Page 53 of Claiming His Scottish Duchess
One evening at dinner, a shadow fell over Lydia’s small face. She pushed her food around her plate, unable to eat her venison.
“Lydia? Why aren’t you eating?” Richard asked.
Lydia looked up at him, her eyes brimming with tears as she brought her napkin up to dab them.
“Sad,” she whispered to him, her voice barely audible.
“Sad?” Richard asked, his tone more bewildered than comforting. “Why are you sad?”
“Miss Papa,” Lydia mumbled, her lower lip trembling. “And Mama.”
Richard sighed, a pragmatic frown creasing his brow. He knew he was ill-equipped for such things, but something about the girl’s confiding in him pulled at him.
I must say something.
“Well, there’s no point in dwelling on things that cannot be changed,” he said, a vain attempt to put distance between the present and the past. “You need to trudge forward and onward.”
No sooner had the words escaped his lips, he realized his attempt at comfort fell woefully short. His words were meant to be helpful, but they registered as cold and dismissive.
Catriona’s eyes flashed with anger as she set down her utensils.
“How can ye say such a thin’, Yer Grace? She has lost both her parents! Of course, she is sad. It is perfectly natural for her to grieve,” she said as she narrowed her eyes on him.
“One must not be consumed by grief,” Richard retorted sharply. “She needs to learn to move on if she wishes to do well in this world of ours.”
“Move on?” Catriona’s voice rose higher, her own pain rising to meet Lydia’s. “She is a bairn! She needs understanding and compassion, nae cold pronouncements!” Her control snapped. “Ye speak of loss as though she’s lost her favorite ribbon, nae someone she loved! Even I, who am much older than her, find meself yearnin’ for me faither. She has every right to grieve.”
“She needs to be strong,” he persisted.
“Strong? Ye think strength comes from pushing yer feelings away?” she scoffed, “Watching yer faither and maither die before yer eyes isnae something ye can push away, Yer Grace! Because I willneverforget me faither’s body bein’ dragged from the water!”
He knew that the late Lord Craigleith had died, but the circumstances had never been shared. He took in the words with a forced gulp.
“You saw—” he began to ask, but Catriona had already risen.
“Excuse me,” Catriona said, her voice choked, and without meeting Richard’s gaze, she turned and fled the room.
Lydia watched her go, her small face mirroring Catriona’s distress.
“Leave too?” she whispered, looking at Richard with wide, pleading eyes.
Richard, still reeling from Catriona’s unexpected revelation and the raw pain in her voice, simply nodded.
“Yes, Lydia. You may go.”
He was left alone in the silent dining room, the weight of the sudden, unsettling glimpse into his wife’s past pressing down on him.
Surely it was only concern for Catriona. For himself, he was done with grief.
He could not afford grief.
Chapter Eighteen
“Chan eil tuil air nach tig traoghadh.” There isn’t a flood which will not subside
Unable to sleep and driven by an almost desperate need for escape as dark memories replayed in her mind, Catriona rose from her bed like a shot in the night.
She dressed quickly in her riding habit and slipped out of the silent house.
