Page 91 of The Blue Viking

His head jerked up at that unexpected admission. “Why would I do that?”

She shrugged. “Revenge.”

He cocked his head as he continued to study her. “You do not think much of me, do you?”

“Men have this thing about carrying on their line. I feared you would develop an instant attachment to your son, and be unable to separate yourself from him. Since you have made your opinions of Scotland clear on many an occasion, ’twas obvious you would not be staying here. So, really, any sane-minded woman would harbor the same fears.”

Sane-minded? Hah! Devious, seductive, secretive … yea. But sane-minded? I have my doubts. “Who else knows?”

“Well, I do not think the MacNabs ever knew for sure, though Kenneth probably discussed his suspicions with his brothers at one time or another. Certainly, they never made a connection with you.” She took a deep breath, then went on, “But on the Campbell estates, everyone knows.”

“Everyone?” he shouted.

“Well, forgive me for pointing this out, Rurik, but you and Jamie are identical in appearance, except for the difference in years. They could not help but note the similarity.”

“Your sarcasm knows no bounds, m’lady. Truly, you tug the wolf by the tail when you risk my wrath thus.” But her words remained imbedded in his brain. What a sightless fool he must be … not to have seen what everyone else did. Had they been snickering behind his back every time he passed by? Was he once more, as he’d been as a child, a pitiful subject for mockery?

“Rurik, I’ve told you that I’m sorry. You have to admit that I tried on several occasions to broach the subject. What else could I have done?”

“Thor’s Blood! You could have told me.”

She stared at him, chin raised with more bravado than she had a right to display. “What will you do now?”

He glowered at her, his chin raised also, unable to express his bone-melting fury. “I do not know,” he said, opening the door behind him. “I just know that I cannot bear to be in your presence now. You revolt me.”

She flinched, as if he’d struck her, and tears immediately welled in her green eyes, but he steeled himself not to care.

“One thing I do know,” he said in a scathing tone before he exited the chamber, “you will pay for this perfidy. You will pay.”

“I toi’ ye I had somethin’ important to tell ye,” Jamie said matter-of-factly as he plopped down on the ground beside Rurik.

So, the boy had known, too … or suspected. The situation got worse and worse. For the past hour, Rurik had been sitting at the edge of the loch, staring out over the nighttime waters, thinking … thinking … thinking. And not a solution in sight.

“Shouldn’t you be abed?” he asked the boy.

“Me mother sent me to find ye. She said ye might need me?”

Damn, but that witch was going to drive him barmy. Could she not leave him be till he’d settled his thoughts?

“Do ye?”

“Do I what?”

“Need me.”

Rurik’s shoulders slumped. How did he answer a question like that? “What I need is to be alone for a bit.”

“To settle yer temper?”

He shook his head at the boy, and tried to see him more clearly in the moonlight. Did he really resemble him? Was there a miniature version of himself walking the earth? Why did his heart swell with pride at such a prospect?

“Are ye gonna beat me mother?” the impudent lad inquired. “If that’s what’s on yer mind, I gotta tell ye … I won’t allow it.”

Rurik chuckled. The boy did have balls … even if they were small ones. “And how would you be stopping me?”

Jamie made some punching motions in the air. “I’d beat ye to a pulp with me bare hands, and kick ye in the shins, like I used to do with me fath… I mean, Kenneth … and put slugs in yer ale.”

A sadness swept over Rurik and squeezed at his heart that his son had witnessed his own mother’s abuse. Had he learned early on to dodge his fath … Kenneth’s fists, just as Rurik had developed survival skills as a child? If so, Rurik felt new anger boil up in him. He had always sworn that no child of his would go through what he had. ’Twould seem the choice had been taken from his hands.