Edwina

by Patricia Strefling

Chapter 57

  As suddenly as the words were spoken, Edwina began to doubt. How could the Scot care for her? Love her? She had no illusions. The man could get any woman he wanted and had proven that to her the minute she’d met him. He had been hurrying home to meet the woman he was to marry, his fiancée.

  So what had transpired from then until now? She could not allow herself to be taken in by foolishness. Her practical spirit rose and argued with her romantic heart.

  He was watching her face as two pink dots formed on her cheeks, evidence of her fearful thoughts.

  The man was even now on his knee awaiting her answer.

  Cecelia and Spencer rounded the corner, and she breathed as they stopped a ways off smiling.

  So they knew? How could they know and she not know? Was this a game? Her mind was frantic with fear. Surely he meant to ask Cecelia, not her.

  Yet he was waiting. Sick with guilt and denial, she heard herself laugh.

  “Ye laugh, lass?”

  He was standing now.

  “No... I just . . .” She shook her head and sought his eyes again. She saw the look of pain there.

  “I mean . . .” She needed to see the look of love she thought she saw only seconds ago, but it was gone.

  The Scot stepped back and glanced at Reardon, made a sign, and walked around the back of the car.

  Cecelia stepped forward and then put her arm in front of Spencer who also looked at her as though she’d grown purple ears.

  What was with everyone? Didn’t they know what just happened could not have possibly been meant for her? Tears popped up. This was too much.

  Reardon held the door, as Alex signaled for Cecelia and Spencer to join her in the backseat. He sat in front.

  No one spoke. Cecelia tried to make light conversation, but her words dropped like a rock in water. Edwina wanted to shout at everyone. What was the matter with them? If this was a game of survivor, she didn’t like it.

  Lord, help me to understand. Her thoughts bounced back and forth like a ricocheting bullet. Maybe she was supposed to act faint and go along with the charade. This man had eyes. Couldn’t he see she was plain and practical? Not anything like Ilana? Or Cecelia? Maybe he just wanted a mother for Paige, someone he could trust to be the closest thing to a mother the child would have.

  Even that was honorable. Why had she balked? Edwina answered her own question. Because she would never be all that man needed. Not now, not ever.

  As soon as Alex stepped out of the car, he was gone and Spencer with him. Cecelia waited until she saw them disappear and said, “What happened, Ed?”

  “What do you mean?” Edwina fidgeted and slipped her shoes off, the ones the Scot had only put on. Her face burned at the memory. “Nothing happened.”

  “I can see that.” Cecelia’s hands were waving about. “Can’t you see that he loves you?”

  Edwina stared at her sister. “He can’t love me.” She waved her arms, put on her shoes and exited the car.

  Before she’d gotten two steps, Cecelia grabbed her and turned her around. “Give me one good reason why you are acting this way, Ed.”

  The words were menacing, and Edwina knew she’d crossed her sister, something she rarely did.

  “What way? This is all so silly. Everybody knows you don’t just decide to get your child a mother and pick the first one who comes along,” she sputtered.

  “Comes along? Don’t you know Alex has had feelings for you ever since you arrived the first time?”

  Edwina laughed. “Yeah, right.”

  “That was Ilana. Alex told you that.” She calls him Alex. Edwina sterilized her heart and said the words.

  “It’s you he cares about, Cecelia. You’re his type, I’m not.”

  “Oh, you are blind. Blind as a ball bat.” Her sister threw up her hands and stepped out of the car. “You have a man, a good man, who cares about you, and what do you do? Toss him off like yesterday’s stock prices.”

  “It’s blind as a bat, Cecelia. And what do you know? You’re the one who is right for him, Cecelia. Not me.”

  “And why not you?”

  “Look, I’m a librarian, for goodness’ sake. He’s laird of a castle. And, if you haven’t noticed, he’s about the handsomest man I’ve ever met. What would he want with me?

