Shawna had no concept of how David planned to explain his sudden appearance. The entire household—Gawain, Lowell, Alaric, Aidan, Alistair, Hawk, Skylar, Sabrina, Sloan, James McGregor, Shawna, and David—sat down to breakfast together. And as they did so, David’s story was a casual one.
“I imagine I must have stumbled into the woods from the stables on the night of the fire. Perhaps I was caught by some falling wood, I don’t know. In truth, I know very little of that night. But I was no longer David Douglas.”
“Amnesia?” Lowell inquired, curious and doubtful. “You had no idea of who you were, or what you were about?”
“Aye, I suppose it was amnesia. I was in the stables when the fire began—Shawna and I had gone there for business, as surely you are all aware,” he said, his tone very dry, “but I know nothing more. I found myself on a ship with no real identity, drifting around the world.”
“Whatever happened? How did you get to come back here?” Aidan demanded. There was excitement in his tone. He appeared to think that whatever had befallen David was surely the greatest adventure of a lifetime.
David shrugged, buttering one of Anne-Marie’s finest scones and adding her homemade jam. “It had to do with another hit on the head—and I knew it was time to come back.”
It was amazing, Shawna thought. He was basically telling the truth.
“So, you came back home—with your friends?” Gawain asked suspiciously, nodding politely to James and Sloan.
“My good friends,” David replied simply.
“Friends from America,” Alaric commented, “and all arriving when your brother just happened to be here.”
“Alaric, life can be amazing.”
Alaric nodded. “Imagine, Father,” he said to Gawain, “we’d thought to see if Hawk might be interested in selling the Douglas holdings—seeing as how he spent most of his time in the States,” he explained to David.
“The property is certainly not for sale,” David said quietly.
Gawain cast his son Alaric an aggrieved glance, then turned his attention to David once again. “You look hale and hearty, lad. And it’s good to see you alive.”
“Thank you, MacGinnis.”
“Naturally, it’s a pity your father never knew,” Lowell told him.
“Indeed, it is that,” David said.
“Hawk, this rather changes your fortunes, doesn’t it? You came here Laird Douglas. You go home without a title,” Alaric said.
“I go home without a title, but with a brother returned from the dead. A fair trade, I think.”
“It’s quite amazing,” Gawain said, staring at David, shaking his head. “You were dead—you’ve suddenly reappeared. Just as your ‘corpse’ winds up on the Druid Stone.”
“Just after Sabrina was kidnapped,” Alaric murmured.
Shawna tensed, hoping no one else had heard what seemed like a tone of insinuation coming from her cousin. But David was no longer dead—and he was returned as laird of his castle. And there would be no insinuations cast in his direction to which he would not cast out a challenge.
“Do you imply something, Alaric?”
Alaric threw up his hands. “I imply nothing. I’m simply and completely—stunned. And unnerved. Very strange events have been occurring in these parts lately.”
“Like as not, it’s the witches, and we should be doing something about the lot of them,” Lowell said.
Shawna sighed. “Uncle Lowell, the Craig Rock witches are intelligent, gentle people who do nothing but practice freedom of religion. Edwina is the most kindly person?—”
“That she is!” Gawain said angrily.
“Sabrina was found in the McCloud vault,” Alaric said.
“We looked there because I was certain that anyone who was up to evil would try to blame what had happened on the witches if Sabrina was found.”
“Perhaps,” Aidan said slowly, looking around the table at all of them, “it’s exactly the opposite. Perhaps Sabrina was taken by Edwina’s people and kept prisoner in the McCloud vault so we’d think that she had to be innocent!”