The Recruit Read Free Page A

in his eyes. “I don’t know.”
    Her chest squeezed painfully. Nine years had passed but it might have been yesterday,
     so sharp were the memories of having her baby ripped from her arms.
    Mary made her decision. She would not
—could
not—let her son be taken from her again. The son who was alreadymore English than he was Scot. She held Sir Adam’s gaze. “Will you help us?”
    He hesitated. She didn’t blame him. She hated to ask so much of him when he’d already
     done so much, but with Edward’s men right behind him, she didn’t have a choice.
    His moment of hesitation didn’t last long. “You are determined to do this?”
    She nodded. Atholl wasn’t coming for them. It was up to her now.
    He sighed in a way that told her he did not agree but recognized the futility of argument.
     “Then I will do what I can to delay them.” He turned to Janet. “You have a means of
     transport.”
    Janet nodded. “I do.”
    “Then you’d best gather David and be gone. They will be here any minute.”
    Mary threw her arms around him. “Thank you,” she said, blinking up at him through
     watery eyes.
    “I will do whatever I must to see you safe,” he said heavily. Mary’s heart swelled
     with gratitude. If only her husband would have done the same. “I owe Atholl my life.”
    Though Sir Adam’s father had fallen on the battlefield at Dunbar, her husband’s heroics
     had enabled Sir Adam to escape. Once she’d been proud of her husband’s feats of bravery
     and battlefield prowess. But her pride hadn’t been enough for him. Admiring such a
     man from afar was very different from being married to one.
    She donned the garments Janet had brought for her—which were indeed too big and hung
     on her like a sackcloth—and went to wake her son. If her sister noticed the wariness
     in the boy’s eyes when he looked at his mother, Janet didn’t say anything. It would
     take time, Mary told herself. But after three months, David still pulled away from
     her touch. Perhaps if he didn’t look so much like his father it wouldn’t hurt so much.
     But exceptfor having her light hair, the lad was the image of her handsome husband.
    Fortunately, David didn’t raise an objection to being woken in the middle of the night,
     covered in a scratchy wool cloak, and rushed out into the stormy night. Being raised
     in England as a virtual prisoner—albeit a favored one—had made him very good at keeping
     his thoughts to himself.
Too
good. Her young son was an enigma to her.
    Cailin swept her in a big bear hug when he saw her. She had to bite back a smile.
     Janet was right; with his round, jovial face and equally hearty belly, he did indeed
     make a good monk.
    Exchanging the horse Janet had purchased for two in her own stables—she would ride
     with Davey, and Janet would ride with Cailin—they set off toward the eastern seaboard.
    It was slow and treacherous going, the road muddy and slippery from all the rain.
     The rain was too heavy to keep a torch lit, so it was also difficult to see. But far
     worse was the constant fear, the taut, heightened senses and frazzled nerve endings
     set on edge, as they sat readied on constant alert for the sounds of pursuit.
    Yet with every mile they rode, some of the fear slipped away.
    She knew they must be close when Janet confirmed it. “We’re almost there. The
birlinn
is hidden in a cove just beyond the bridge.”
    Mary couldn’t believe it. They were going to make it! She was going home.
Scotland!
    But as they crossed the wooden bridge over the River Tyne, she heard a sound in the
     distance that stopped her cold. It wasn’t the pounding of hooves behind her that she’d
     feared, but a clash of metal ahead of her.
    Janet heard it, too. Their eyes met for a fraction of an instant before her sister
     flicked the reins and jumped forward with a strangled cry.
    Mary shouted after her to stop, but Janet, with Cailin behind her, raced ahead. Mary
     tightened her hold around her