Highlander Wanted: A Scottish Time Travel Romance

Book 15: Highlander in Time

by Rebecca Preston

Genres: Ancient World Romance; Scottish & Highlander

Synopsis

When Lissa is thrust back in time to ancient Scotland near the MacClaren Keep, she must take on a new role while watching the man she’s destined for risk his life and their potential future…

Child welfare worker Lissa’s trip to Scotland was supposed to help her decompress after handling a traumatic case. Instead, she finds herself tumbling back in time to ancient Scotland where she’s confronted with the strange reality of the time-lost women in MacClaren Keep.

Warrior Cameron MacClaren has his hands full as a widower single father to four-year-old twin girls. He doesn’t have time to assist his clan with their bandit problem. But when he finally reluctantly returns home, he finds an even bigger complication—Lissa, the reincarnation of his beloved wife and the woman his children believe is their mother come back to them.

Confronted with an uncomfortable reality, Lissa steps into her role as Cameron’s “wife” and the mother to his girls who can’t grasp the truth that she is from the future. Rather than cause the children any further pain, she goes along with it, but the attraction she feels toward Cam makes things even more difficult for her.

When Cam must use his skills to confront the bandits threatening the clan, he leaves Lissa in a position where she may lose the love of her life before she even has a chance to truly enjoy finding him.

Highlander Wanted is the fifteenth book in the Highlander of Time series, perfect for fans of brooding heroes, intrepid heroines, and page-turning time-travel romance. Grab your copy today, and enter the exciting world of Highlander of Time!

 

Read more

Release date: April 4, 2024

Print pages: 201

Sample

CHAPTER 1

 

“Lissa? I’d like a word when you’ve got a moment.”

Lissa Orwell felt dread pool in her stomach. There were only a few reasons her boss would be using that gentle and sweet tone of voice… and none of them boded especially well for her. She glanced over her shoulder to see the petite woman standing in the doorway of her office. What was it about Gina that made her seem to take up twice as much space as her tiny frame ought to require?

It probably wasn’t Gina’s fault, Lissa reflected, grimacing down at her desk for a moment before turning to give Gina a nod and a little wave of acknowledgment. Lissa wasn’t usually so intimidated by her boss. Of course, Lissa didn’t usually burst into tears at her desk at the drop of a hat either, but that had happened this morning. And there was no way that particular little outburst wasn’t connected with this quiet, gentle request for a chat.

At least she knew her job performance wasn’t the problem. Gina used a very different tone when someone had screwed something up, slacked off or been negligent. She was a gentle woman, and as kind as anyone Lissa had ever met… but in their work, there was absolutely no room for laziness, and she could turn to steel in a heartbeat if necessary. Lissa was grateful never to have been on the receiving end of that particular Gina — she cared about her work too much, and Gina knew that.

But she had a feeling she wasn’t going to like the outcome of this little chat, either.

Alright, she thought. Gina didn’t want her right away — she could take a minute. Grabbing her handbag, she headed for the bathroom, trying not to let the lingering dread show on her face as she walked past her colleagues. She caught a few sidelong glances, but it wasn’t as though the whole office was whispering… then again, it wasn’t like anyone had time to spare for office gossip. Not in a chronically overworked, underfunded field like child welfare, where every wasted moment could have been used to transform a life… or save one.

There was ice in her veins all of a sudden, shocking her enough that she almost stumbled on her way to the bathroom. How many moments had she wasted? What if she’d done something differently? Gotten to the case earlier? Dug deeper in her conversations, caught something, some sign, some indicator that something was even more wrong than—

“It’s not your fault,” she whispered fiercely, trying to interrupt the thought spiral she could feel taking hold of her. To her dismay, Lissa could feel tears prickling at the backs of her eyelids again… something that only made more panic pool in her belly, which in turn seemed to trigger more tears. She all but slammed the bathroom door open, grateful that there was nobody else in there for the time being and hastened to the sink to splash cold water onto her face. “I did everything I could; I did everything I could; I did everything I could…”

Whispering mantras aloud had always felt a little silly to Lissa, but she’d seen too much hard evidence of their efficacy to turn her nose up at a tactic that might help her. Even the act of speaking aloud seemed to be soothing her — as she dabbed her face dry with a paper towel, she could already feel the panic beginning to ease, the icy chokehold on her heart reducing. Her shoulders rose and fell rhythmically as she drew deep, slow breaths into her lungs. She was okay; she was okay; she was okay… she just needed to get herself under control enough to get through this meeting with Gina.

