Chapter 7
Rory didn’t have time to ask what Bridget’s real reason for opening the portal was. He certainly didn’t have time to reach for her throat. The anxious crew man with the binoculars came back, waving his arms and shouting.
“My lady, we must move if we’re to have any chance at outrunning them.”
Bridget stared out at the ocean and pointed. “Full steam ahead, then,” she yelled back.
The crew man skidded and turned back to pass on the order to the captain. Within minutes, they were barreling along, slicing through the waves. Rory swayed and grabbed the nearest thing to keep from toppling. Which was Bridget.
She stumbled forward and they both ended up in a heap on the deck chair. She grinned at him.
“I told ye we wouldna be caught. We’ve got the finest engine available beneath us.”
He wanted to believe her. He wanted to keep lying pressed against her but she wiggled out from under him and hurried toward the aft end, waving for him to follow. The madwoman wanted to watch the Navy as they chased them? He couldn’t believe her audacity, but followed along. If nothing else, he wanted to see if they had any chance of outrunning them.
He caught up with Bridget to find her grasping the rail, half leaning over the back of the ship. A surge of fear overtook him, thinking she might tumble overboard to be churned up in the wake. Her look of confidence from a moment before was gone.
“Ah, this doesna look like outrunning to me,” he said, earning a glare that should have sent him straight to Hades.
“We will,” she said, abandoning him once again.
He ran after her to the bridge, where she and the captain murmured together. Bridget pointed port side, going so far as to grab the wheel herself when the captain didn’t comply fast enough.
“We must keep going straight,” he argued, wrenching the wheel back to the course he wanted. “If we turn that way, they’ll catch up to us in no time. I believe in your innocence, my lady. I won’t let them take you.”
Rory tried not to make a derisive noise as she looked fearfully out the windows at the water. She was anything but innocent. Still, Rory didn’t want to have to explain why he was with her if the Brits did catch them, so he hoped the captain would stick to his own plan. He moved to her side, for comfort or for lack of anywhere else to stand, he didn’t know. And who was he trying to comfort? Himself or her? All he knew was he wanted to be by her side until he couldn’t anymore. As daft as that was.
She looked at him, eyes large and wild, then turned back to the captain. “Do as I say,” she commanded.
Rory groaned, seeing at once what the captain meant by her change in course. Instead of clear blue horizon he could see they were now almost veering back toward their pursuers.
“What are ye doing?” he asked as quietly and calmly as he could. All traces of her former confidence was gone. But they still might have a chance if they stayed straight. They’d wasted time, but the yacht was still clearly faster than the pursuing boats. “What are ye doing?” he repeated a lot less calmly. He didn’t want to stay in this time at all, let alone in an English prison.
Instead of answering him, she fled the bridge, heading down to the deck once more. Did they have weapons that could reach her? Cannon? Would they disable or even sink the ship in order to catch her? Within minutes they would be in firing range and that was using the calculations from his own time. He had to imagine they’d improved their weapons in this time, made them more accurate and deadly.
“We should have kept going straight,” he told her, gripping her arm.
She didn’t flinch or turn his way, only kept staring out at the vast sea. Her lips moved and her knuckles were white as she clung to the rail.
“Please,” she muttered. “Please.”
He shook his head, his stomach turning over at the thought of being blown out of the water. At the very least they would be boarded. In the not-too-far distance he could see the two Navy boats splitting apart from each other to surround them. Bridget was offering herself and him up on a platter with her madness. That was it, plain and simple. The lovely lass was insane.
“Bridget,” he yelled, yanking her arm. She was surprisingly strong and he couldn’t break her fierce grip from the rail. “Ye must tell the captain to turn away from them.”
His pleas fell on deaf ears and it was too late anyway. They were as good as caught. He turned away from her in disgust and sank onto the nearest deck chair.
As soon as he sat down, thunder cracked so loudly he thought the noise might have rattled his very bones. He jumped back up again and struggled to see. The heavens had opened and within seconds he was drenched with icy rain. It went from a clear, cloudless summer day to a midnight dark tempest. A huge wave crashed against the side of the yacht, nearly sweeping Bridget out to sea with it as it retreated.
He slogged through the heavy sheets of rain to pull her to safety, heart racing with terror at losing her in such roiling waves. He’d never seen such a sudden change of weather. He whirled her around and stopped dead. Her dark hair was flattened to her scalp, her clothes completely soaked through. She shivered in the gusts but a wild grin took over over face. She laughed with utter glee.
And he realized he had seen such a sudden change of weather once before.
“This,” she yelled maniacally, dancing in place as he held her arms. “This is why I set up the bloody portal.”
***
“It worked,” Bridget shrieked. “Finally, finally. Something actually went my way.”
She had never felt such joy. It actually worked. At least she had to believe it had. It was too dark and the rain came down too hard to see, but she knew in her heart they were no longer being pursued. Knew it had worked at last.
Poor Rory. The look on his face made her laugh harder. She knew she should stop lest he give up on her sanity completely, but she was too overcome with relief. And happiness. It had worked.
For once, for the first and only time, the castle’s frightening whispers had worked for her. Perhaps she’d been wrong about it being evil? Maybe it had so much more to share with her. Whatever time they were in, the damn thing would still be standing. Perhaps she’d go and find out.
Rory dragged her inside, wrestling with the door as it got caught in a gust of wind. He pulled it shut with a curse, drowning out most of the terrible sounds of the storm.
“What worked?” he snapped.
She could tell he already suspected and did another little dance. A bolt of lightning lit up the night outside the big observation windows, then there was nothing but darkness and rain again. It lashed at the windows and the wind rattled the panes, but she knew her baby was sound.
