He squeezed her hand to encourage her. “What is it, lass? I like the way ye say all the things that enter yer mind. Doona stop now.”
“That isn’t the kiss of someone who doesn’t care. Believe me, I’ve had them. Men who don’t care don’t kiss someone like that.”
She let go and started walking back to Artair. It would be too cruel to allow her to hope. “Mitsy, lass, ye are wrong. ’Twas no the kiss of a caring man. ’Twas the kiss of a man who’s been too long without a woman.”
His throat burned at the lie that even he couldn’t believe. She faced him, her expression giving nothing away. As always, she didn’t mince her words.
“Then don’t ever kiss me again because if you mean it, I deserve far better than you.”
It hurt him to his very soul just how right she was.
Chapter 19
What a moron. I truly didn’t think that he even believed himself what he said. Even so, any man should know better than to say something like that out loud to a woman, even if he thought it. It was like saying that he used me, but his actions had shown otherwise.
His words didn’t hurt my feelings, they just pissed me off. I just couldn’t understand his mindset. It was terrible that he’d been hurt, but if he thought no one else had ever had love bite them in the ass, he was delusional.
Maybe I was just a serial optimist. All of the modern conveniences that I had the pleasure of using throughout my life aside, I knew I had a harder life than him. He was a Scottish laird who grew up in a castle, for goodness sake. He had a mother and father who loved him. He’d never been poor.
I was an orphan who spent my childhood without family and with only one close friend. I’d not been born into a family filled with love, and I’d be paying off student loan debt for the rest of my life. I’d been burnt by love more than a few times myself, but never for a moment had I thought about just shutting myself off from all feelings or emotions.
His cowardice disappointed me, but I refused to let him put a damper on my day. I hadn’t seen Bri in over a year. I couldn’t wait to squeeze her neck and catch up.
The rest of the ride remained silent and awkward after the incident in the woods, but thankfully we were close to Conall Castle. As we approached the castle’s stables, there seemed to be few people about. I worried for a moment that perhaps they wouldn’t be home.
Baodan approached the stables and called out to who I assumed was the stable master. “Kip? Are ye in there?”
Inside the stalls, I knew the voice who answered us, and it wasn’t the Kip that Baodan called out to. I recognized it instantly as that of Bri’s look-a-like, Blaire.
“Is that ye, Baodan? What are ye doing…” she paused as she popped her head up out of the last stall and looked at me.
I could only hope Bri’s face would look half as surprised. I waved as I spoke to her. “Don’t worry. I won’t attack you this time.”
Baodan dismounted from the horse, and looked up at me in utter bewilderment. “Do ye know her, lass? That isna Bri, ye know.”
Blaire stepped out of the stall and made her way quickly over to Baodan, wrapping her arms around him as if he were her long lost brother. “Aye, she knows I’m no Bri. We’ve met before.”
“How?”
Baodan reached up to help me off the horse, but I wouldn’t take his hand. Instead flipping over so that my belly touched the horse’s back, I slid off onto the ground.
Once I grounded myself, Blaire pulled away from Baodan and moved to give me a hesitant hug before stepping away. She remained skittish around me. Not that I could blame her. The first time I saw her, I’d mistaken her for Bri. I thought Bri pretended to be someone else and it made me so angry, I’d attacked her in one of my most regrettable ginger moments.
Blaire reached out to touch Baodan’s arm. “Ach, I forgot that ye dinna know. Before we were engaged, I’d been living forward in time. In the same time that Bri and Mitsy here come from.”
That was news to me. It was my turn to look bewildered. “What? You two were engaged?”
Baodan shook his head and started to move Artair into an empty stall. “Long story, and one that doesna need to be told. Blaire, will ye take Mitsy to her?”
She reached out for my arm and together we left the stables. “Aye, o’course. I was only tending to the new colt here. I’ll send Eoin and Arran out for ye, and they’ll see ye inside once ye’ve seen to yer horse.”
