‘He asked me to stay as his leman and to move with him to Ord Dubh.’ She’d not shared that with her friend—or with anyone—since he’d told her. ‘He says married or not, he wants me by his side.’
‘And what did you say to that?’
‘I will be no man’s whore and will not share the bed of a man married to another woman.’
‘And has that changed? Have you changed your mind on such matters since learning that you carry his bairn?’
That was the heart of the matter, was it not? Could she continue to love him if he chose another woman? Oh, it was the custom and no one would think anything was awry when the heir of the most powerful man in the Highlands took a leman. Especially if she’d borne his child. But, after living with the shame and humiliation of failing her own husband, she really could not do that to another.
Muireall let out a sigh then and sat down, drinking her ale and pondering the matter. If her wise friend had not advice to give, she had no other place to turn.
‘You love him, do you not?’ Cat nodded. ‘And he has declared his love for you...’
’Twas not so much a question as a statement, for Aidan had made it clear how he felt about her to one and all. He’d declared his love in his actions and his words before his people and in the privacy of the home he gave her.
‘So, share with him this wonderful news and talk about the choices you have. If you wish to live somewhere else, he can still support the child and you. You must work this out between you.’
Catriona knew she must talk with him. Standing, Muireall stopped her from leaving with a hand to her arm.
‘You should think about seeing the midwife soon. If you had problems before...’
She did not have to finish the words, for it was something that already filled Catriona’s dreams with terrible images. She might not carry long enough. There could be problems with the bairn. It might not live past delivery.
‘Gunna is a kind soul and very experienced in matters like this. Fear not to speak to her, ask her advice. She has saved many women and bairns over the years.’
‘I will do that,’ she promised.
First, though, she would share the news with Aidan.
She began to walk back to the house and realised she was already much closer to the midwife’s house, so she turned around and decided to seek the woman’s counsel. She would rather be able to give Aidan more knowledge about her condition and her chances of delivering the bairn safely when they spoke.
‘Mistress MacKenzie!’
Before she could turn, a small, hard body ploughed into her, nearly knocking her over. She grabbed him and held him up and realised it was Alasdair.
‘Alasdair,’ she said, with a laugh. ‘You must have a care when running through the village. You could knock someone down.’
‘Lord Aidan...’ he said, pointing towards the main road. Was Aidan on his way here now? She did not think to see him until nightfall when his duties finished with his family at supper.
‘Is he come?’ she asked, peering in the direction in which the boy pointed.
‘Nay, nay,’ he said with a wild shaking of his head. Oh, the boundless energy of childhood, she thought. ‘He is there. Fighting with Munro. Like this.’ Alasdair began throwing punches into the air around him.
Aidan fighting Munro? Why? She gathered up her skirts and ordered the boy, ‘Take me there, Alasdair. Quickly, if you please.’
They scurried along the path to where it crossed the main road and Cat discovered that wee Alasdair was right—Aidan and Munro were involved in a vicious fight there for all to see. Knowing she must stop them, she ran up to where they now rolled in the dirt and called out their names.
Now close enough to see them, she saw the blood streaming from Aidan’s nose and from a cut over Munro’s eye. She began to call out to them again when the ground beneath her tilted and she had to fight to remain standing.
It took only a moment more of witnessing the bloodiness before her for her world to go dark. She heard Aidan screaming out her name and then her world went silent, too.
Chapter Nineteen
Aidan saw Catriona crumpled to the ground and tried to reach her, but Munro grabbed him by the hair and pulled him back to the fight. He used the motion of Munro’s action to swing around and punch his former friend in the jaw. A satisfying crunch told him that he’d broken something.
That satisfaction was short-lived, for Munro was the best fighter with fists and feet among his group of friends and a well-delivered blow to his stomach reminded Aidan why he needed to stay at least a pace away in a brawl. Landing on the ground again, he pushed to his feet and tried to reason with Munro.
‘Munro, I must see to her,’ he argued.
‘You bastard! Why her? Why could you not leave her be?’ Munro yelled at him as Aidan tried to get past him to Catriona. Why had she fainted so?
‘I love her, Munro.’
‘My father loved her! She was his wife!’ Munro tripped him as he took a step towards her and kicked him back to the ground. ‘She was just a game to you. You should have listened when she said nay, you...you did not!’
‘Munro!’ he called out again. ‘I order you to cease this now.’ Aidan backed up his demand with his own fists, gaining his feet and pummelling the man until he fell back a step.
‘You are good at giving orders, are you not, Lord Aidan. You ordered him away so you could seduce her. You ordered him to his death. And she does not ken the truth of it, does she?’
Aidan paused in shock at hearing his sins exposed and that brief moment allowed Munro to knock him down. He waited for the next blows and instead saw Munro grabbed and pulled away by Young Dougal. Climbing slowly to his feet, he looked around and realised that others had probably heard his claim. Dougal kept hold of Munro while Aidan ran to Catriona’s side.
‘This is not something to settle in public, Aidan,’ Dougal warned. When Munro began to argue, Dougal shook him and warned him off. ‘Bring her and finish this between you in private.’
