Page 98 of Captured By the Cruel Highlander
She nodded as the carriage pulled away, putting MacNiall Castle and Adam Kane behind her for the final time.
Adam was drunk.
He had guzzled far too much whiskey in far too short a time to be able to remain sober.
He hadn’t eaten anything since midday the previous day, and Doughall was watching him incredulously from the other side of his desk.
The two men had left the cliffs and walked straight to his study. There, Adam had opened a fresh bottle, and they were already halfway through it.
His head was pounding, but he didn’t care. He wanted to drown himself in the misery that was consuming him, and then he would move on as he had always done.
The faint sound of fading carriage wheels made nausea rise within him. He clamped one hand on the arm of his chair, preventing himself from leaping to his feet and running after Emily to stop her from leaving.
It is better she is gone. She will have the life she deserves.
At that thought, the door flew open so violently that both men jumped up in shock. Doughall’s hand was on the handle of his dirk on instinct, but it was not a warrior who entered the room, but Lady MacNiall, looking like a whirlwind.
Her gaze was calculating and angry. She glared at her son and raised a scolding hand in front of her, a gesture that reminded Adam of his tutors when he was a boy.
“And what do ye think ye are doin’?” she asked irritably.
“Drinkin’.”
“I can see that,” she said, stalking toward the desk and plucking the bottle off the surface.
Adam cried out in surprise as she pushed open the window and emptied the contents on the ground beneath.
“What the hell are ye doin’?” he shouted, rising to his feet to grab the bottle from her, but it was too late.
She gave him such a withering glare in response that he sat back down again, the whisky roiling unpleasantly in his stomach.
“Ye are a fool, Adam Kane,” she stated.
“Ye can hold yer tongue,” he barked, but the effect was somewhat ruined as he belched loudly.
“Ye have let yer wife leave all because of yer pride.”
Adam stared at his mother in amazement. “I have let her go as Iplanned.She was never truly me wife, ye ken that!”
He ignored Doughall’s derisive scoff, just as it was echoed by his mother.
“She was yer wife, and ye are a dobber for lettin’ her leave. Ye couldnae even come out to bid her farewell, hidin’ in here like a frightened little boy.”
Adam rose to his feet, pointing an accusatory finger at his mother. “Dinnae speak to me like that.”
“Like what? Like a maither beratin’ her son? Right at this moment, I am nae speakin’ to me Laird, I am speakin’ to the boy I raised, who has always blamed me for his faither nae bein’ with him in his youth.”
Adam clenched his fists and simply stared at her, unable to say anything in response.
“It is true, is it nae?” Lady MacNiall demanded. “Ye believe I forced yer faither to wage all of those wars, never allowin’ him to come home? Tellin’ him where to go, what to do. Ye believe I influenced his choices and that he died for it.”
Her lip trembled as she spoke the truth Adam had believed all his life.
“If it hadnae been for ye, he would have been with his clan!” Adam spat.
“Hewaswith his clan, ye damned fool,” Lady MacNiall’s voice rang out loudly in the quiet room. “Ye truly believe yer faither wouldnae have returned if he wished to? He loved his people, and he wastherefor his people because ofme. I worked with thecouncil every day when he was unable to be there in person. I conferred with him on everythin’. I was his eyes and ears, and he kenned exactly what his people needed. No decision was made in this clan without yer faither’s say so, nae even which battle we would fight next.”
She was standing proud and tall before him, and Adam had never seen her so resolute.