As we left Baodan, Blaire pointed up to a high window near the top of the castle. “I expect we will find her nursing the baby. I hope the wee thing isna sleeping. If she is, it willna be for long with the way Bri will scream at the sight of ye.”
“Baby?”
She didn’t answer, only nodded and grinned as she led me inside the castle.
* * *
We only just turned down the hallway that held the room where Blaire seemed to think Bri would be when I heard an American accent whisper quite loudly behind me.
“Oh my God! Mitsy!”
I turned to see Bri’s mother, Adelle, walking toward me excitedly, a sleeping bundle wrapped in her arms. I smiled as I met her, shocked for the third time in a matter of minutes. “Adelle! What are you doing here? Is there anybody that Morna hasn’t got her witchy claws on?”
“Oh, I guess you didn’t come here on your own then did you, dear? Don’t be too hard on Morna though, she knows what she’s doing. She wouldn’t have sent you here unless you needed to be here.”
I reached over to embrace Adelle, making sure not to squish the sleeping babe. I lifted the blanket to get a better look at the beautiful dark-headed girl. I thought I might cry at the happiness I felt for Bri as I looked down at the small child. Bri always wanted nothing more than a family of her own. “She’s beautiful. What a happy grandma you must be.”
“Happy indeed, I’m even married myself now.”
I’d never seen Adelle look so happy. The seventeenth century seemed to agree with the Montgomery women. “Get it, Adelle!” I winked at her, knowing she was as crass as me and wouldn’t be offended. “Is he good to you?”
She chuckled once and then stopped so she wouldn’t wake the baby. “Too good. I’m not worthy of him, but I don’t plan on letting him go any time soon. Bri’s in there.” She pointed in the direction Blaire and I were headed. “I told her I’d get little Ellie asleep so that she could get a little nap in herself. Go in there and wake her up. She’ll be so excited to see you, she’ll think she’s dreaming.” She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek before starting off down the hallway. “Love you, sweetie. We’ll talk more later.”
With Adelle gone, Blaire waved me over to the doorway and opened it just a crack before whispering in my direction. “There ye go. I’m off to find the lads.”
I crept in to the room and walked over to the edge of the bed, grinning as I looked down at her. She slept as she always did, with her hands above her head and her mouth hanging wide open. It would’ve been kinder for me to allow her to sleep, but it also would have been totally out of character.
I gave her a light shake as I spoke. “Wake up, sleepy head. Turns out you’re not as bat shit crazy as I thought. I really worried about you for a while.”
Her eyelids flickered open slowly, and I laughed as I watched her eyes adjust. When they finally did, she all but tumbled out of the bed in her rush to stand so that she could look at me properly.
“Mitsy! Oh my gosh, I hoped you would come, but I wasn’t sure if you ever would. Did you get the letter?”
She wrapped her arms around me in a hug so tight I could scarcely breathe. I patted her back in an effort to get her to release me, but she would only do so when she was good and ready. “I did find your letter. Let’s sit down.”
Eventually she let me go and crawled back on to the bed, motioning for me to join her.
We sat crisscross on the bed in front of one another. For a while, she just stared at me, smiling as if she thought she’d never see me again. And I suppose, she c
ould’ve been right.
“Why did you leave the letter?” There’d been more to it than her just wanting to give me the option. She knew something, something that made her believe that things wouldn’t work out with Brian.
Her smile faded, and I thought her eyes hinted of guilt.
“Why don’t you tell me why you decided to come here first?”
“He cheated and did for most of our relationship, I think. Not that it was all his fault, I knew he was an asshole. He never really tried to hide that fact, but I married him anyway.”
She nodded, knowingly. “Total asshole.”
“Did you know, Bri? That he was cheating?”
“Not until the wedding. I…”
She hesitated and I didn’t blame her for doing so. Who wanted to be the one to tell someone that the night of their wedding, their husband had been screwing another girl?