Did she look like she’d been crying? Lissa lowered the paper towel and looked her reflection in the eye. Was her face a little puffy? Her dark brown eyes were a little red-rimmed, and she had a suspicion that Gina wasn’t going to believe her if she said it was allergies… not in Chicago in winter, and not when she’d never mentioned having allergies before today. Grimacing, she wet the paper towel under the faucet and pressed the damp paper to each eye in turn, hoping to bring the puffiness down at least a little.

Her sister would know what to do about this. Katerina had always been one of those glamorous girls who could basically shapeshift given a makeup bag and a few minutes by a mirror… there was almost certainly some kind of color-correcting eyeshadow or something that would make Lissa look like she’d never had a care in the world… but Katerina wasn’t here, was she? She was in Florida, partying on a yacht or modeling or something. Lissa had never quite understood her younger sister’s career as a social media influencer — what did that even mean? — but she knew enough to know Kat was killing it.

She wished she could call her. Kat always knew how to cheer her up… but Gina would be waiting, and she didn’t want to make it seem like she was freaking out too much about this conversation. She gave herself another quick once-over in the mirror, ran her fingers through her wavy brown hair, murmured one last supportive affirmation that she wished she could believe … then steeled herself and headed for the belly of the beast.

The belly of the beast involved cookies, but that didn’t make it any less the belly of the beast.

“Please, help yourself,” Gina urged, gesturing at the delightful little basket that was set up on the table by the couch in her office. “Gary keeps telling me he’s cracked the code, whatever that means.”

“Love that man,” Lissa said with a grin, leaning forward to take one of the chocolate chip cookies from the basket. Gina’s husband was a legend around the office — he’d been a professional pastry chef before he’d retired, but he hadn’t left his passion for sweets behind. The running joke around the office that it was actually Gary who was the power behind Gina’s impeccable track record with troubled kids — his baked goods could melt even the toughest and most rebellious teenager. It was a cliché to say that the secret ingredient was love, but as Lissa took a bite of the deliciously soft, perfectly sweet, unbelievably rich cookie, she knew there could be no other explanation. “God, Gina. How are you not the size of a house with this man in your life?”

Gina chuckled. “Running five miles a day helps. Eight during the holidays.”

“Marathon fuel, of course.” Lissa took another nibble of the cookie, hoping the chocolate would give her strength. “I’m gonna join you one of these years, I swear.”

“We’re ten months out from next year’s Chicago Marathon,” Gina said, flashing her a smile as she came to sit beside her on the couch. “It’d be tight, but you could do it.”

Lissa had known Gina long enough not to fall for the small talk gambit. She might have seemed casual, but Lissa had seen her with enough clients to know exactly what she was doing right now. Sizing her up, observing her body language, trying to get a gauge on how she was feeling before they switched into ‘official therapy’ mode. Not that she was here for therapy, she reminded herself firmly. She was here for a conversation with her supervisor about her work performance, not to dig into her traumas. She had her own therapist for that.

“You obviously know why I wanted to have this talk,” Gina said softly, her pale blue eyes intent as she studied her, and Lissa exhaled as she realized she’d fallen right into Gina’s trap despite all her self-awareness. “And of course, you know you’re not in trouble.”

“Helps to hear it anyway,” Lissa said, flashing her a little smile. “I’m sorry, Gina. I know I’ve been… a little fragile lately.”

“There’s no need to apologize to me, Lissa,” Gina said, and just like that, Lissa felt like she was on the verge of crying again. She leaned on every trick in her book — slowed her breathing, pulled her lips into a smile, blinked her eyes a few times — but it was too late. A tear spilled over and ran down her cheek, and she exhaled shakily, frustration mingling with sadness.

“Damnit, again?”

Gina chuckled softly, touched her gently on her upper arm and nodded toward the nearest box of tissues — they were never far out of reach in this office.

“You’re a mental health professional, not to mention one of the most talented young women I have the pleasure to work with. You don’t need me to tell you that you’ve been through a substantial trauma this month, Lissa. What happened would have devastated anybody.”

