Page 83 of Sutherland's Secret
Brice stood alone in the middle of his solar. Already Eleanor’s life was pulling her away from him, and there was nothing he could do about it.
Chapter 33
Eleanor hesitated once she was outside Brice’s rooms, torn between two worlds. Thomas looked at her expectantly, and on the other side of the thick wooden door, she could practically feel Brice’s disappointment.
“Eleanor,” Thomas said softly. “I know you have been through so much. There were choices you had to make that may not have—”
“That’s enough, Thomas. The choices I made were mine to make. I’m not asking for permission or approval. Yes, I’ve been through a lot, and what I have been through has changed me. I’m not the same sister who left London as a new bride. I will never be that Eleanor again. I’m sorry if that disappoints you.”
Thomas sometimes liked to act more like her father than a sibling, and she had always accepted that. But he wasn’t her father, and she wasn’t the same young, naive girl who traveled to Edinburgh with stars in her eyes and a polished soldier on her arm.
“I’m not disappointed,” he said. “Shocked, maybe, but not disappointed.”
Cecilia stood to the side, waiting for them, pretending not to listen, but Eleanor knew there was little Cecilia missed and even less that she kept to herself. Eleanor looked pointedly at her maid, then back at Thomas. “You should go to bed. We have a lot to discuss in the morning,” she said.
“We discussed so much tonight that my head is spinning. I truly am sorry, Eleanor, for not being there for you. For taking the army’s word that you were well instead of coming straight to Edinburgh to get you.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered. Blackwood moved too quickly.”
Thomas’s gaze moved over her shoulder to the closed door behind her. The door she ached to walk back through, but she feared that by leaving Brice to go with her brother, she had crossed a line that she wouldn’t be able to cross again.
“Cecilia, take Thomas to his room, please.”
“Yes, my lady.”
Thomas looked like he wanted to say more. He looked at the door again, then back at her. “Tomorrow we’ll discuss when we’ll begin our journey back to London.”
She pressed her lips together but didn’t agree or disagree with him. Instead she walked to her door and entered her own room. She stood in the middle of the bedchamber, feeling the silence. She’d had no idea that silence had a feel to it, but it did now. It was heavy, stifling, making it hard to breathe. For so long, locked in that cell in Fort Augustus, she’d been alone. Since Brice had found her in the middle of the road, she’d rarely been alone. She missed Brice and she’d just left his presence. What would happen when she was in London? If she missed him now, his absence would be unbearable there.
But she couldn’t stay here. Her family was anxious. She’d already caused them enough grief. And she needed to speak to the Hirsts to tell them that she didn’t believe Charles had been a traitor. She needed to tell someone about Blackwood.
She rubbed her arms and looked at the cold fireplace, then at the bed she hadn’t occupied in weeks and the blue walls that she hated. She couldn’t stay in here, not when her heart was in the other room.
Quietly she opened the connecting door to Brice’s rooms and peeked in. He’d lit the fire and was standing at the window overlooking the sea beyond, sipping his whiskey. She closed the door behind her and walked up to him to put her arms around his waist and rest her cheek against his back. He smelled so good, of the sea and horses and the distinctive spicy scent that was Brice.
“Deep thoughts?” she asked.
“Aye.” He took another sip and put one hand over hers. They stood like that for the longest time. She didn’t know what to say to him, how to make all of this better. She was torn between two worlds, and there was no way to make everyone happy.
He set his glass down on the window ledge and pulled her around until they were chest to chest. He wrapped his arms around her and leaned his chin on the top of her head. “I didn’t think you would come to me tonight,” he said, his voice rumbling through her.
“I couldn’t stay away.”
“Not even with yer brother down the hall?”
“Thomas is not so fierce. Not once you get to know him.”
He let out a disbelieving sound. “Ye’re not the one sleeping with his sister. He’s no’ overly fond of me.”
She squeezed him tight. “It’s none of his concern.”
“Ah, but it is,mo ghràdh. If ye were my sister, I would run me through with a dagger and be done with it.”
“And if you were my brother and did that to my lover, I would…Well, I don’t know what I would do, but it wouldn’t be pretty, and you would regret it the rest of your days.”
He chuckled. “Ye make me laugh, lass.”
She pulled away just enough to be able to look up at him. “Make love to me,gaolach.”
