A Laird to Hold by Angeline Fortin (free children's ebooks online .TXT) 📕

close. A bit of sightseeing, so to speak. I didn’t wish to create a scene what with this being a busy…”

She left the statement dangling and thankfully Marius filled in the answer. “Sunday.”

“Right. So, I had someone let us in the side door.” A twinge of remorse hit her for whoever was about to lose their job over the fib. “I’m so sorry for the disruption. Would it be possible to just sneak out again without making a fuss?”

The woman hesitated, torn between duty and the desire to please Scarlett. “I guess you could stay a little longer and look around some more, if you like.”

“No, no. They’re all good. Aren’t you?”

Everyone nodded obediently.

“I could take you out the side then, if it would help?”

“I wouldn’t want to take you away from your tour group. Did you get a promotion?”

Marius’s face glowed as she nodded.

“How lovely for you. You deserve it.”

“I guess I can at least swipe open the door for you.”

Scarlett breathed a sigh of relief. “That would be wonderful. Thank you, Marius. You’re a life saver.”

Marius beamed under her praise but her expression soon became inquisitive once more. She cocked her head to the side. “I didn’t know you had an accent, Miss Thomas.”

“Do I?” Scarlett stammered in surprise. “Oh, um, method acting. For the new play.”

Marius seemed doubtful but nodded and turned toward a thick door that led to the passage in the curtain wall. “I suppose that’s a wig then too? For your new part?”

Her auburn hair, though braided on the sides and wrapped behind her head, was long and loose in the back. Self-consciously, she smoothed the wild curls. “Um, yes.”

“Rather convincing one. It’s just as it was before you cut it short.”

Emmy gasped. “You cut off your hair?”

Luckily their guide didn’t hear her, otherwise a fresh round of questions might be coming their way. As it was, they were about to be blessed with an easier and less conspicuous escape than Scarlett would have thought possible. Thankfully, the tour group stayed beyond the velvet ropes, leaving them free to make their getaway.

Fingers crossed, no one would post on social media about their sudden appearance. Though, such restraint was highly unlikely.

“Mummy?” Hermione piped up sleepily. She lifted her head from Laird’s shoulder and peered around. “Where are we going?”

With her key card an inch away from the scanner of the final portal to their escape, Marius stopped in her tracks and turned. She gaped at the toddler, lips parted in surprise while Scarlett mentally scrambled for a valid explanation.

Emmy, bless her heart, took Hermione with a display of maternal doting. Hermione, having no fear of strangers, went to her readily enough. The gesture might’ve been enough to belay the truth, but the toddler pushed back her hood just as Marius opened the door and the sun to the west lit Hermione’s hair. Bright auburn curls sparkled in the light against Emmy’s blonde locks, making no mistake of whose daughter she was.

Marius gaped like a landed fish.

“Enough, we need to go,” Laird bit out.

He gently pushed Marius to the side and held the door open for them all to pass. Scarlett, the last to go, paused near the astonished woman. “You’ve been so kind to me in the past, Marius. Please, don’t say anything. Please?”

The attendant nodded erratically as if the motion were out of her control. Likely any promises she made would be as unreliable, but Scarlett had to take the chance. She grabbed Marius’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Thank you.”

“Uh-huh.” Her head was still bobbing when Scarlett slipped through the door and closed it tight.

“Och, where has Donell gone to?” Connor was saying when she rejoined her personal tour group.

Sure enough, the old man had vanished.

“Figures,” Emmy grumbled. “Smarmy little bastard. Wait ‘til I get my hands on him.”

“Ye and I both,” Laird vowed. “But we hae a far more pressing issue presently, aye? How do we get all the way to Edinburgh from here?”

“If it’s only been a matter of days as Marius said, my rental car might still be here. If they didn’t have it towed, that is.”

“Which one is it?” Emmy asked.

There wasn’t a sea of cars in the parking lot but enough to give Scarlett pause. The men around her were all wide-eyed, taking in sights they’d heard about but hadn’t yet seen for themselves.

“Did you forget where you parked?”

“It’s been a while, you know. Give me a minute.”

She tried to trace back the memories. Life had been so bleak that month so long ago when she’d haunted Dunskirk every day hoping for the miracle that would send her back to Laird. Hadn’t cared much what she drove, didn’t give the car a second thought after she’d been returned to him.

It was a little white thing. That’s about all she remembered. “Oh, what does it matter?” she complained abruptly. “It was too tiny to fit us all anyway and I threw away the key years ago.”

“The agency might have another.”

Another contraction caught her breath. They were getting closer together. Less than ten minutes for sure. Time for urgency not exploration.

“I don’t think we’ll have time to wait.”

“How about this conveyance?” Rhys asked, finding his voice. “It appears large enough for us all.”

The transport he pointed to was one of the tour shuttles that often brought groups down to Dunskirk from Glasgow and Edinburgh. Big enough and the group of tourists boarding were largely an older crowd who, with any luck, may not have been huge fans of young adult fantasy novels or movies.

“Let’s go hitch a ride.”

Scarlett

 

Edinburgh, Scotland

October 2013

There were at least a half dozen reporters outside the