Isabella, his lovely Isabella, who had been so brave and so stoic, these past few days. Not a tear had she shed, nor a word of complaint had she uttered. Not a mention of that perfect night they’d shared had she made. No regrets. No looking back. Only onward, forward, to the new life she would forge. A new life in a new world. A world he would not inhabit.

His gut clenched. He thought he might be sick. The breeze ruffled her hair. She dipped her head to make some adjustment to her reins, and he thought he caught a glimpse of tears. Though it might be the wind. His heart contracted. His stomach roiled. It took him a moment to recognise it for what it was. Fear. He was desperately afraid of losing her. He knew at that moment, knew despite all, that he could not let her go.

‘Isabella.’

She turned to face him. Tears. They were tears, but she forced a smile. ‘I’m fine. I will be fine. It is just— I will be fine,’ she said.

She was trying to reassure him. Hope did not spring, it burst forth like the first snowdrop of the year. A fragile shoot, but determinedly pushing itself towards the sun. He hadn’t allowed himself to consider how deeply her feelings for him ran; he had been too concerned with damping down his own, but if she cared even a fraction as much as he did...

‘Isabella...’

‘Finlay, don’t worry. I won’t let you down. I am—I am ready.’

She straightened in the saddle, determined to play the soldier she thought he expected, and it was his undoing. ‘Isabella, I love you so much. My own heart, I love you. I can’t let you go without me.’

* * *

She thought she had misheard him. She must have misheard him. She opened her mouth, but no words came. She could only stare stupidly.

‘Isabella.’

Finlay jumped down from his horse and pulled her from the saddle. These past few days, in their wild race across the mountains, his face had been set, his expression steadfastly distant. He had played the commanding officer, she had played the foot soldier, just as they had agreed. Now the light was back in his eyes. They were the colour of the sea below. Her heart, her poor about-to-be-broken heart, began to beat faster. She couldn’t possibly hope. There was no hope. None.

‘Isabella.’ He took her hands in his. The horses were untethered, she noticed, and then immediately lost interest. ‘Isabella.’ He shook his head, grinned, shook his head, frowned. ‘I’ve never said the word before.’

Say it again, she prayed, but said nothing, in case her prayers were misguided.

‘Never. I don’t know if I should... It’s—it’s likely all wrong, only— Ach, what a blithering eejit I am. I love you. I love you with all my heart, and no amount of telling myself all these other things matter more makes a whit of difference. I love you, lass, and I don’t want to have to live without you. I don’t know what that means. I can’t make any promises, I can’t even...’

‘I don’t care!’ Isabella threw her arms around him. ‘I don’t care what or how or if. All I care about is that I love you, and if you love me, too— Do you? Do you truly love me?’

Finlay laughed. ‘Could you ever have doubted it?’

‘Yes! You never once...’

‘I could not. And you...’

‘I could not. Oh, Finlay, how could I tell you that I loved you, how could I ask you to come with me, when it would mean you giving up everything that is important to you?’

‘You are everything. You are the only thing that is, or ever will be, important to me.’

‘But your family. The army. You will be court-martialled.’ Cold reality hit her. She dragged herself free of his embrace. ‘Finlay, I love you so much. Too much. I could not do this to you, put your life in danger, ask you to...’

‘You haven’t asked me,’ Finlay said gently, pulling her back into his arms. ‘I’m offering. I don’t have much, or I won’t, not if—when—I leave with you, but without you, I have nothing. I don’t know what kind of life we’ll make, lass, but I’m asking you for the chance to build it together. Will you give me that chance?’

She wanted to. Her heart cried out yes, but her head...her head needed some convincing yet, it seemed. ‘You said it yourself, Finlay, you’re not a man to run away. You have a duty to go back, even if it is only to resign. You cannot blight your honour with the shame of desertion, and you cannot take the risk of them catching you, for you will be hanged.’

‘I will not lie to you, I would wish it otherwise. I would wish that we could both go to England together, that I could put a clean and honourable end to my career, but I can’t. There are some sacrifices worth making. I love you. My duty is to my heart now, and not my country.’

She swallowed the lump in her throat that his words, his beautiful, heartfelt words caused. ‘But your family?’