“It’s fine, Bri. I don’t care anymore. Really.”
“I went in search of a restroom during the reception. With the women’s being cleaned, the janitor directed me to one in a private office down the hallway. I heard him with a woman inside. I should’ve told you, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it that night. That’s why I left the letter. I figured when you found out about him yourself, you would know why I sent it. How long have things been bad?”
I shrugged. The real question was when were they ever not bad? “They always were. I think inside I knew he cheated, but I didn’t find out about it until a few months ago.”
“When did you get the letter?”
“Oh that. Brace yourself, I know you’re going to blow a gasket. Brian gave that to me the day before I came here to Scotland. He’d opened it the week after the wedding. He stayed in your place with her.”
Her eyes tripled in size. “That son of a bitch. Oh, if I was there I would have unleashed a whole barrel of crazy on his sorry ass. I’m so sorry. I didn’t ever think…I wouldn’t have…”
I grabbed her hand. “Of course you didn’t think about that. Why would you? It’s fine, I’m just glad he gave me the letter. I didn’t believe a word inside it of course. I only came to Scotland because I believed you were in some sort of brainwashy cult.”
She laughed and shifted her position on the bed. “What? I told you in Edinburgh. Although, I knew you didn’t believe me.”
“How could I? This is the craziest thing I’ve ever experienced.” My own feet were asleep so I rolled off the side of the bed and moved about the room to stomp the tickle out of them.
“It is crazy, but amazing. I was always meant to be here, I think. What do you think about all of it?”
Many things ran through my mind: the blisters on my toes from uncomfortable shoes that rubbed, the lack of toilet paper, the miserable meals, no hot running water. “I think most of it is completely terrible. Parts of it though,” Baodan crossed my mind, “aren’t so bad.”
“Parts huh?” She looked up at me knowingly. “You obviously didn’t just end up here. Where did you land and who brought you here now?”
* * *
It wasn’t his intention to listen in on the lassies’ conversation. He’d been on his way to a room to rest and clean up after far too many days out of doors. The sound of his voice being uttered from Mitsy’s lips stopped him cold.
“What do you know about him? Baodan?”
He pressed his back flat against the wall, only leaning his ear toward the doorway so that he could hear Bri’s response.
“I don’t know a lot, only that I like him very much. He’s very close friends with Blaire, and she adores him. He has to be a pretty good guy to remain friends with someone who dumps him days before she’s supposed to marry him.”
He probably imagined it, but Mitsy’s voice when she answered almost sounded jealous. “About that. How did that happen? Baodan told me yesterday that he isn’t capable of loving anymore, whatever the hell that means. Why would he have asked her to marry him? Did they date or something? Do people do that here?”
Bri’s voice was calm, a perfect counter to her fiery friend. With great insight, she seemed to understand his relationship with Blaire better than most.
“I don’t think he ever loved Blaire. I think he enjoyed her friendship and wanted to help her when she was heartbroken and alone.”
“Hmm…that sounds like something the silly fool would do.”
He didn’t know what she meant by that, but she was still clearly upset by what he’d said to her earlier.
“Oh, you’ve got it bad, don’t you?”
Baodan couldn’t repress a grin at Bri’s question. While he didn’t understand the exact meaning of it, he understood the connotation well enough. She asked if Mitsy fancied him.
“Why would you say that?”
“Oh, come on Mitsy. Your face is all red just from talking about him. And Mits…everyone is capable of love. If he took the time to tell you that he wasn’t, he obviously likes you very much.”
“Well, that’s what I thought! But when I gave him the perfect opportunity to ’fess up, he was a total wuss.”
He didn’t know what that was, but was he really so transparent?
Quietly, he stepped away from the doorway but stopped at Bri’s next question. The question he wanted to know the answer to since soon after he met her.
“What are you going to do? Will you stay here?”
Mitsy stood close to him, leaning against the wall he supposed, for her voice when she spoke sounded right next to him. He could offer nothing, but he wished with every fiber that she would stay.
