Page 19 of The Scot’s Secret

He shrugged. “Enough.”

“Don’t let him fool you, lad.” Brockburg’s priest approached, grinning at them. Thank the heavens. “Alex knows much less than he claims.”

Alex smiled at the priest, who looked no more than a few years older than the eldest Kerr brother. Mayhap thirty and five? And yet, he exuded a sense of wisdom beyond his years.

Clara liked him immediately.

“I know you are wanting something, Father,” Alex said. “You have that look about you.”

“Ahh, do I now? Well, boy, you’re right on that account.”

Alex rolled his eyes. “I’ve not been a boy for many years.”

“To me, you will be one always.”

Clara looked back and forth between the men. She’d heard of Father Simon while at Bristol. Lady Catrina spoke highly of him.

“I’ve just heard the rumors.”

Clara felt an immediate jolt of fear, but the priest wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were fixed on Alex. These rumors weren’t about her, then.

Alex shook his head. “Reid told me earlier. I care not if—”

“Tell yourself that if you’d like, but don’t lie to a man of God.”

The men stared at one another, and Clara began to back away. It was a conversation she should not be a part of. That much was clear.

“Stay with me, Alfred,” Alex insisted. He turned to Father Simon. “Father.”

Obviously dismissed, the priest walked away with a nod to them both.

Alex tipped his head back and looked up to the sky. For divine intervention? These rumors, whatever they were about, clearly troubled him.

For a moment she thought he was going to tell her what Father Simon had meant, but instead he began walking through the courtyard toward the gatehouse. “Are you ready for today’s training?” he asked over his shoulder.

He didn’t give her time to answer, so Clara scrambled after him instead. Just as they were passing through the massive arched entranceway, Alex stopped. A merchant, the same one she’d seen approaching the gates earlier, walked alongside a cart filled with spices, judging from the smell that wafted back to them.

“You there,” he called, jogging ahead to reach the man, who looked as if he’d been travelling for days. Mayhap more.

Clara couldn’t hear what they were saying, and although she did not want to intrude, their raised voices carried back to her, rousing her curiosity. She moved just a bit closer until she could hear their conversation clearly.

“And you are quite sure?”

“Aye, my lord. She was most clear. There was no denying it.”

Clara didn’t know Alex Kerr well, but he always seemed to be in good humor, smiling or even laughing. But there was no joy in him now. He gripped the hilt of his sword so tightly she could see his knuckles whiten even at this distance. Did this have something to do with the rumors Father Simon had mentioned?

“She did not deny it?”

The ominous tone to his voice seemed to affect the merchant as well, for the poor man began to have difficulty forming his words.

“No. . . she. . . uh, no. She bragged of it.”

After staring at him a moment longer, Alex dismissed the man, who rushed ahead, likely glad to be leaving Brockburg Castle.

Returning to her, he spoke as if not realizing she was a virtual stranger.

“The merchant brings word of my long-lost English mother, who is still very much alive, it seems.”