“How did you know?”
“He told me about the lass at the church, and I pieced it together. I know him well.”
“Thank you, Angus. I’m headed to the point near Garb Eilean. You don’t need to worry about where I’ve gone.” She nudged Misty into motion and headed out. The islands at the east end of the loch offered the privacy she craved. Better to remain on the north side of the bridge with Kieran south at Torr na Carriach. They both needed space.
“Don’t stay out too long, Bonny. You’ll worry him. The Lord be with you.”
***
Garb Eilean
The ghost of Emily walked alongside her. Bonny headed off the single-track road into the grass along the shore. She needed solitude, and if Kieran took chances, she would too.
She settled her Stetson lower to shade her from the warm sun. With her western saddle and boots—along with a MacDonell tartan scarf around her neck—she’d make a rare sight for anyone who happened along. Today, she needed the comfort of familiar things. Her lunch held a turkey sandwich with green chile and biscochitos from the freezer.
Homey foods turned her thoughts to Albuquerque and their honeymoon visit to Old Town for the Christmas Stroll and tree lighting. The warm glow of the luminarias enveloped the sidewalks, rooftops, and porch rails with a golden radiance the way their new marriage and the unexpected gift of her pregnancy illuminated their lives. Flickering lights bestowed a simple beauty on ancient adobe buildings. Everything had been peaceful and serene. Where had their closeness gone? They were really still honeymooners.
Aside from the new environment, nothing prepared her to be a wife under such strange and trying circumstances. Their delayed honeymoon that began with a visit to an Albuquerque emergency room, where they discovered her pregnancy, had taken an even more bizarre direction.
Enough. She came away from the house to avoid morbid thoughts. The sparkling loch, lined with tall trees and green grass carpeted with yellow gorse, mirrored green mountains fading to blue. She drank in the lovely view and breathed deep of the fresh, sweet-scented air. Here and there, a few early sprigs of bright-pink, cross-leaved heath heather waved in the breeze, a cheerful banner, and one of her favorite Scottish flowers. A pair of broad-winged hawks soared on the breeze, and in the trees above, a blue-winged warbler sang its song.
The isolated shores of the islands near the east end of the loch beckoned her. Without a boat, she imagined her trouble and confusion floating downriver in the clear, rippling water.
Marriage wasn’t supposed to be this hard, especially when her husband was the most selfless, generous man she’d ever known, except for her father. Her mind connected the dots between the loss of the baby and Emily’s appearance with no detours between.
Before she and Kieran were married, they seemed to agree on everything. Now, they disagreed about both challenges they faced. How could they argue when a child needed parents and a young girl begged for help they could provide?
At a flat, grassy spot with a clear view of the islands, Bonny halted Misty and dismounted. The blanket in her saddlebag provided protection from the damp ground, while the gray mare cropped tender new shoots of grass near her side. She led the horse to the shore for a drink and sat on a sun-warmed rock while a woodpecker tapped on a tree the way questions needled her mind.
The sandwich filled the empty spot in her stomach, but failed to satisfy her heart. A wee bit of homesickness niggled from the combination of anise, sugar, and cinnamon in the cookies.
Her mother once said men’s brains organized everything in tidy boxes with no connection to each other, while women’s brains were a tangle of electrical wires. Each sparked the one next to it, all linked, never at rest. Kieran had pigeonholed adoption in a box he refused to open.
Bonny grew up knowing a lot of adopted kids, and because of them, believed adoption answered her desire for a family. When Kieran accepted her infertility and proposed, she assumed he agreed with her need to adopt. The loss of their unexpected miracle, and the appearance of Emily made a neat little package of God’s intervention. Her mother would say to give him space, the same way Angus and Janet warned her to let his heart follow its own path to the answers.
Living with a man wasn’t easy, especially a proud one. Though he did everything to please her before marriage, now differences appeared on an almost daily basis.
The sun had passed its midpoint. Misty’s eyes were closed, her back to the rising wind. Bonny stood, stretched out the kinks, and picked up the remains of her lunch. Angus would worry if she didn’t return soon, and Kieran shouldn’t come home to an empty house.
“Thanks for filling in the blanks, Mom. I miss you.” She turned for one last look at the islands.
Snap!
She stood. Eyes scanning the woods and down to the loch’s edge where something moved in the shadow of a tree. A tidal wave of fear rushed through her veins when a man stepped into the sunlight. She was looking at a character out of Braveheart. He fit the description of Gavin Gunn. He lunged toward her, mouth twisted in an evil grin of yellowed teeth and tangled beard.
Instinct propelled her into the saddle. “Giddup, Misty! Fly!” She kicked the little mare into a gallop.
Her hat flew away. Her ponytail loosened, hair streaming free. Bonny laid over the horse’s neck. Urged her faster.
Halfway home, where the road curved away from the loch, she slowed the horse to a trot and looked back. No one followed. Perhaps he was on foot?
Prodding Misty back into a gallop, she headed for the farm. Neither of them should be out alone. How could they consider bringing a child into such a dangerous situation?
***
Torr Na Carriach
The lowing of his Highland cattle always soothed Kieran. The sheep ignored his presence, but the small, shaggy kyloe allowed him to rub between their ears. The wee beasties listened without judgment. Coos were a way to preserve Highland heritage and also a source of excellent beef and a good income. He saw them as friends.
Bonny wasn’t pleased when he came alone after she and his mother urged him to avoid it, but today called for solitude. Her wide-eyed fear, the disbelief in her voice when he insisted on a fertility specialist replayed again, a horror movie stuck in a loop. It seemed logical. Why hadn’t her beloved Dr. Carson suggested it? Yes, the severity of her endometriosis made pregnancy more risky than normal, but he hadn’t said it was impossible.
When he fell in love with a thirty-year-old woman, Kieran expected the large family he’d craved as an only child. After fifteen years with Bronwyn, he assumed he had marriage figured out, but Bonny presented a new challenge every day. Both were fiery redheads with minds of their own, but the resemblance ended there. The opposite of quiet Bronwyn, content with her painting, Bonny involved herself in every aspect of farm life, and never gave up without a fight. Strong opinions were etched in her mind like a stone tablet.
Irresistible from the moment he spotted her across the room at the faculty meeting, their love was an unexpected gift. Emotional and tenacious, her ideas on adoption weren’t going away.
He developed a fascination with his ancestor’s portraits in early childhood. Stern, stoic, in colorful tartans, and crackled with age, they survived Culloden, the outlawing of the clans, and confiscation of their homes. His second great grandfather achieved an extraordinary feat when he bought back the sacred trust of family lands generations later. Throughout his years in Glasgow, as a math professor and bagpipe master, Kieran never doubted he would return to the farm out of love, not duty.