Read Chapter 23: The Double Game

The alley behind Donal MacAllister’s Edinburgh office stank of coal smoke and fish guts. Iona pressed her spine against the damp stone wall, the hood of her borrowed cloak pulled low, and watched Gregor work the lock with a thin blade he’d produced from his boot. His hands were steady, unhurried, as if he broke into merchants’ offices every night of his life.

“You’ve done this before,” she whispered.

“Often enough.” The lock gave with a soft click. Gregor glanced over his shoulder, a half-smile ghosting across his face. “My brother taught me. Before Donal had him killed.”

Iona’s stomach knotted. She had heard that name too many times tonight already. Donal. Donal. Donal. The merchant who financed the raid that started her clan’s ruin. The man who had her mother murdered to keep her quiet. The uncle who had killed Gregor’s father. All roads led to him, and tonight she meant to burn the map.

Gregor eased the door open, and they slipped inside.

The office was dark, lit only by the faint glow of street lamps through shuttered windows. A clerk’s desk sat near the front, neat stacks of paper arranged with cruel precision. Behind it, a heavy oak door. Gregor moved toward it without hesitation, and Iona followed, her boots silent on the floorboards.

“He keeps the real ledgers in a false bottom drawer in his desk,” Gregor said, his voice low. “The ones he shows the tax men are out front. These are for his own records.”

“You know a great deal about his habits.”

Gregor paused at the oak door, his hand flat against the wood. “I watched him for two years before I approached you. I know where he sleeps, what he eats, who he pays. I know he keeps a mistress in Leith and a son he’s never acknowledged. And I know that every coin he’s made has come from the ruin of Highland families like yours and mine.” He pushed the door open. “I intend to take it all from him.”

The inner office was smaller than she’d expected, dominated by a vast mahogany desk piled with papers. A single candle sat in a brass holder, and Gregor lit it with a flint, casting long shadows across the walls. The room smelled of cigar smoke and leather.

Iona went to the desk while Gregor pressed a panel at its side. There was a click, and a drawer slid out from beneath the false bottom—so smoothly that Iona’s breath caught.

“He’s arrogant,” Gregor said, lifting the ledger from its hiding place. “Thinks no one would dare.”

He handed it to her, and Iona opened the leather cover. The pages were filled with neat, cramped handwriting—dates, amounts, names. Her finger traced a line: *The Glenfinnen Herd—sixty head, sold to Campbell by way of MacTavish, 12 April.* The raid. The raid her father had been forced to stage. Proof, in Donal’s own hand, that he had orchestrated it all.

She turned the page, scanning further. More entries. More names. Estates she didn’t recognize—Corrieburn, Tallawood, Dunnock. All sold. All swallowed up by Donal’s growing empire.

“He’s not just taking our land,” Iona said slowly. “He’s been buying up half of the Highlands, one clan at a time.”

Gregor came to stand behind her, his shoulder brushing hers. “Look at the last page.”

She turned it, and her breath stopped.

*A draft of a letter, addressed to one Lord Ashworth, London, for the sum of £20,000, in return for his sponsorship of the Highland purchases and his assistance in the matter of the MacAllister claim.*

Iona’s finger pressed against the name. “Ashworth.”

“A lord in London,” Gregor said. “Donal doesn’t have enough coin of his own to buy half the countryside. Ashworth provides the backing. In return, Donal funnels titles and land deeds south, so Ashworth can sell them to English gentlemen who fancy themselves Scottish lairds.”

“That’s the whole game.” Iona looked up at him, the candle’s flame reflected in her eyes. “It was never just the MacTavish land. It’s all of it. He’s dismantling the clans one by one, with London money behind him.”

Gregor nodded slowly. “If this ledger ever saw daylight, Donal would be ruined. Ashworth would withdraw his backing—he can’t afford to be linked to outright fraud. Donal’s creditors would tear him apart.”

“Then we need to make sure it sees daylight.” Iona closed the ledger and pressed it to her chest. “My father’s confession is lost, but this is better. This names the man who paid for it all.”

A sound from the front of the office froze them both.

Gregor’s hand went to the knife at his belt. Iona’s heart slammed against her ribs. The candle flickered.

“Quiet,” Gregor breathed, but the word was barely audible over the sudden rush of blood in Iona’s ears.

Footsteps. Two sets, heavy, moving through the front room. A man’s low voice, too muffled to make out. Another answered, and then a laugh.

Gregor moved to the door, pressing his eye to the gap in the hinges. When he drew back, his face was grim. “They’re checking the front desk. They’ll be through that door in another minute.”

Iona looked down at the ledger in her hands, then at the window on the far wall. It was shuttered, but small—perhaps wide enough to squeeze through. “We go out the window.”

“It drops into a yard,” Gregor said. “Stone wall on the far side. We can climb it if we move fast.”

He crossed the room and lifted the sash. The shutter swung outward with a groan, and cold night air rushed in. Gregor gestured for her to go first.

Iona tucked the ledger into her cloak and pressed herself through the gap. Her feet hit packed earth, and she stumbled, catching herself against the stone wall before she could fall. Above her, Gregor followed, more agile, landing silent.

She heard the office door open behind them, heard a man bark a startled curse.

“Run,” Gregor said.

They sprinted across the yard. Iona’s skirts snagged on a low bush, and she tore free, not slowing. Gregor reached the wall first, cupping his hands for her foot. She stepped up, hauled herself over the top, and dropped into the alley on the far side.

A shout behind them. The yard gate slammed open.

Gregor landed beside her, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her down the alley. Their boots rang on the cobblestones. Iona’s lungs burned, but she held the ledger tight against her chest, a promise she would not break.

They burst onto the main street, where gas lamps cast pools of light. A few late-night drinkers stumbled past, oblivious. Gregor slowed to a walk, dragging Iona with him into the shadow of a closed shopfront.

“Stay calm,” he breathed. “They won’t expect us to stay on the street.”

She nodded, breathless, and risked a look back. Two figures stood silhouetted at the mouth of the alley, heads turning, searching. After a long moment, they peeled off in the opposite direction.

Gregor exhaled. “That was close.”

Iona’s fingers curled around the ledger’s cracked leather. “Worth it.”

A voice came from the darkness ahead—low, amused, familiar. “I should think so.”

Iona froze. A man stepped into the lamplight, tall and broad-shouldered, his face half in shadow.

Lachlan.

He wore travel-stained clothes, his hair wild from a long ride, and his eyes were locked on her with a look she couldn’t read. Behind him, at the mouth of the street, stood a rail-thin man in a clerk’s coat, watching her with sharp, knowing eyes.

“Iona,” Lachlan said, his voice rough. “I came to Edinburgh to find you. And it seems I’m not the only one looking for trouble tonight.”

Iona’s grip on the ledger tightened. “How did you find me?”

“I didn’t.” He nodded toward the thin man. “But he did. He says he’s the one who left the note at the inn.”

Iona’s gaze snapped to the stranger, who dipped his head in a small bow.

“I served your mother once, Miss MacTavish,” he said, his accent soft, Edinburgh-born. “Before she died. I thought you should know the truth of it.”

The ledger suddenly felt heavier in Iona’s hands.