Highland Dream: The MacGrough Clan, #8

By Cherime MacFarlane

Scotland: 1816

Siobhan waits for her husband to leave the ship and finds him as hesitant to meet as she. The same individual who lied about him and had him impressed has brought misery to them both. The MacGrough clan is in tatters, Hamish's younger brother dead and the cousins disbursed far and wide. That is not the worst of it. She has something she must tell the man she loves and hopes his heart will forgive and accept.

His highland dreams dashed forever, his family scattered, Hamish didn't expect to find his love broken as well. Her tale of agony leaves him hungry for vengeance. But survival comes first, and who is to blame? If he discovers his tormenter, can he take revenge and not be a suspect?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paper Gold Publishing OLD
• Release date: Dec 22, 2022
• ISBN: 9798215625507

Cherime MacFarlane

Meet Award-Winning, Best-Selling Author Cherime MacFarlane. A prolific multi-genre author, she has a broad range of interests that reflect her been there-done that life. Romance, Historical Fiction, Fantasy, Paranormal, all sorts of characters and plots evolve from a vivid imagination. As a reporter for the Copper Valley Views, Cherime MacFarlane received a letter of commendation from the Copper River Native Association for fair and balanced reporting. She was part of the Amazon Best Selling in Anthologies and Holidays, and Fantasy Anthologies and Short Stories. The Other Side of Dusk was a finalist in the McGrath house award of 2017.

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Copyright © Cherime MacFarlane

2022

Copyright Notice:

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is completely coincidental.

Author's Note:

The years after the union saw great upheaval for the Scots. Some left; some couldn’t bring themselves to leave the land. They continued to dream of Scotland as a country. I have taken as little license as possible.

License Notes:

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your retailer and purchase a copy for yourself. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Artwork: Designs by Dana

Dedicated to: The MacFarlane

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Epilogue

About the Author

Other books by the author:

Prologue

1816 – Late February

She waited on the dock, off to the side. He could see her and knew his lass had brought her stool—the very same one he’d made her as a wedding gift. It had been partially a joke and, then again, not. She needed it to reach things on the taller shelves.

Hamish wiped both palms on the stained legs of his trousers. This would be awkward come evening, and he didn’t know if he could rise to the occasion. No smile lifted his lips. The double meaning didn’t amuse. Not this time.

Bag in hand, he waited at the side. Let the rest go first. He and Siobhan had much to discuss before reaching home and Hamish would rather do so without his weans listening. The marriage could well be over. If so, he’d not blame the lass one bit. She’d married a man who could love her as she needed. What had returned from the bloody swamp of New Orleans might not be what she wanted.

She’d seen him, knew he waited for a reason. There had been a connection between them from the instant his eyes met hers at the market, two weans ago. As other couples embraced and hurried from the dock, she slid down off the stool and stood beside it.

Bright red tendrils crept from the bonnet. Hands clasped before her; the woman he’d teased as being no longer than a minute waited. When he stepped on Scottish soil for the first time in three years, Hamish realized he wasn’t the only tense one.

Something had his lass caught still as a statue, ramrod straight. She didn’t run to his arms, her fair face with a blush of sun, a mouth made for smiling... didn’t. His heart, already low, sunk further still into the toes of the worn boots.

With him not over two steps from her, Siobhan’s face tipped up, and the tears spilled over freckled cheeks. Before he could say a word, she grabbed his hand. We must talk, and nae before the weans. Hammie cannae keep Ailene from mischief for long so we must hurry.

She reached down for the stool. His long arm got there first, and Hamish tucked it against his side. Where?

Nae the shop. They’ll all see and... nae there.

A walk then? Terrified, he tried to keep the fear from his voice. She couldn’t know of his trouble. He’d not said a word to a soul. This was something wrong at home. Young Hamish, is he...?

Tis nae the weans. They are well. The tears rolled down.

He looked around and saw a shed, its back to Broomielaw Street. Behind yonder hut? We’ve the stool. Ye can sit on it.

She nodded, turned, and walked that direction, Hamish following. Once in the shelter of the old building, he put the stool down for her to sit back on the wall behind her. With Siobhan on her perch, he folded long legs and took a seat in the dirt facing his wife. What’s the trouble, lass? I ken there must be a world of it, since ye cannae cease crying.

I worked hard the first year ye left to keep all together. I ken how tae grade the lumber... Mary, mother of Jesus! I wish they hadnae conscripted ye. The bastards who accused ye of theft should have gone in yur place.

Aye, lass. We both ken they wanted rid of me tae get the business and property. That we have any left is a testament tae ye.

She clenched her hands so tight together her knuckles lost all blood. Eyes on the ground, her breath hitched in her chest. He wanted to reach for her and couldn’t. She must come to it in her own time.

A deep sigh left his wife, and she glanced back up at him. Aye. We still have the house. I had tae sell all tae keep it, mind. The year ye left, I worked late one night. There’d been folk in and out of the lumber yard all day. The last one I took for a spy. Since he bought a fair bit of oak, I had tae wait for his men tae come and load it. They finished at full dark. Ah, Hamish. I must say it before I lose what courage I have. On the way home, one grabbed me. I hadn’t the strength tae fight him off. There’s another bairn at home and he’s nae yours.