“I know. I know, but I should have — I should have better professional boundaries in place, I should—”

“I don’t think so,” Gina said, cutting effortlessly across her. “I know you, Lissa, and I was keeping a very close eye on this case. I don’t think your conduct was ever anything less than professional, and while I can’t speak to your inner life, I didn’t observe any signs that you were growing inappropriately invested in the outcomes.”

“That’s — that’s incredibly good to hear,” Lissa whispered, feeling another tear roll down her cheek and dabbing it away with a tissue. So much for keeping her cool. She should’ve known better than to hope she could go up against Gina and get away unscathed. “Thank you.”

“It’s this job, Lissa. No matter how ironclad our self-care is, no matter how firm our personal and professional boundaries, no matter how much work we do to keep ourselves invested but separate… sometimes, you just get an absolute bear of a case. Sometimes, it’s beyond our control.” Gina’s steady gaze was almost hypnotic. “You did incredible work for those kids, Lissa. You got them out of an entrenched, long-term generational abuse situation. You showed them that there are good people in the world. You broke an intergenerational abuse cycle, and you gave four kids a chance at a better life.”

Gina exhaled. “But what happened later … that was a tragedy.”

 

 

CHAPTER 2

 

Lissa nodded, resisting the urge to flinch away from the subject that had been haunting her every waking minute of the last two weeks… not to mention her dreams. After months of groundwork and investigation, including some surveillance work with the Chicago PD, their department had managed to remove four children from a severely abusive home. The kids were all aged between four and sixteen, showing clear signs of abuse and neglect, but Lissa and the other child welfare professionals who had assessed them were cautiously optimistic about their chances of recovering and healing outside of that environment, given the right support. And then…

Nobody was sure how it had happened, but three nights after they’d been removed from their situation, the eldest child had disappeared. After a panicked twenty-four hours spent searching the city for the boy, their worst fears were confirmed when his body was discovered by some train tracks. He’d been struck and killed on impact… and though Lissa had held out hope that it had been a tragic accident, it hadn’t been long before his younger sister had come forward with a text message he’d sent to her and to their parents, saying goodbye. The death had been ruled a suicide.

This wasn’t a cheerful field to work in at the best of times. Lissa knew that, had known that ever since she was young, ever since she’d known that what she wanted to do with her life was to stand up for children, to help and protect the most vulnerable members of society. Like everyone she worked with, she was no stranger to the tragedy of youth suicide, to the consequences of trauma, abuse, and mental illness. But there was something about this particular case that had stuck with her. It was natural to grieve, normal to feel some level of responsibility when such an awful outcome befell a client you were trying to help. As was standard in these kinds of situations, Lissa had taken a few days off work after the incident to process and heal from it, trusting her colleagues to handle the fallout and be there for the boy’s family.

But it hadn’t been enough. On her return to work she’d hoped to resume her duties as normal, to set the grief and sadness aside and to move on with her work… but it was taking her longer than usual to bounce back. It had been two weeks since she’d returned, and she was growing increasingly aware that she wasn’t at her best. She was hazy, distracted, making careless mistakes — just this week, she’d been late for work on Monday because she’d gotten confused about what day it was and set her alarm wrong the night before. And the more she told herself to get it together already, the worse she got.

They’d talked it through before, of course, her and Gina. She trusted her boss more than anyone in the world. Gina had been in this field for forty years. You name it, she’d seen it. She was no stranger to trauma, no stranger to the after-effects of tragedies like this one… and Lissa knew that Gina could tell she wasn’t coping.

“You know how much I admire your work, Lissa,” Gina said softly. “You are a brilliant young woman who is an asset to this department. But you and I both know that you’re struggling at the moment.”

Lissa’s heart sank into her chest. “You’re right,” she said, shrugging her shoulders helplessly. What else could she say? No, I’m doing great, it’s totally normal for me to burst into tears at my desk at ten in the morning for literally no reason? She wasn’t going to insult Gina by trying to mislead her. “I just… I just can’t shake the feeling that I should be able to handle this. It’s not like it’s the first time something so awful has happened.”

Gina shook her head. “It doesn’t need to be the first time, or the worst tragedy, or the most traumatic experience. You know trauma doesn’t follow those rules.”

