Page 4 of The Lass Defended the Laird (Explosive Highlanders 2)

As if she needed reminding.

She crossed her arms under her breasts and they bunched under a dress gone thin with so much wearing. The movement drew his unwavering attention, long-lashed eyes latching on the mounds as his mouth used to do. Said mounds pebbled, and hot crimson colour washed over her skin.

Her dry throat forced staccato words out. “There is nothing to explain.” Her eyes darted back to his. She had to make this appear true. “I left, full stop.”

His humourless chuckle reverberated in the small room. “We knew you were a McPherson, but you seemed of a sound mind when we became betrothed.”

Her clan’s name discharged cold terror inside her. The root of the darkness in her life, the cause for the sacrifice she made and still must endure. If he suspected any of the true reasons for her actions, it would deflagrate a clan war she had been avoiding for four years. Together with the threat to his life. She would go mad if she had to live in a world absent of Drostan. It would be unbearable, like wandering in a barren desert for centuries on end. She must live without him if she did not want to live without him.

“Turns out I am a McPherson after all.” In more ways than he would ever fathom.

Something must have shown on Freya’s stance because his focus sharpened and he strode closer. The intensity he trained on her got her restless. Unable to sustain such scrutiny, she turned away, breath clogged in her lungs.

He would have none of it, would he? Strong fingers locked on her upper arm and swivelled her to him. “Look at me when I talk to you!” He rasped irreducible.

This close the heat of him slammed on her with the scent of horse, wind and man impossible to forget. His touch, even rash, met eager skin. A skin deprived of caress, tenderness, desire for so long.

Her head tilted back to meet his gaze since her height came barely to his shoulders. To plunge fully in his magnificent eyes was surely the hardest thing she had done in her twenty-six years. To do it and lie wrenched her insides.

“Why?” He demanded.

The expression on her face hardened, and she remembered she did it for him, for Ewan, their safety. When her cousins approached her, she gave her word to stay away from him, aiming to spare his life. No going back now. Or ever.

“I got bored.” Ludicrous, she was aware of it. The day Drostan bored her she would become a skeleton in a grave.

A glacial glint blanketed his glare, followed by undisguised loathing. If she had not lost him up to now, she had just accomplished the feat with her last words.

The realisation caused her heart to flood with a despair too overwhelming to describe. Bitterness tasted like the deadliest poison. A poison that would fester in her for the rest of her existence.

With it came a perniciously aching doubt. What if she poured the whole story out? What if she shared with him this veritable anvil lodged in her as an extra organ these years? This should be what couples did, should it not? Solve problems as a team, as a family. They formed a family now.

No. Oh dear, no! The risks were too great, too lethal. Their consequences would raze whatever valuable they built. Clan McKendrick included.

So, she squeezed her heart in a cement case and doubled her efforts at convincing him.

“And you robbed me of four years of my son’s life because you got bored.” Cold and sharp as a sabre, his tone tore at her as a final blow.

“I did not know I was with child when I left.” At least she could say the truth in this. She really did not.

For the better, she concluded. No one must sniff her son. No one suspected. She had used all the resources in her power to conceal him, as difficult as it proved to be. Hidden, the boy’s life would not be threatened.

“When you did?” He challenged, still towering over her.

Hell broke loose. And heaven showed its glowing face. Fears, joys, apprehensions, hopes. All wrapped in one big thrashing sac.

“There was no going back.” A vague answer for something so important.

Oh, how she had wished he could be with her, witness her increasing with his seed. See the endearing bundle when Ewan came to be, every tiny step in his development. His first tooth, his first word, first step, first drawing on the sand. She had dreamed of nothing else but her husband at her side to smile dumbly at their babe as if no other child in the world accomplished these deeds. And the pride which would shine on this big man. His heir, the next Chief.

“You thought it fair to raise him in poverty when he could have everything.” Accusation clear in it.

“He has love.” Her chin tilted up to defy him to contradict her and the certainty it would be the most important in a child’s life.

“The love of a father

discardable, no doubt.” He taunted, dripping in disdain.

Clearly, he was right. Ewan received half of the affection he should have had. The notion bled her heart further. She wished she had covered for both. Fathers and mothers loved differently though. Drostan would have dotted on all of his children. The knowledge she would have merely this one hurt immensely.

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