Dougal dragged Munro down the path that led to Catriona’s house. Muireall reached his side and tried to help him, but he brushed her off.
‘I will see to her, Muireall.’
The woman looked as though she wanted to say something more, but she nodded and let him pass. Catriona did not rouse as he followed Dougal down the paths and lanes to the edge of the village. Dougal kept Munro outside when Aidan carried her in and laid her on the bed. Sitting at her side, he stroked her cheek and whispered her name.
‘Catriona, open your eyes and look at me.’
He went out to the common room and found a cloth and brought the jug of water with him into the bedchamber. Pouring some cool water on the cloth, he touched it to her face and neck and watched her rouse. She tried to sit up, but fell back, clutching the air.
‘Here, now,’ he whispered. ‘You are on our bed,’ he soothed. ‘Lie in ease and get your bearings first.’
‘Aidan?’ she asked as her eyes seemed to clear and she met his gaze. ‘You and Munro...fighting...’
‘You fainted, love,’ he said.
His stomach churned now, not from any damage done in the fight, but from knowing that he could not avoid her learning the truth. Munro would not let it lie and, unless he took drastic measures and got Dougal to drag him away now and remove him from Lairig Dubh, Catriona would find out the terrible way in which their love had begun.
‘Where is Munro? Why were you fighting?’ she asked, pushing herself up to sit next to him.
Did he stop it now by telling her the truth? Would it be worse if he did it or if he was exposed? Was there a better way to tell Catriona that he’d manipulated her life and caused Gowan’s death? As he realised the inevitable results now of his stupid shallowness and lust then, he knew he was facing the end
of...them.
And, though knowing he did not actually cause the man’s death and though knowing he’d tried to make things right after it, Aidan knew that the true consequences of his acts faced him now. He’d gained what he wanted only to watch it, and her, be torn apart.
Would she survive this betrayal? He looked at her face, her eyes widened in confusion and fear, and he prayed that she would not pay the price for his selfishness. But how many times could a person’s world be shattered for them to fall apart themselves?
Munro called out his name then, the sound of it loud enough for them to hear. She startled and looked at him.
‘I beg you to give me a chance to explain,’ he said, taking hold of her hand.
Munro’s call drew her attention once more and she walked out of the bedchamber towards the door. Before he could reach her, the door slammed open and Munro burst in. Dougal was right behind him, but Aidan waved him off.
‘I must speak with you, Catriona,’ Munro said.
‘Munro,’ she said, standing at Aidan’s side now, ‘I know how upset you are about me moving here and Aidan and my...’ He could tell she did not know what to call what existed between them. ‘But I love him, Munro. Your father is gone and I—’
‘Do you know how he died, Catriona?’ Munro asked in a harsh tone. Both of them carried wounds from their fight and both still bled. Munro must have continued struggling with Dougal for he was out of breath.
‘Do not do this, Munro. If not for the friends we were, then for her,’ Aidan pleaded with the man. The last time her world had collapsed, he was there to pick up the pieces and help her regain a life of her own. This time...who would do that?
Catriona looked at the two men, facing off now just as much as they had in the road a short time ago. She knew that the blood of young men ran hot and fights were commonplace among the laird’s strong warriors, but what had happened between these two was more personal. Sighing, she should have realised it was inevitable that they come to blows at some point over what Munro thought had happened.
‘Aye, Munro, I know how he died. His horse went lame and threw him on his journey back here from his assignment.’
‘Ask him how my father was sent on that assignment. Go ahead, ask him!’ Munro demanded. She jumped at the ferociousness of his tone. Looking to Aidan, she was shocked by the sad resignation in his gaze.
‘Aidan? What is he talking about?’ she asked, turning to the man she loved and whose bairn now grew within her. There was barely a pause and no chance for Aidan to answer when Munro said the words that would shock her to her soul.
‘He did it, Catriona. He asked his father to send your husband away so he could seduce you without a care. He sent my father away and to his death just to be able to rut between your thighs.’
If not his coarse words, his tone condemned her again of unfaithfulness to Gowan. She wanted to defend herself, but if what he said was true, then Aidan...Aidan....
‘You planned it all along? Did you?’ She looked at him, but he would not meet her eyes. ‘Did you?’ she screamed at him then.
He said nothing then and she threw herself at him, pounding her fists against his chest and crying out. His silence said more than any words he could say would. He took her by the shoulders and held her back a bit.
‘Cat, let me explain,’ he whispered.
‘Just tell me...is it true? Did you send Gowan away to...seduce me?’ She held her breath, hoping, praying, wishing he would deny it to her face, but he smiled that sad smile that always made her want to take his worry and pain away. Now, it damned him. ‘Is it true, Aidan?’ she cried out.
‘Aye, Cat. I told my father to send him away.’
Though she heard the words, she could not take them and all they meant in. Her mind rejected it all and showed her images of the two of them since she became Aidan’s leman...his whore. And all at the cost of a good man’s life.