Lissa nodded reluctantly.

“You need to take some time, Lissa. There’s no shame in it. We all do it sooner or later. I took a whole year, once. It was what I needed. We can’t help others at our own expense.”

“A year?” Lissa was horrified.

But Gina shook her head quickly. “I’m not saying you need that long. And I’m also not going to force the issue. This isn’t an official recommendation, or an order. It won’t go on your file, or factor into your performance history here in any way. I’m simply suggesting, as a mentor, a colleague — and, I hope, a friend — that you take some time for yourself. Six weeks or so.”

Lissa took a deep breath, feeling more tears spill from her eyes — these ones motivated more by gratitude than anything. She hadn’t realized how badly she’d needed to hear someone say those words. “That — that makes so much sense.” She uttered a hoarse little laugh, surprising herself. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

“What are we here for, if not to help each other realize the obvious?” Gina smiled.

Lissa fought the rather unprofessional urge to throw her arms around her and give her a bear hug. They’d never hugged — Lissa was a little worried the slender woman might break like a twig if she tried it.

“Thank you,” she whispered, dashing the tears away from her eyes and mustering a smile that felt a lot less forced than her last one. “You’re right, like always, of course, I’ll… I’ll take some time off. I’ve got plenty of leave saved—”

“Don’t use your personal leave,” Gina said sharply, switching seamlessly into administration mode. “This old dog knows a few tricks — I can organize some paid leave that won’t cut into your vacation days. This isn’t a vacation; this is a mental health intervention.”

Lissa nodded, fighting the urge to laugh. If there was one thing Gina loved, it was administrative puzzle-solving. She took to the complex web of HR guidelines with the same enthusiasm she took to the paper’s cryptic crossword every morning. “What am I going to do with myself for six weeks? I’m already seeing my therapist twice a week.”

“Good,” Gina said firmly. “I’m surprised she hasn’t suggested taking some time.”

“Oh, she has.” Lissa realized, too late, that she’d been caught in Gina’s trap.

The woman grinned at her. “Let me guess — you knew she was going to suggest it, so you ignored the suggestion.”

“Something like that.” She rubbed her forehead. “She thinks I should go on a trip. Go somewhere I’ve never been, clear my head.”

“And what do you think?”

“I think it would look a bit suspect to take medical leave and then go on a holiday.”

“Lissa, if your therapist made the suggestion, and your supervisor supported it, how could it possibly look suspect?” Gina raised an eyebrow. “I’ll sign a medical letter from her to that effect if it would put your mind at ease. A trip away sounds like an excellent idea. Somewhere warm, perhaps.”

“I was actually thinking of Scotland.” Lissa bit her lip, feeling a little unsure about whether she should be discussing holiday plans with Gina — but her boss had asked, hadn’t she?

Gina’s eyebrows lifted. “Scotland! Well, it won’t be warm, but it will be beautiful. Orwell’s a Scottish name, isn’t it? Do you have family over there?”

“Not that I know of.” Lissa shrugged. “I’ve just always wanted to go. Too much Harry Potter as a kid, maybe.”

Gina chuckled. “Well, I think it sounds like a wonderful idea, and if you have your therapist’s support, you have mine.”

Why on Earth had she been dreading this conversation? Lissa shook her head, her gaze downcast, then looked up to meet Gina’s curious eyes again. “I’m really not in a good state,” she admitted, shaking her head. “I was actually — really scared to come in here, to talk to you.”

“I know,” Gina said softly, reaching out to touch her arm again, just lightly. “I could tell. If you’ll forgive the phrasing — what were the thought patterns?”

Lissa smiled a little at the boilerplate question. “I was worried you were going to tell me off. Fire me, tell me I hadn’t done enough for the family, that I’d missed something…” Tears sprang to her eyes again, and she exhaled shakily. “Yep, there it is. I was frightened you were going to tell me it was my fault that the boy died.”

“And —"

“Irrational, of course. I did everything I could — and even if I hadn’t, there were dozens of people involved with that case who’d have picked up on anything I missed.”

“We don’t work alone,” Gina said simply. “We’ve got your back, Lissa Orwell. You did incredibly important work for that family. Those children have a future now that they never could have dreamed of. They’re going to heal because of you. And now you need to take some time to heal yourself, too.”