If he didn’t say something and quick, she’d jump from the stool and leave. We’re a hurting pair, we are. I need tae make ye understand I dinnae ken if I can even make a bairn now.

The stiffness fled and her face twisted as she reached for him. Were ye wounded?

Nae that way, Siobhan. There’s something wrong in my lug. He used one finger to tap on his forehead. I wake at night in a cold sweat still caught in all the fear, hearing the whine, tasting the gunpowder. I’m nae a coward, least I stayed and fought. The battle was a bloodbath. It was like standing in the middle of a slaughterhouse. For the love of God! It was a bloody carnage, and they made naught but sides of mutton of many of us.

She leaned forward. Siobhan’s bonnet slid back as her forehead touched his. Small hands resting on his shoulders, his wife pulled him close.

How did ye get away with having the wean without the bloody kirk jumping ye?

It’s the other reason I had tae sell the yard. I took me and the weans tae Ireland. Said I had tae settle an estate of a distant relative. Took me a full year tae get it done.

Good enough. Now, do ye ken who it might have been? Was it the one ye thought might be a spy for the enemy?

For an instant, she turned to stone again. Her voice wobbled. I cannae rightly say.

She couldn’t positively say the culprit’s name. Still, he guessed his wife had a sense of who might have attacked her, but Siobhan wouldn’t tell him. She feared what he might do, and rightly so.

He plucked her from the stool, turned his wife, and settled her in his lap. I take it I may have made a visit tae ye in Ireland. How did it happen? We must appease the kirk.

Ye had a wounded leg. Nae enough tae keep ye from fighting once healed, but it took the better part of the year tae get better.

Then I’m glad ye were there for me, love. If I find I’m unable tae function as a husband should, will ye still keep me?

Dafty eijit, ye ken I will.

What did we name the lad?

Edan. I’ve heard tales of yur grandda. He was a good man. I’m hoping this Edan can overcome and be as good as his great-grandsire. Are ye sorry I kept him? I couldn’t give him up, not after carrying him. Tis nae the bairn’s fault he comes from a thief. The bastard stole from us as sure as God made little fishes in the sea.

I’m sorry the poor wean came about as he did. Nae matter. None of us are whole here. We’ll muddle along as best we can. Ye, me, and the weans. Come wife, let’s go home.

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Her arm in his, Siobhan felt her heart lighten. She had more bad tidings to report, but hers had been the worst of it all. The rest could wait until he had a full belly and sat in his chair at home.

Regardless of what the kirk thought, she had prayed to the Virgin, asking that Hamish accept little Edan. God knew the poor mite needed all the love he could find. It hadn’t been easy. The first few months, she tipped back and forth between seeking to rid her body of the bairn or keeping it. Then he moved, and the battle ended. Life so evident, she couldn’t destroy the new little being. 

He'd asked, as she knew he must. Who had attacked her? If one asked for proof, she couldn’t give it. In her heart, she knew who hated Hamish enough to hurt her.

God had blessed her in that Edan favored her side of the family. All red-gold curls and pale skin. The other two children, called Irish Twins by some, were as dark as their father. Hair, eyes, all dark with a light olive tint to their complexions.

The first time she saw Hamish, staring at her as she stood beside her mam in the market, Siobhan thought he resembled a dark angel. When she got to know him, her impression changed radically. He approached life with a sense of humor and a touch of the absurd. Later, she discovered part of the reason he tried hard to see the world that way. Her man possessed the sight, a matter to keep hidden from the kirk at all costs. They might not burn witches, but they could make life a living hell for anyone suspected of dealing with Old Nick.

He said he’d come home to her, swore what he saw to be the truth. And so he had, but there was something off with her man. A bleakness he hadn’t possessed before, a dryness of spirit. The other things waiting at home would make it worse.

Hamish MacGrough loved his family. The clan had always been small, or so he said. After the Peninsular War, it became that much smaller and two cousins leaving for the colonies shrank it yet again.

Then there was the lumberyard. Not a stick remained in it. The aged oak brought a good price. Selling the wood gave her enough to live on while waiting on the bairn in Ireland. She held on to as much of the money as she could, knowing they would need it when Hamish returned.

No matter what happened, Siobhan refused to mention the interrogation the pastor had put her through. If the man insisted on doing the same to Hamish, he’d be drawing hell down on his head with no help from her.

The accusations had come thick and fast that she’d been cavorting with other men and eschewed her vows to Hamish. She’d understood from the beginning being Irish, and probably a closet papist, left her open to a harsher judgment than had she been a God-fearing Scot. In her heart, Siobhan would always be a Catholic, but neither admitted nor denied it. That sat between her and God.

She’d not given them, the parson, and the elders, what they wanted. She didn’t cry or beg. Her story was the same every time they accosted her. Never had she felt tempted to repudiate her marriage vows. When Hamish returned home, he’d uphold her story. She’d seen to his care while in Ireland. Her man would claim the babe on his homecoming.

Hamish. Ye ken the weans are eager tae see ye again.

He sighed as if an old granny. How do they remember me?

