Page 112 of Bride of Ice
“I’ll find a way to fix this,” he vowed.
“Thereisno way.”
“Who is this betrothed?” Colban fought a sudden violent urge to slay the unnamed villain.
“I don’t know.”
“Ye don’t know?” Colban clenched and unclenched his fists in outrage. “How can they marry ye to someone ye don’t even…”
Yet even as he said the words, he knew that was the way of nobles. So it had been with Morgan. So it was with any firstborn of a powerful clan.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said.
But Colban saw the bleak emptiness behind her cold acceptance of her fate.
“O’ course it does,” he insisted. “Ye can’t just trust your future to someone who doesn’t appreciate your strength. Someone who doesn’t respect ye. Someone who doesn’t love ye.”
Her eyes filled at his words.
His throat burned with frustration as he realized the futility of his argument. Part of him wanted to grab Hallie right this moment and run away with her into the night. But he knew no matter what he said or did, Colban couldn’t change Hallie’s destiny. He was only a lowly bastard shaking his fist at a king.
He wanted to rail against the injustice of nobility, the travesty of arranged marriages and forced alliances. But he could see that would only prolong Hallie’s suffering and make things worse.
The best thing to do—the noble thing, the kind thing—was to forget what had happened between them. To tuck away his one precious, private memory of what they’d shared and forget he’d ever known Hallie.
It was the hardest thing he’d ever done to raise his targe against Hallie’s broken heart. But he managed to swallow his pain, steel his features, and say what he had to say.
“I won’t speak of it again,” he promised. “None of it. Ye must put me someplace else for the night. In the stable or the dovecot.”
“I won’t let you sleep—”
He held up his hand to stop her protest. “I’m a hostage. Ye must treat me as such. On the morrow, ye’ll return me to Creagor, aye?”
“Aye,” she choked out.
“Then ye’ll get your cousins back, none the worse for wear. And no one will ever know what passed between us.”
Hallie nodded, on the verge of tears. Gathering her skirts, she began to walk stiffly toward the door. But as she drew even with him, she hesitated.
Turning toward him, the fierce Valkyrie suddenly looked as vulnerable as a child. Her wet eyes were wide and full of heartache. Her lips trembled uncertainly. “Will you…will you give me one last kiss?” she entreated him. “A kiss of farewell?”
He wanted that more than anything. He wanted to bury his face in her fragrant hair. Taste her yielding, honey-sweet lips. Press his hungering body against hers.
It seemed cruel beyond measure to leave her like this. Empty. Aching. Heartbroken.
But though it tore him up inside to disappoint her, he had no choice.
If he kissed her again, he knew he’d never let her go.
“Nay.”
Chapter 29
Hallie gave a tiny gasp and then closed her lips so tightly that not even a breath could escape.
He was right. Of course he was right. It was futile to prolong their agony by indulging in a kiss.
But it didn’t keep her cheeks from flushing with shame at his rebuff. It didn’t keep his rejection from feeling like the slice of a blade across her soul.
