“I fearedye wouldnae find me in time,” she whispered when she could finally speak again.
Hector’s armstightened around her. “I’ll always find ye, nay matter how far ye run or who tries to take ye from me.” His voice was fierce with promise. “Always, Gabriella. Always.”
24
The silence stretched between them, broken only by Gabriella’s ragged breathing against his chest. Hector’s heart hammered with such violence, he was certain she could feel it through his shirt.
Lewis’s bodylay twisted nearby, but the man might as well have been invisible—every fiber of Hector’s being was focused on the woman in his arms.
Noah approachedLewis’s body cautiously, nudging it with his boot before kneeling to check for a pulse. After a moment, he straightened. “He’s dead.”
“Good,”Hector said flatly.
“What doye want me to do with him?” Noah asked, his tone matter-of-fact.
Hector’s armstightened around Gabriella. “Leave him. He doesnae deserve a burial.”
Noah nodded curtly. “Aye, Me Laird.”
Christ.Gabriella’s alive. She’s breathin’. She’s whole.
The litany echoedin Hector’s mind like a prayer, but beneath the relief coursed something darker. Self-recrimination, sharp as any blade.
“I failed ye,”he said quietly, his voice rough with emotion he couldn’t contain. “I was supposed to protect ye, and I?—”
“Nay.”Gabriella pulled back just enough to look up at him, her tear-streaked face fierce with conviction. “Dinnae ye dare blame yerself for this!”
“But I should have been there. Shouldhave seen the threat, should have?—”
“Should have what?Been with me every moment of every day?” Her hands cupped his face, forcing him to meet her gaze. “Hector, ye came for me. That’s what matters. Ye found me, and ye saved me.”
The simple wordshit him like a physical blow. She was absolving him of guilt he’d carry to his grave, but the fear—Christ, the fear that had driven him through those trees like a man possessed—would never leave him.
“When I sawme maither’s blood,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper, “when she told me ye’d been taken… I thought I was going to die right there. The thought of losin’ ye, of never seein’ ye again…”
“But ye didnae lose me.”Gabriella’s thumbs brushed away tears he hadn’t realized he was shedding. “I’m here. I’m safe. And I kenned—even when I was most afraid, I kenned ye’d come for me.”
The absolute certaintyin her voice nearly undid him. “How could ye be so sure?”
“Because ye did everythin’ye could to find me the first time, even when ye didnae ken who I was,” she said, her voice soft but steady. “Because ye’ve never broken a promise ye made to me. Because ye took care of me in the castle like I was yer own. Ye showed me love.”
Love.
Such a simple wordfor something that had changed his entire world.
“Aye,”he murmured, his hands cradling her face with infinite tenderness. “I love ye more than me own life, Gabriella. More than me clan, me lands, me honor—everythin’ that makes me who I am pales next to what ye mean to me.”
Her breath hitched.“I was so afraid I’d never get to tell ye that I love ye, too. Completely. Desperately. Even when I thought I was going to die, the worst part wasnae dyin’—it was thinkin’ ye might blame yerself, might think ye hadnae done enough.”
The confession brokesomething loose in his chest, some last barrier he’d been holding against the flood of emotion. His mouth found hers with desperate hunger, pouring everything he couldn’t say into the kiss—his fear, his relief, his overwhelming need to make sure she was real and whole and his.
She kissedhim back with equal fervor, her fingers tangling in his hair, her body pressing against his as if she could melt into him. For a moment, nothing existed but the taste of her, the feel of her alive and responsive in his arms.
Then,she pulled back suddenly, her eyes wide with concern. “Andrea—how is she? Is she truly all right?”
The question was so quintessentiallyGabriella—thinking of others even after her own ordeal—that Hector felt his love for her swell.
“She’ll be fine,”he assured her, pressing a gentle kiss to her forehead. “The healer said it’s just a nasty bump. She was conscious when I left, more worried about ye than herself.”
