anger forgotten. She turned to Daisy. “There’s one last thing I have to tell you. I’m sorry I burned down your mother’s bungalow.”

Daisy felt a jolt run through her, causing her knees to buckle. Perdita had caused the fire—and not she?

“Even Mother and Cassandra don’t know I’m responsible,” Perdita said in a whisper that was loud enough to bounce off the trees. “You left it darkened, and then went inside to play cards with Roman and Cassandra. And I decided to go out there to cut up the dresses you’d made. I had to light a candle to do it. But one dress caught on fire, and then everything went up in flames. It was an accident, and I’m sorry. Not because you lost your dresses and the bungalow, but because I know I”—she let loose with a sob—“I’m the one responsible for your father’s death. He was a good man. And I’m bad.”

Daisy inhaled a breath as best she could through the gag, but the shock of Perdita’s news made her limbs tremble violently.

She hadn’t caused the fire.

She’d been carrying a burden of guilt so heavy that it had crushed a part of her heart, making her afraid to love again, and it had all been so unnecessary.

Dear God, how could this be?

Tears sprang anew to her eyes, but they were tears of relief. She already knew she’d not been responsible for winding up in Roman’s bed. That had been Cassandra’s doing.

It was an astonishing revelation that Cassandra and Perdita, each in their own way, had unwittingly set the tragedy of her father’s death in motion. And neither one had known what the other was scheming—not until it was too late.

But Perdita was sobbing once more, and Daisy had to get through to her.

She nodded her head. “It’s all right,” she tried to say. But her words were completely garbled in the gag.

“Perdy!” From somewhere below them, Mona’s demanding voice called, “Are you done up there?”

Perdita hesitated only a second. She picked Daisy up and then—

Daisy kicked. Her other shoe flew off somewhere in the bracken.

And then Perdita gave a mighty heave-ho, and Daisy was flying …

Flying into the bog, where she landed with a mighty squishing noise faceup, thank God. There was a burbling of peat and water around her and the sensation of sinking into cold, mushy nothingness. She heard Perdita crashing through the woods, and she looked up and saw the pale white summer night above the branches overhead.

She was alone, and she was sinking, being sucked beneath the peat.

But before she could register that horrible fact, Perdita came crashing back again, this time toward her, and she was bellowing, “Hold on, Daisy! I’m coming to save you!” in a hopeful, noble voice—

As if she’d never been the one to dump her in the bog in the first place.

Perdita shoved the end of a branch at her, which Daisy couldn’t grab because her arms were tied behind her back. So Perdita angled the scrawny limb and then she was caught, just like a trout, her sleeve snagged by a knobby part of the wood that jutted out almost like a hook.

She hung there, moaning and crying, and watching the gray shape that was Perdita apologize for being so cruel to her.

“I am the Highlander,” Perdita said, holding firmly to the branch. “I hate Mother and her wicked ways. She may kill me, but I can’t do this. You don’t deserve to die, Daisy.”

It was some few minutes that she spoke, genuinely whispering for the first time in her life words of comfort and sorrow and shame that she’d been so stupid and wicked. And then her words melded into more gray forms that were shouting and crashing through the woods. And just when Daisy heard Charlie’s voice cry, “Daisy! Is that you?” she let her eyes close and the sound of his voice carry her into a sweet, black nothingness.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

The hot bath had restored a healthy glow to Daisy’s cheeks. Now she lay in her old bed in the left turret at Castle Vandemere, safe and warm, bundled up and sipping a steaming mug of whisky punch Hester had concocted for her.