Page 85 of Beguiled By the Highlander
He opened a leather pouch that hung from his belt and pulled out his mother’s ring. There would be no gathering of the clans for a magnificent wedding at Dunstrunage castle now. No opportunity for him to give his bride his beloved lady mother’s ring.
He closed his fist over the engraved band, and the gold dug into his palm. It had always been destined for his wife. But here, standing in the gloom of his great hall, it wasn’t the symbolic joining of Campbell and MacDonald the ring would represent should Isolde wear it that filled his mind.
It was knowing the woman he loved would forever have a link to him, no matter how far apart they might be.
A small comfort. But it was something, and at least he’d know, when she was safely back in Sgur, she would never be in danger because of him again.
He went up the stairs and entered their antechamber, and despite his resolve to spend the rest of this cold, lonely night on a chair by the hearth, he went to the door of their bedchamber, like a cursed moth to an unattainable flame.
All he wanted was to hold her one more time, to breathe in her evocative scent, and pretend, for a few short hours, that she’d choose him over her beloved isle.
His hand was inches from the iron ring when the door was wrenched open, and Isolde stood there. Her hair cascaded over her shoulders like a molten river at sunset, an ethereal fantasy from his wretched imagination.
But she was no fantasy. She was his wife.
And he had to let her go.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Isolde stifled agasp as her gaze locked with William’s. She’d been so sure he was still downstairs and had resolved to spend the rest of the night searching for him, if need be, until she found him and made him see reason.
But he was here, and hope sparked through her. It was plain he had intended to see her. There could be no other possibility as to why he stood outside their bedchamber.
Yet he didn’t say a word.
“William,” she said at last, when the silence stretched so taut between them it hurt her very ears. There were so many things she wanted—needed—to say to him, but they tangled in her mind until they made no sense at all. But she had to say something, to keep him here, since, unaccountably, he now appeared on the verge of retreating. “Have ye eaten?”
She barely kept from wincing at her inane question, but how much easier it was to speak of inconsequential things, rather than confront the fear that gnawed through her heart at the prospect of being banished from Creagdoun.
From William.
“I didn’t mean to disturb ye.” He sounded gruff, and a frown slashed his brow as though he found their encounter distasteful. But since she could think of no reason why he had been standing outside the door unless he’d intended to enter the bedchamber, she could only hope he’d had a change of heart about hisintention to send her away. “I should have waited until the morning.”
She tugged her shawl tighter about her shoulders, but it wasn’t an instinctive gesture against the chill in the air. It was the undercurrent of finality in his voice that caused a shiver along her spine.
“Well, ye’re here now.” The words were sharp, but she couldn’t help herself. He hadn’t changed his mind, and foolishly she wished she hadn’t decided to go looking for him. Except that wouldn’t have changed anything, since William had come looking forher. “What do ye have to say to me that cannot possibly wait until morning?”
He pressed his fist against his hip. In another man, the action might indicate impatience or suppressed rage at her retort, but that wasn’t in William’s nature, and the fanciful notion occurred to her that he was protecting something.
Aye, fanciful indeed. The despairing truth was, she didn’t know her husband nearly as well as she had always imagined. Because the William in her heart would never demand she leave him.
“’Twas never my intention to put ye in danger.” This time, there was no mistaking the thread of anger in his tone, and she threw her last remnant of caution to the wind. What did it matter what she said, when he was determined not to listen to her?
“Do ye think ye’re the only man to put his wife in danger because of his name? Do ye imagine the MacDonalds of Sgur have no enemies of our own who would like nothing more than to see us dead? What a mighty opinion ye have of yerself, William Campbell.”
He glared at her as though she had gone mad. Perhaps she had. But she wouldn’t allow him to destroy their marriage under the pretext he was doing it for her. If he wanted to end their alliance, she refused to make it easy on him.
“This isn’t a tournament, Isolde, to see which of us has more enemies. But I knew of the MacGregor threat, and I should’ve ensured it was stamped out before taking ye as my bride.”
“Ye knew Creagdoun was compromised, and Alan MacGregor had infiltrated yer men when ye insisted on our marriage, is that what ye’re saying?” She knew it wasn’t. He hadn’t known any of that until this day, but his stubbornness was infuriating.
“Ye know I didn’t.” He appeared aggrieved by her accusation which, considering his own argument, proved her point, although he obviously couldn’t see it. “But if I’d ensured the castle was fit for ye before forcing yer hand, if I’d had the lady’s chamber restored, that cursed secret passage would’ve been discovered. But I couldn’t wait. I couldn’t risk losing ye simply because ye hated the very sound of my name.”
A spark of guilt burned through her. It was true. She’d hated his name for ten long years and had made no secret of it once his identity had been revealed. But there was a difference between hating a name and hating the owner of it.
“Can ye blame me? I thought...” she hesitated. They’d had this conversation before. But had she ever told him she now believed he had always been truthful with her, during those blissful days in Eigg when nothing had mattered but being with her mysterious Njord?
“I know what ye thought. That I’d trick ye any way I could to make ye mine. I don’t know how I can ever prove I never lied to ye, not with how things turned out.”
