My Highland Lover Read Free

the sweet-natured dog. Granny strode along with her thin arms swinging. Her brisk pace belied the fact that the tiny woman was on the downhill side of her seventies. Maybe. The chronological age of an elder Sinclair time runner was always pretty much a wild guess. If a runner skated between centuries often enough, they could cheat death for quite a while. A curt sideways glance followed by a sharp shake of Granny’s head confirmed Granny agreed with her cat.
    Granny huffed out a frustrated growl and quickened her stomping pace. Glancing down at the cat skipping along beside her, she flipped both hands upward. “She just doesn’t get it, does she, Kismet? The gal is never going to learn all the ways ’cause neither of us will live long enough to teach her.”
    The cat aimed another disdainful glance back at Trulie.
    “Keep it up, Kismet.” Trulie walked faster to catch up with Granny and the cat. “As soon as we get home, I’m gonna tell Karma where you hide your treats.”
    The cat flattened her ears back against her sleek, dark head. Her golden eyes narrowed and she whipped her tail forward, clearly telling Trulie to kiss her ass.
    “We must return to the past.” Granny snorted out short, impatient huffs as she clumped through a puddle. “It is very…important and we must do it soon.”
    Trulie filled her lungs with the crisp night air and forced herself to remain calm and keep the frustration out of her voice. She loved and respected Granny with all her heart, but this incessant badgering was getting old. Trulie stopped walking, pulled her denim jacket tighter about her and waited for Granny to realize Kismet was the only one still walking beside her.
    It didn’t take long. Granny stopped, spun in place, and glared back at Trulie. “Well? Now what?” Granny’s tone had taken on the color of a full-blown scolding.
    Trulie widened her stance and tried to ignore the sudden feeling that she and Granny were facing off like a couple of gunfighters from the Old West. “You know how much I love you. I understand you miss the old Scotland, but we belong here. We belong in this now. We’re pretty much settled, and life isn’t too bad when our home remedies aren’t sloshing around in the back of the truck.”
    Trulie waited, then took one step toward Granny. “Please forget about relocating. I don’t want to uproot us again. We’re settled. Home base for all our forages across time is right here.”
    Six months of this harping was too much. Time to pull out the big guns and aim dead square at Granny’s conscience. “You know you can’t time-jump alone anymore. And you’re not able to maneuver the web as point beacon and connect all of us to you like you could when you were younger.”
    Trulie scuffed the toe of her boot in the mud.
Double dammit all to hell.
She hated pointing out anyone’s weaknesses, especially Granny’s. “I haven’t jumped as beacon enough to connect with more than one or two travelers. If I try any more than that, I’m afraid I’ll scatter the lot of us across a string of centuries. If I ran beacon to take you back, we’d have to leave Kenna and the girls in this time. Alone. Would you feel good about deserting the rest of your grandchildren? Do you really think they’d be okay without us?” There. That should stall out this round. Trulie forced herself not to back down. She hated using guilt on Granny, but it was the most effective ammo she had.
    Granny’s shoulders sagged and her gaze lowered to the patch of road between them. Her voice fell to just above a whisper as she stared unblinking at the ground. “I do not want you permanently anchored here, Trulie. Your babies are not meant to come from this disturbing patch of time. This place is temporary. A place of trial to help us grow and strengthen.” Granny bent and ran a slightly shaking hand over Kismet’s arched back as she continued. “Kenna and the twins will be fine if we have to leave them here for a bit.