Now he did flinch. She sensed true pain there, but still he shook his head. ‘I will be sacrificing no more than you, my love. We will make a new family together. If you’ll have me. It won’t be easy. It won’t be painless. We’ll miss what we’ve lost, but we won’t have lost the most important thing of all.’

‘Each other?’

‘Each other.’

She could resist no longer. The future, which had seemed like a huge, black abyss, now spread golden before her, not perfect, not rosy or easy, but one redolent with promise. ‘I love you, Finlay Urquhart, with all my heart.’

‘And I love you, Isabella Romero, with every fragment of mine.’



Epilogue

Oban, Argyll—six months later

The fishing village of Oban reminded Jack Trestain a little of San Sebastian. Funny how things sometimes came full circle. The same horseshoe bay, the island a short distance offshore, the sheltering haven of the harbour, the cluster of white houses lining the front. Admittedly the gently bobbing fishing boats were shallower, longer, the sky was a paler blue and it was significantly colder, but all the same...

Had the similarity struck Finlay when he had sailed for Lisbon with his Isabella all those months ago? He had not mentioned it in his letter, but then he’d had rather more important matters to occupy him. Such as how to arrange his death, along with the death of El Fantasma.

Jack smiled wryly to himself. Who would have thought that the partisan Finlay had encountered all those years ago would turn out to be a blue-blooded Spanish lady? And who would have imagined that the blue-blooded Spanish lady would turn out to be one of Spain’s most wanted rebel partisans? ‘No one, and it’s just as well,’ he said to himself as he stepped out of the fishing boat that had carried him here, after agreeing a time for his return journey with the captain, for his visit was a fleeting one with a sole but crucial purpose.

Jack sat on the edge of the harbour wall to garner his thoughts. It had been Celeste’s idea that he come here in person. ‘For you cannot write such things in a letter, mon amour,’ she had said. It was true. What he had to say was far too politically sensitive to commit to paper, but that wasn’t what his lovely wife-to-be had meant. Finlay’s family had already received one tragic letter out of the blue, posing more questions than answers, something Celeste was only too familiar with. On this occasion, he would be there in person to answer all their questions, ease their concerns. This time, they would get the truth. Or as much of it as was prudent to furnish them with.

Finlay’s missive had come to him via heaven knew what circuitous route, but by some miracle it had not, to Jack’s very experienced eyes, been tampered with. Short and pithy, it had been shocking, but it had also made Jack smile. Clearly, Finlay was head over ears in love with his partisan, though he had naturally said no such thing. Love, as Jack had recently learned, was capable of making a man do all sorts of rash and mad things. Such as ask his best friend to fake his death. You’re a master strategist, Finlay had written. I rely on you to give me a suitably fitting end.

Well, he’d managed that, all right. The fate that had met the brave Major Urquhart in the remote, rocky mountains of Spain, was deemed heroic when reported in the British press. There had been no overt mention of El Fantasma, of course, but there had been sufficient hints to entice the Spanish chaps to ask the English chaps for more background, and the top-secret information they’d received had convinced them. El Fantasma was dead, and Major Urquhart had died, presumably at the hands of the cut-throat partisan’s accomplices, but not before successfully completing his mission. The Romero family were safe from prosecution, just as Finlay had insisted. More important, Wellington had fallen for the story, relieved that a potentially awkward political scandal had been avoided, and had even been persuaded to grant Finlay a posthumous honour.

Jack looked at the medal now, sitting in its leather case. Finlay wouldn’t be interested in it, but his father would, and Jack was pretty sure that Mr and Mrs Urquhart would be able to put their son’s military pension to good use. It had taken a good deal of strong-arming to secure that pension. Jack had to make an effort to unfurl his fist, thinking about that. It shouldn’t have proved so difficult.

He patted his coat pocket, though there was no need. The paper with Finlay’s new name and whereabouts in America was safely tucked away there, along with the letter from the bank with the arrangement for payment of the monies due each quarter. It was a risk, telling these strangers that their son was alive, but one Jack was certain to be worth taking. Secrets and lies, he had learned from his lovely Celeste, could tear a family asunder. Finlay’s family might never see him again, but their love for him would reach across the oceans that separated them in the letters they could write, and one day, perhaps, Finlay and Isabella’s children would be able to visit their father’s Highland homeland. That was a thought to warm the heart.