The Ghost (Highland Guard 12) by Monica Mccarty Read Free Book Online Page B

threat and needed to keep it that way. Fortunately, although Joan’s looks appeared to resonate with the men, her cousin didn’t view her as competition. With her dainty, well-curved figure, blond hair, blue eyes, and perfect doll-like features, Alice de Beaumont was a strikingly beautiful woman.
    With a properly chastised nod that showed her gratitude for her cousin’s benevolence, Joan followed her cousin to the Hall.
    But the foiled attack, her ignorance of Pembroke’s arrival, and Sir Richard’s upcoming departure combined to make Joan realize that she was going to need to increase her efforts. She would not be caught in the dark again. If she was going to continue to be useful to Bruce, she had to take risks. Sir Richard had information, and she was going to get it. Even if she didn’t like how she would have to do so.

3

    J OAN COULD BARELY close the door behind her, her hands were shaking so badly. Actually, her entire body was shaking. Her skin was like ice. Fear and panic had invaded her body like a snowstorm in the dead of winter and wouldn’t let go.
    It’s all right. You are safe. It’s over. Nothing happened .
    But it had been close. Too close .
    She crept through the darkness of the corridor, winding her way down the stairs of the Captain’s Tower from Sir Richard’s third-floor chamber.
    She felt clumsy . . . awkward . . . tentative. Her heart was still beating like a drum in her chest and ears. She couldn’t shake the moment of terror. God, she could still feel his hands on her, pinning her down, not letting her move. The memories had come hard and fast and for one horrible moment she had been paralyzed with fear. It had been too similar. She’d thought he was going to . . .
    But then her plan worked and the threat had collapsed in a drugged heap. The panic, however, remained.
    Good gracious, she’d been so shaken she’d almost forgotten to search his room! A search that had resulted in a missive with his orders and details regarding the ports and shipping routes for getting the necessary supplies into Scotland for the war. An army of the size Edward was gathering would require far more than they could carry, even in an extensive baggage train. Now she knew how it would get there.
    There were probably only a handful of people who knew the information she had discovered, and soon one of them would be Robert the Bruce. Thanks to her.
    It had been worth it, she told herself. But her frazzled nerves didn’t seem to realize that. The shadows seemed to jump out at her as she wound her way down the darkened corridors. At well past midnight, most of the lamps had already been extinguished for the night. She hurried down the stairs, going down faster than she should, trying to put as much distance between her and what had nearly happened back in that room, when her slippered foot landed awkwardly on one of the narrow stairs. The stairs were made of stone, and as they became worn with use, they could become slippery. She discovered this the painful way when her foot slid out from under her.
    She tried to catch herself, and in doing so wrenched her ankle in the effort to find her footing. She tumbled down the last part of the spiral staircase, and likely would have landed in a painful heap at the base had someone not caught her.
    “Christ! Are you all right?”
    She was so startled to feel the man’s hands on her, it took a moment for her to process his words . . . and his face.
    But when she did . . .
    God in heaven! A heart that she thought incapable of catching did just that. If she still believed in handsome knights riding to the rescue, this man would have personified her fantasy. Dark golden-blond hair shimmered in the flickering light. Piercing blue eyes that were so crystal and clear they seemed to sparkle in the darkness. A finely featured face that might have been boyish were it not for the slightly skewed once-broken nose and the dark shadow of stubble shaped into a