Dawn smiled her appreciation.
“That was a brave thing you did going to find Old Mary. You are truly a good friend.” Flanna grabbed Dan and hugged her. “I owe you so much.” With that the woman rushed out of the cottage wiping tears from her eyes.
A minute or two passed when a knock sounded at the door and Dawn smiled wondering what Flanna had forgotten. But when she opened the door, it wasn’t Flanna standing there.
~~~
“It was a blinding snowstorm, so tell me how someone could have found their way to that boarded up door, and the wind be damned for not drifting the snow in front of it,” Cree said though it sounded more like an irate growl.
“You know the answer to that,” Sloan said filling a tankard with ale and shoving it at Cree to force him to stop pacing in front of the hearth in the solar.
Cree grabbed the tankard. “I do and I don’t like it. It means that the person knew where that secret entrance was located. Old Mary told me that only Goddard and Colum knew of its existence and their both dead, so that would mean that one of them told someone.”
“And what else does that person know? Something is amiss in this place, I can feel it. It chills to the bone and sends the shivers through you. And it has grown worse since the McCluskys have arrived. Father and son whisper much too often with each other.”
“You think they plot?” Cree shook his head as soon as he asked the question. “I feel no ill will from them and they would have more to lose than gain if they should take as an enemy.”
“They don’t seek to be our foes. It is something else, though I do not know what and that irritates me. Now they will be here until the snow clears enough for them to continue on. Here I was looking forward to a quiet winter with different lassies warming my bed and we have a keep full of problems.”
“Problems that need solving sooner than later,” Cree said. “Let’s go see how the men are doing and I have another chore for you. I need you to find Bree a chore and a cottage of her own. She is one of ours now.”
Sloan broke out in a huge grin. “Finally, a task that has some promise.”
The two men raised their glasses in a toast and downed the remaining ale in their tankards before leaving the solar.
~~~
Dawn stared at Torr, his lean frame filling the doorway.
“I would like to speak with you. You have nothing to worry about from me, nothing improper. I just want to talk.”
Dawn felt no fear toward this man. Actually, she felt the opposite; she felt safe with him. Cree, however, would probably not be happy with it, but she did want to learn more about this woman who had no voice and if Kirk knew her than his son must have known her as well. Her curiosity won out and she bid him to enter with a nod and closed the door behind him. She pointed to the table and gestured eating.
Torr smiled. “I would love to join you for the meal.”
He was a handsome man, though like Cree there was a sense of danger around him. He was a man you did not cross for the consequences could prove fatal and yet she sensed a caring heart.
Dawn pointed to one of the chairs and then slipped off both her cloaks. Something spilled out from one and Torr leaned down having seen it and scooped it up. He stood staring at the object in his hand until he finally turned slowly and stretched his hand out.
“Where did you get this?”
His tone was taut and curt and fear prickled her skin as it once did when she had met Cree and he had spoken to her in much the same way. She was hesitant about approaching him and when she didn’t move he stepped toward her so that she could easily see what he held.
There in his hand was her mother’s comb. The one she kept hidden away.
Chapter Twelve
Dawn could not believe that Torr held her mother’s comb in his hand. She had hid it the day she had settled into this cottage and hadn’t touched it since. So how had it gotten there?
It had flown out of her cloak—she shook her head—but that wasn’t possible. She hurried to the hiding spot buried behind the stack of baskets beneath the narrow table against the wall and was surprised when her hand found the cloth she kept the comb wrapped in. And she could feel that the comb was still there.
She stood and carefully unwound the cloth and seeing it laying there in her palm, an identical match to the other one, made her wonder if the comb had ever belonged to her mother. She reluctantly held it out to show Torr.