Highland Shifter (MacCoinnich Time Travels #4)(3)
Author: Catherine Bybee

Kong offered a passing glance before returning to his meal.

Simon took to the sky.

Above the trees, Simon returned to the direction of battle. He noted the battlefield and Cian helping with the dead.

Simon let a falcon’s cry fill the air and saw Duncan and Cian both turn their heads his way.

Duncan nodded at him then continued with his duty as Cian waved a mock salute.

Leaving his family behind, Simon followed the trail the enemy left behind in search of answers.

Chapter Two

Without an invitation, Helen walked into her boss’s office of the Auction House and gently placed the book she’d found the day before on his desk. “Look what I found.”

She’d spent most of the previous night mulling over its pages and found herself more confused than ever by why her gift led her to this particular tome.

“What is it?” Philip lifted his dark eyes to hers briefly before glancing at the book in front of him.

Helen leaned a hip against the side of her boss’s desk and crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s about Scottish folklore.”

“Is it valuable?” He ran a hand over his firm, attractive jaw, the way he always did when intrigued. She had his attention.

“It might be.” Though she doubted it. “It’s what I found inside that has me puzzled.”

Philip Lyons, owner of The Auction House and Magazine, and her boss, encouraged her to follow her gut instincts when it came to finding valuable antiques. A couple of months before, two ornate candlesticks were brought into the auction house to be sold on commission. As the house photographer, and occasional buyer, Helen’s entire body sizzled with excitement when she encountered the twelfth century works of art. She knew there was more to the candlesticks than a common sale to a collector. Philip knew it too.

He opened the pages of the book with care and skimmed the words. “What am I looking for?”

Helen leaned in and scooted the book closer. She opened to the page of the Highland warrior and the lady who looked a whole hell of a lot like her.

Philip paused.

“Quick. What’s your first thought?” she asked him, not wanting him to filter his words.

He paused, and then said, “She looks like you.”

Not your first thought.

Helen wasn’t sure how she knew Philip held his first impression back, only that he did.

“What else do you notice?”

Philip ran his finger over the page, stopping at the pendant around the woman’s neck. “That’s your necklace.”

The necklace Helen wore even now. Philip’s gaze traveled to her neck. His eye twitched and a smile started to spread over his face. “How’s that possible?”

“I told you I had funny feelings about things.”

Philip reached out and touched the pendant. His cool fingers sent a tiny jolt over her skin and she shivered.

Philip leaned forward to examine the necklace. His proximity suddenly felt too personal, and Helen shifted back.

Letting his hand drift to the desk, Philip narrowed his eyes to hers. “Maybe I should appraise your necklace.”

“I’ve already checked. It’s not worth much of anything.” Besides, the thought of removing it and handing it to anyone actually left her ill.

Philip’s eyes skirted over the necklace and dipped lower. After a brief pause on her br**sts, they returned to the book.

Men and their wandering eyes.

Helen would have been offended if she hadn’t already detected a desire from her boss to get to know her better. Something she wouldn’t have minded exploring if he wasn’t in charge of her paycheck.

He was five years older than her, financially stable, and pleasing to the eye. His dark brown hair was military short and his jaw always clean-shaven. Though, if Helen had to guess, she’d swear he’d worn a beard at some point in his life. She constantly caught him stroking his chin and upper lip, a habit men with facial hair acquired. At six feet, he had five inches on her and though she’d seen him only in a suit and tie, she didn’t think he was a stranger to the gym.

…but he was her boss. That meant off limits as far as she was concerned.

“What do you think it all means, Helen?”

“I’m not sure, but I’m hoping you’ll give me a couple of days off to look into it.”

“A couple of days off? That’s all?”

Now came the tricky part. “A week, actually.”

Philip didn’t say a word, just continued to stare at her.

“…and a plane ticket to Scotland.”

* * * *

Twenty-two hours later, Helen finished unpacking her suitcase at a Holiday Inn outside of Dundee, Scotland and after renting a car, she started driving north. Where to, she hadn’t a clue.

Part of her couldn’t believe she was even here, another part, a nagging little itch, felt as if she was coming home. Which was stupid, because Helen had never had a home? The closest she’d ever come was Mrs. Webber’s foster care where she’d spent four years housed in a small room with three other girls. At seventeen, Helen emancipated herself from the system by running away and never looking back. Smart thing, too, the other girls she’d roomed with all ended up either pregnant, in jail, or strung out on some cheap drug. Not the sort of life Helen envisioned for herself.

Feeling at home in a country where she’d never been was as foreign as driving on the wrong side of the road. Even the gimped up car they’d loaned her didn’t have the controls in the right place.

Still, the strange sense of peace had washed over her the minute she’d walked off the airplane.

Philip had given her the time off and the ticket abroad. He’d have been stupid not to. The last time she asked for such a thing, she delivered the location of a stolen Vermeer.

While on assignment in a Boston museum, Helen photographed several pieces that were going to auction. When she scraped her hands along a wall, she’d felt a current of electricity similar to one she’d experienced when touching the book of Scottish folklore.

Apparently, a Vermeer had been heisted from the spot long ago. Helen called Philip and asked him to research the museum and tell her everything he could find out about the missing art. In addition to looking into the past theft, Philip flew to Boston and stood beside her as she followed her gift tracking the painting around the city. One week and hundreds of miles later, on an island off the Florida Keys, Helen led her boss to a collector who had the art in his possession.

The museum in Boston credited Philip’s Auction house for the retrieval of the art. As a result, his standing in the art community elevated to amazing heights. Philip attributed her gift, her ability to follow objects and find missing things, to intuition. There was a lot more to it than intuition. That she knew. But why was this path now leading her toward a missing boy?