“I expect I’ll leave. I love you, Bri, but I couldn’t stay here with you and your family. It wouldn’t be right, and there’s not much for a woman on her own to do around here.”
He shouldn’t have expected her to stay, but his heart felt like lead in his chest at the thought of her being centuries ahead of him. If she wanted to leave, it would be wrong of him to stop her.
He moved away from the door and made haste down the hallway. The castle walls suddenly restrained him. He needed to get outside to clear his head, to remind himself that he’d only known the lass a few short days.
* * *
Bri waited until his footsteps disappeared before she looked at me knowingly. “How long did you know he was standing on the other side of that door?”
I laughed, pleased with myself. “I heard him walking down the hallway before he ever stopped. You did too, right? Why did he think no one would notice the sudden lack of movement?”
Bri stood and moved to put her arm around me grinning. “Yes, I noticed. So you really don’t have any intention of leaving, right? Please say you don’t.”
I reached up to pat her arm. “No, I’m not going to leave right away. I don’t know if I’ll stay forever, but if it’s alright, I’d like to stay for a while. I have this magic rock that Morna gave me so I can go back to our own time whenever I want, but the truth is I have little to go back to. You and your mother are the closest thing I have to family. Until I figure out what it is I really want, I’d like to stay.”
Bri squeezed me and stepped away so that she could point at the door. “Good! Now, go and find him and see how upset he is. If he has any sense, he’ll talk you out of leaving. I expect you’ll find him sitting out on the outer wall. He hung out there a lot when he was here caring for Blaire. I’ll show you the way.”
I hoped I hadn’t made a mistake by lying, but I wanted to see if he would be bothered at the thought of me leaving. I suspected by his sudden disappearance from the doorway that he was, but I supposed I would find out for sure soon enough. “Was it wrong for me to do that?”
Bri looked over her shoulder at me as we walked down the hallway. “Not at all, girl. It was very well played.”
Chapter 20
I found him where Bri expected, and it pleased me to see that he did look very upset about something. He glanced backward at me as I crawled out on the edge to sit beside him but said nothing.
“Thank you.” I
leaned in to him, just barely nudging my shoulder with his to get his attention.
He didn’t turn to look at me, instead facing straight ahead as he spoke. “For what, lass?”
“For bringing me all the way here. You didn’t have to.”
His arms crossed and he appeared uncomfortable. “Aye, I did, lass. I couldna allow ye to travel alone.”
He wasn’t going to give me the answer I searched for, not without a little prying anyways. “And I suppose that’s the only reason you brought me? You just couldn’t stand the thought of me not being safe?”
“Aye. I did no less than any decent man would.”
I crossed my own arms as I turned my body to stare at the side of his head. My temper flared and, if he didn’t watch it, he would find himself on the receiving end of some serious ginger rage. It was unfair of him to be so cool toward me. “So, when you will return home?”
“At sunrise. I have responsibilities at home. I have been away for too long.”
I couldn’t believe that he planned on leaving so soon. I thought he would at least stay a few days. “Well,” I could hardly utter the lie. “I guess this is goodbye then. I’m planning on returning home tonight.”
“Aye? Well, safe journey to ye, lass.”
About to cry, I didn’t wish for him to see me do so. I spun myself around so that I could crawl off the ledge and re-enter the castle. He stared straight ahead, behaving as if my leaving was of no consequence to him.
Perhaps it had only been me who felt it, and our few days together seemed nothing unusual for him.
A sob bubbled up. While I tried to get away, I knew he heard me start to cry as I crawled back inside the main building. He did nothing to try to stop or comfort me. It seemed I was the wrong one. He told the truth before. He was incapable of feeling anything.
* * *
Why did he feel like crying? He never cried. Not once, since the death of his wife had he done so. He stared into the black sky in front of him, trying not to blink so that tears would dry in his eyes rather than fall.
Morna's Legacy: Box Set #1 Page 59