  “You spend way too much time putting yourself down. Are you that small that you base everything on looks?”

  Cecelia was pounding her fist in her palm. This was not good.

  Edwina clamped her mouth shut. Did she?

  “See, you can’t answer. I thought you had more sense.” Her sister turned on her heel, her flowered dress swinging in the aftermath. And Edwina stood there alone. Hot tears formed and fell.

  She had grown as a person, stepped out of her comfort zone, made a move across the Atlantic Ocean, and taken on the care of a young child. Didn’t that count for something?

  It seemed that everything she did failed. It must have been that story. She was going to tear it up. All this fluff about romance, dreams, and foolish frippery. The only thing she had going for her was her practical nature, and up to this day and hour it had served her well enough.

  Maybe she would be an old maid. But at least she wouldn’t have to look into the eyes of a good man and see him suffer for making a wrong decision. There was only one thing she wanted: to be in Paige’s life. But that did not mean her father had to give up his right to happiness. Edwina stomped her foot and headed up the stairs to her room.

  Maybe everybody else was blind around here, but she wasn’t. The man was giving up his life to make his daughter happy. Well, she wasn’t going to be party to that! Best to pack her things and head right back to her safe place. Another small city, another small-town library.

  She slammed the door for good measure. All good intentions, but not aimed well. Edwina threw her shoes at the door, remembering him standing there in the crack talking to her one evening. What in the world had happened?

  The bath water was running and so were her eyes. Edwina squirted rose-scented soap into the water—and then an extra dose for good measure—and watched the bubbles rise. She slipped in and sobbed until her eyes could not possibly squeeze another tear from them.

  A knock at the door sounded, and she jumped. Who could be about this hour of the night? It must be well past midnight. Then she heard the slight creak of the door. Someone was coming in.

  “Lass, I’m coming in.” came the familiar voice.

  “Oh Bertie, you frightened me,” she said through her stuffy nose. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

  “Aye, and I think ye have become a bairn.” She stood in the doorway.

  “A baby?” Edwina wanted to cry again.

  “Tis so.” Bertie began picking up her clothes, all the while muttering from the bedroom.

  “What are you doing up, Bertie?” she asked quietly.

  “Seeing to the laird.” She was back in the doorway. Edwina stared at her, too tired to try and figure out what the woman meant.

  “Get up out of there.” Bertie held out the cherry pink towel. Edwina got up and allowed herself to be wrapped. “Tis a fine lass that turns down the laird.” she snapped.

  “And a foolish one.”

  “He wasn’t asking me to... to marry him. He just needed a mother for Paige,” she said quietly. “I admire him for that, but I would not saddle him like that for anything.”

  “Saddle?”

  “Yes, you know, tie him down.”

  “Ye mean with ropes?” Bertie looked askance.

  “No.” Edwina giggled and popped a tissue from the box and blew her nose. “I just mean . . .”

  “There now, lass. Tell Bertie all about it.” Edwina allowed Bertie to put a soft white robe around her and stepped up on the box, throwing herself across the huge four-poster bed.

  “I’m so confused, Bertie. Nothing’s going like I planned. Everybody’s mad at me, and I don’t know what I did. I’m just trying to understand why a man like... A
lex,” she whispered his name, “would ask someone like me to marry him.”

  Bertie, sitting on the end of the bed, waited.

  “I mean, I know why he asked. Paige needs a mother and—”

  “Wait, lass. Ye think the laird asked ye for the bairn’s sake?”

  Edwina nodded slowly, feeling like a teenager after her first broken heart.

  Bertie’s hand hit the bed. “Ach, the American is a bairn herself.”

  No words came out of Edwina’s mouth. She knew it was true. She was a baby. A big baby.

  “Have ye no brains up in yer noggin?” Bertie pointed to her temple. “I’ll not have the laird pairin’ up with the likes of ye. Mark my very words,” she sputtered and stomped away.

  “Bertie—”