The Highlander's Promise

We Found Him

We found a small park area and sat on a bench waiting to see if the person babysitting the child would actually show up. I yawned and hunkered down on the bench wishing I brought a book with me to keep myself occupied.

“How well do you know my brother?” I blinked and stared at Sullivan, that was from out of left field. I sighed and stuffed my hands in my pockets. I didn’t want to talk about it.

“Apparently, I don’t know him as well as I thought I did. I haven’t been in Scotland for even a year so it kind of just happened quickly. But it wasn’t just him there was Alexei too.” His eyebrows shot up into his hairline and thought he was going to start lecturing me.

“Really? Alexei? Huh now that one is a surprise, he always struck me as a real prude.” It was my turn to stare at him in shock. He caught the look on my face and started laughing at me.

“I have known him for a long time and he always seemed like the type that would be more into men than girls or not into anything. He was always so cold and calculating. I guess he has changed a lot since I have been away.” He was looking across the street at a man and woman with a small child, I doubt they were the people we were looking for though.

“Alexei was a prude? If anything, I thought it was your brother that was kind of a prude.” He snickered again and elbowed me lightly and nodded towards a kid running ahead of a man that was busy talking on his cellphone.

“Well, I can’t argue with you on that one. Gregor is kind of a prude and apparently a jackass too.” I grunted in agreement as the little boy that was running tripped and started crying. The man looked up at the kid and went back to talking on the phone. The couple with the other child came over to see if the little boy was ok.

“Wonder if that is the kid?” The boy was still crying and now the father of the other child was glaring angrily at the man who was ignoring everything going on around him.

“You there, your kid fell down, are you not going to see if he is alright?” It was like watching a bad soap opera unfold before our eyes, we both sat still in the cold air watching to see what the cellphone guy would do.

“The brat isn’t mine, I kind of hope he busts his head open.” I frowned as I looked at the crying child, he was dirty and looked skinny. The father was stomping towards the cellphone man and I was reaching for my phone.

“I don’t care if he isn’t your child, what kind of monster would do this to a child?” Cellphone man scowled and then hit end on his call.

“What are you doing Anna?” Sullivan was trying to stop me but I was fuming mad, I don’t care if this child was Mack’s or not, that kid was not going home with the douche on the phone. I looked toward the mother who was trying to comfort the small boy.

“Excuse me, is there a children’s service that you can call?” I looked at the mother and she nodded and dug out her cellphone. I knelt down by the boy and he had soft brown eyes that were rimmed in red. He sniffled and I saw that there was a scrape on his hands and knee.

“What is your name?” I took out some hand sanitizer and a handkerchief in my bag, “This is going to sting I’m sorry. But it will help clean out some of the dirt in your wound alright?” The boy nodded and sniffled again.

I squirted some hand sanitizer on the rag and then gently used it to wipe away the grit and dirt that was on the boy’s hands, he whimpered in pain as the two men started getting louder in their argument. The mother came over to me and she was digging around in her bag and found a box of band-aids. I looked at the box and she gave a slight chuckle.

“Between my husband and my kid, well it pays to keep them on hand. Now ducky what is your name?” The boy was crying as I put the bandages on his scraped palms. I went to work on the scraped knee, I glanced up to see Sullivan trying to break up the fight between the two men.

“Caleb Mackenzie.” The boy whimpered again and the breath left me in a huge exhale, the kid was the one we were looking for. I was hoping that Claire really was keeping secrets from Mack but the kid even had his last name. I wasn’t sure if the kid really was his flesh and blood, a name was just that, a name, nothing more. It was the DNA that would prove the claims.

It was fifteen minutes later when a cop pulled up and a woman in an ill-fitting suit got out of another car, a cellphone man was trying to run away when he saw the police but Sullivan and the woman’s husband stopped him from running.

The cop was saying something to the men and another was talking to the woman and I while the children’s services lady was talking softly to Caleb. I shook my head and tried to pay attention to what they were all saying but I was in shock and couldn’t wrap my brain around the fact that this might be Mack’s kid.

“Ma’am we are going to need your information and have you come down to the police station to make a statement.” I nodded and the officer handed a card to me, the woman came over to us with the child and she thanked the other woman for calling.

“This poor child looks like he has been neglected. Does anyone know about his mother?” I shook my head; I couldn’t assume and I did not want to assume. The woman shrugged and worried at her nails.

“My mother is in Scotland with my father, she left me here and couldn’t take me.” It felt like someone kicked me in the stomach again and I started feeling light-headed. The mother stared at me in concern and both women were trying to get my attention.

Sullivan was wrapping his arms around me and I leaned heavily against him as he explained to the onlookers that I had just gotten out of the hospital, the cops said they would give us a ride back to the hotel and I accepted it gratefully. We rode in silence and I followed Sullivan back to our room.

He sat me down and then proceeded to grab some water for me. I took it with shaky hands and sipped the lukewarm water and trying not to throw up after what I found out. My phone was ringing and it sounded like it was a million miles away. So many secrets were uncovered and this poor kid seemed to be at the center of it.

“You ok Anna? I know what the kid said, but we still don’t know if that kid is actually my brother’s child. He doesn’t look like him, and I wouldn’t put it past Claire to pull something like this though.” I felt Sullivan grab my hands and squeeze them gently. I know he was trying to be optimistic about it, but what happens if that shrew really did have Mack’s kid. Was he lost to me forever?