Every night I’ve told them of ye and the other MacGroughs. Told them all the stories. They ken Gideon and Ailene. How MacGroughs come tae be dark. They are ready tae welcome ye home.

I’m of a mind tae never leave home again.

We’ll need tae discuss that matter, and soon. There’s been someone sniffing about the place. Hinting I should sell before the worst happens. Glasgow Green is a park now. They’re saying big development is about tae take place and we should get what we can for the land now before we’re forced out.

Ha! Forced out, is it? And who might be applying this ‘force?’

Well, it’s all vague. Covered over in fine words, but I’m thinking those who wish tae see things happen plan tae make a profit. If they hold the land, ‘tis more profit for them and theirs.

They came to the turning into Wood Lane. The rowan tree stood tall and proud as it had in Edan and Rhona’s time. It had been a hard winter and not a leaf still stood attached. Siobhan hoped it would get the chance to bloom once again.

But times were changing rapidly. God only knew what they would face during the rest of the year. With Hamish beside her, they would survive.

Chapter One

He sat on the back steps, staring out at what had been Anderson’s field in his grandda’s time. So much had altered in one generation. They had given him all the tools the elders had to make his way in Glasgow... until everything changed.

He’d heard all the stories. The MacGrough riddle he could rattle off with ease. Where the Hamish, who’d fallen at Culloden and Grandda’s first wife, Daracha, were buried were things he could draw in his sleep. The same with Edan’s and Rhona’s burial spots. They were in the glen, where they belonged.

The old cave where Edan had taken his prey, the location back behind Loch Sloy, on MacFarlane land, he could ride a horse there in the dark. He could open the secret compartment of Edan’s old chest where the family Bible rested without thinking about it.

All the old knowledge would have been lost to generations of MacGroughs to come if he had died. He’d written everything down before they took him off to fight in the colonies, a land lost to the English as surely as Scotland had been lost to them. The papers he labored over before leaving rested in the same hiding place with the Bible.

Siobhan waited inside, in the bed Edan had built. The little ones were safe in their beds, but he couldn’t go up to her. Not yet.

The newest one, Edan, seemed a happy wean. The bairn lay in his cradle and cooed. His coloring the same as Siobhan’s, Hamish had sighed with relief at first glance. None could nay say their tale with the child taking after his mither.

It was already colder than he ever experienced. As the sun slipped over the horizon, he shivered in the bitter wind. They would use every penny available to heat the house. They might need to shut off the upper floor and all move into the lower area.

Opening the shop to the house must happen if he was to work. God only knew what the market would be like at these temperatures. With people hoarding so they could get through the winter, he must get out and see if he could find some commissions.

With no money coming in from the lumberyard, he must do something. There was still the rental money from the home close to the village. If the tenants couldn’t pay... another shiver took him. He must go in. Still...

A feeling much like that when a battle was about to begin took him. Hamish grabbed the edge of the step he was on to keep upright. It seemed a great weight settled on everything around him and he felt trapped beneath a huge building. Strange whistles sounded.

The house was gone, he along with it. The vision Edan had put to paper came back to him. They would lose the house and the land. Someone would take it from them. Along with all else, he had to decide where to go and how to get there.

The Andersons had left when the village grew too close. They sold up and moved farther out. He would need to go see Adam Anderson and find out what it cost to buy in that area. Those cousins had moved south and west, buying a bigger plot for raising their garden truck and carting it into Glasgow.

That far out, doing business for him would be far more difficult. Unless he were to open a store, another and greater expense.

All his sitting in the cold trying to divert his mind didn’t work. The reason he couldn’t go to his bed lay in it. Siobhan. What someone had done to her must be addressed. He could not allow some piece of filth to go unpunished for putting hands on his woman.

If she had taken a lover, he’d have dealt with that, somehow. Malice. Evil against him was the reason she’d been attacked and used. He understood the rape of his woman violated them both.

It had been repayment of a debt in another’s mind. Had they come against him, demanded satisfaction, he would have obliged. Instead, they’d hurt Siobhan.

He knew the woman he married, as he knew his right arm. The bairn in the crib was there because she had a good heart. She cared for people and did her best for all that came her way. She’d give her last crust to a starving soul. For someone to hurt so beautiful and giving a woman to take revenge on him, built an anger in Hamish, the likes of which he’d never known.

Edan. How fitting she’d named the bairn after his grandda. She knew where the old Bible hid. He’d shown her in case his sight was wrong, and he died somewhere in America. What she didn’t know, he’d not show her now.

It would near ruin her if she found out he meant to destroy the man who hurt her. She would fear him being hung. That wouldn’t happen. He knew what the man who was said to be his grandda had done to the men responsible for his first wife’s death. It seemed another Glasgow wolf must be brought to heel.

Edan had cared for his father as if that Hamish was his lad. He wasn’t. None knew of the Hamish buried beneath the rocks in the glen as none knew he could claim the title of Laird of MacGrough. The secret tucked in the back of the Bible would stay there.

Still, he planned to take a hint from his grand-uncle, Edan Campbell MacGrough. He had a murder to plan and must be quite careful about how he managed it. He would raise little Edan as the first Edan had raised his father. He’d be a