“The portal,” she said breathlessly. A tiny bit of reality was worming its way past her relief. Where were they?
Rory’s face turned blank with shock. He wiped the dripping water from his brow and tossed his hair, sending droplets everywhere. “When are we?” he asked.
Yes, that was the true question, wasn’t it? She leaned against the window, trying to see anything out in the gale. As if that would give her the answer.
“Ye dinna have a single clue, do ye?” he demanded, voice rising. He began to pace, swearing with each heavy stamp of his feet. “And I’ll wager ye dinna know if we can get back.”
“I willna be going back,” she said defiantly. “If Albert’s alive, he knows his money’s gone and he’ll know it was me who took it.”
Sudden realization dawned in Rory’s eyes. “Ye wicked wee witch. Ye made that evil portal to escape from your husband, with twice stolen money?” He stopped pacing and laughed contemptuously. “And what of me? What of your crew?” He made a choking noise and she wondered if he might be having apoplexy. He was certainly turning red enough for something to burst. “And what of your family?”
The thought of never seeing her parents again only gave her the mildest of twinges. Once she started trying to get them to believe there was something wrong with their house, something wrong with her, they’d slammed their hearts shut against her pleas for help.
It was always Dinna speak of such nonsense, Bridget. Pray, Bridget. And finally, leave, Bridget. Marry the Englishman and live a quiet life. Far away from where she might embarrass them.
Well, this was certainly a place where they’d never have to be bothered by her again. She only had to find out what the year was, then settle down and live that quiet life she was supposed to have. An ear-splitting crack of thunder made her flinch and she finally went to Rory.
“We’ll find out what the year is as soon as the storm passes. We’ll find the nearest port and—”
“And what?” he broke in with a croak. “I was already damned to never seeing my family again by getting pulled through that thing the first time. Never knowing what happened to my men and my ship. Ye’ll have a mutiny once the crew learns of what ye’ve done to them. See if they dinna throw ye into the drink.”
“The crew is a bit of a bother,” she said.
She’d meant to let her crew off in Ireland and sail away herself. She knew how to operate everything on the boat, she’d made sure of that when Albert first gave it to her. If bloody Albert hadn’t disappeared and she hadn’t had to run from the law, the crew would all be a bit confused about why she left them, but safe and in their proper time. It was a real wrinkle in her plan.
“A bit of a bother,” Rory repeated with derision.
“Your poor attitude isna helping me think,” she said.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I would have thought ye had this all figured out, your highness.”
“It was pure luck the thing opened when it did. Else we’d both be in shackles right now.”
She wasn’t actually certain it was luck. She had felt it opening and shutting intermittently while they waited but she hadn’t wanted to involve the crew. Rory, maybe, but she still didn’t trust him enough to let him know the gold was on board with them. And she would have sunk like a stone trying to get it all to the portal on her own in one of the lifeboats.
When the Navy finally showed up, she threw everything she could think of in that direction out of desperation. Prayers, wishes, all sorts of incantations the castle had implanted in her mind while she dreamt. Sheer force of her stubborn will.
She was almost positive The Mer Princess could have outrun that lot, but then what? She would have been arrested on the first shore if she tried to land and even her well-stocked supplies would have run out eventually. She hated the thought of being like the man without a country from some terrible story she’d read when she was young. As much as she loved sailing, she didn’t want to spend the rest of her days on the water as a fugitive. Especially when she hadn’t done anything wrong. Much.
Rory had turned his back to her, shivering in his wet clothes and trying to see through the rain. He turned around, a wondering look in his eyes, all his anger seeming to be miraculously gone.
“Come here, Bridget. Do ye see a light out there?”
She went to his side and got as close as she dared. “I dinna see anything but water. Rain, the waves. Just water.”
He peered anxiously and shook his head. “I could have swore I saw a light flash.”
“It was a bit of lightning,” she told him, putting her arms around him.
They both shook with cold and underneath all the ways her plan went wrong, she was glad he was near. She almost apologized for causing his current plight but stopped, not wanting him to go on and on about it. Instead she linked her arm through his. He looked down at her with a wry twist to his lips.
“I suppose we should get dry,” he sighed.
The crew man who’d warned her they were being chased hurried in through the other door, completely soaked as well.
“Aye, what is it, Ellis?” she asked.
Rory hissed under his breath at her casual tone, but she didn’t know quite how to explain that she’d stolen the lad’s life away from him. She really didn’t want to do it. He motioned toward the window at the storm he’d just come in from.
“Er, the captain would like a word,” he said.
She nodded. “Aye. Could ye please round up anyone else who’s still with us and have them come up to the bridge?”
“Right now, my lady? I’m sure they’re cowering in the hold.”
“Right now. After what I have to say, a bit of rain is going to be the least of their troubles.”
As soon as Ellis left, slipping and sliding along the deck to the stairs, Rory turned on her.
“At least let the poor buggers stay dry. Unless ye think we can take a return trip through your wee portal, our sorry situation will be the same when the sun comes back out.”
She threw up her hands. “I thought ye were giving me those dirty looks because I wasn’t confessing everything to him.”
He laughed a true belly laugh, and took her in his arms. “Ye wicked creature. If I was giving ye a dirty look it was because my entire life is upside down and inside out because of ye. And yet I cannot find it in myself to strangle ye. Though my fingers keep itching to do it.”
His shirt was cold and wet, but she felt warm and cozy in his arms. It was dangerous, but she stayed put. Even wrapped her arms around him in return.
“That’s one of the kindest things anyone’s ever said to me,” she mumbled against his chest.
He was silent for a moment, then dropped a kiss onto the top of her head. “Really?” he asked, holding her closer. “That’s verra sad.”