For a moment this morning, after sharing her news—her news!—with Muireall, she’d begun to accept the idea of remaining here and raising her child, his child, there in the place where he’d grown up, around his kith and kin. But all of that crumbled as did all her hopes and dreams as the ground on which they were built were washed away by the treachery of his act.
‘Get out.’
Neither man moved, so she shouted it. ‘Get out now!’
She pushed Aidan towards the door, moving him only because he allowed it. ‘Get out. Get out,’ she repeated over and over again, only knowing she must rid herself of him and Munro, who was right all along. Unable to face her part in the sin, she needed them gone.
Neither one resisted or refused her then. When she reached the door, she noticed Rurik’s son standing there with an expression of shock that must have resembled her own. She slammed the door and was left alone in the house Aidan had given her and now she understood his actions better.
He’d sent her husband off to be able to seduce her without interference.
He’d sent Gowan to what would become his death.
He’d paid her blood money to ease his guilt.
He’d made her his whore and she’d loved every moment of it.
God forgive her, she’d accepted it all and never looked at the real cost of it.
For the longest time, she stood there, in the centre of the room, unable to move, unable to think really, unable to put all the pieces in this terrible puzzle together. Then, the silence was broken by a knock on the door. Still unable to do anything, she began to tremble as his voice spoke from the other side of it.
‘Cat, I beg you to listen to me. I know you are not ready to hear me now, but I pray you not to do anything until you hear me out. Please, Cat.’
Once his pleading would have warmed her heart. Once his pleading led to indescribable pleasure. Now, it chilled her from her skin to her soul. She would not answer him, even if she could. Closing her eyes, she prayed he would leave before she lost the last bit of dignity and control she held on to.
The sound of his heavy footfalls echoed into the silent chamber as he left.
* * *
Aidan followed the path back to where Munro stood waiting with Dougal. Without pausing, he punched the man who used to be his friend, knocking him off his feet. Dougal gave him a look of frustration, but did not intervene now. Hidden from view of the rest of the village, Aidan planned to say the things he could not say to her.
‘You had to do that, did you not, Munro? She was your father’s wife. I was your friend.’
‘That gave you no right to her,’ Munro argued back. But it was the tone of his reply, the hints of jealousy and possessiveness that Aidan had never realised before.
‘So you wanted her for yourself and I got in your way?’
The shock of his accusation flashed across Dougal’s face, but Munro’s reaction was more of the guilt he probably wore on his own face.
‘What did you hope to gain from telling her? That she would run to you and beg for your help? That she would be shamed into returning to you?’
Munro scrambled to his feet. Brandishing his fist, he fought with his words this time. ‘But I did not send my father to his death, you did that, Aidan MacLerie.’
‘Did I, Munro? I sent him away, I admit it. I wanted her from the first time I saw her and I sent him on a mission that would keep him away from Lairig Dubh so I could get her in my bed.’ Aidan shook his head. ‘But my aim was never to kill him or harm or hurt her. You did that.’
Munro gasped and shook his own head in reply. ‘I did not. I could not stand by and see my own father turned cuckold by you. So, I summoned him home to see to his own wife and her unfaithfulness.’
‘Munro,’ he said, talking now, not shouting. ‘Did you ever ask her if she’d broken her vows? You were my friend—did you ever ask me?’ He paused. ‘Nay, you did not. Instea
d you summoned your father back with some stories drawn from rumours and not the facts. Catriona was faithful to your father until and even after the day he died.’
Munro’s face drained of colour as the truth struck him then.
‘Between the two of us, we have destroyed two lives,’ he admitted. ‘I hope that God forgives us, for I doubt that Catriona will be able to now.’
There was nothing else to say now between them. Two men who had been friends and rivals for the same woman without knowing it and now were nothing. Only the thinnest of blood connections remained, leaving them related.
‘Come. Your father will have heard about this by now,’ Dougal counselled. ‘You should speak to him.’
Aidan did not wish to speak to his father—he wanted to go back and beg her forgiveness. He wanted to hold her and tell of her of the youthful madness and indefensible attempts at seduction that had driven him to have her. That he truly had not wished Gowan ill mattered not—he had, directly or not, brought about the man’s death.
Worse, he’d convinced Cat that he was better than the other men who had betrayed her in her own life. Just when she might have believed that he’d helped her, the truth came crashing into everything and she was left with a life in tattered pieces...again.
At least this time she had property and coins saved. At least this time she could walk away and live her own life with no ties to the MacLeries, if she chose to.
But he prayed that she would do nothing until they could talk. He wanted her to stay, to let him explain, but mostly he wanted her to wait until the shock of what she’d learned passed.
Aidan feared for her. He feared for their love even more.
* * *
When she was alone again, all control vanished and she crumpled to her knees and then fell to the floor.
He’d professed his love for her, to her, making plans and begging her to stay at his side. And yet, all the while, he was the one responsible for sending Gowan away. He’d given her the means to an independent life, more than she’d ever had before—property she could have called her own, money to use as she needed. He’d urged her to better herself and even his cousin offered her a place in her household.
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