She wanted the blessed numbness to return.
She wanted the black terror to retreat and never bother her again.
“I ken that ye dinnae want to see me, lass. But I cannae leave ye be. Not when I know ye are hurting so. I promise I will do nothing. I willnae touch ye.” A softthunk, as if he had rested his forehead against the door. “Just . . . dinnae shut me out.”
She could see it so clearly in her mind’s eye. Kieran leaning against her door, his palm on the wood, as if he could reach her by the strength of his affection alone.
It tugged at her. A need to go to him, to soothe his fears.
Why?!
She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes.
Why, why,whydid he pull at her, call to her? Why could he not be vile and ridiculous so she could hate him and move on?
Instead, he plied her with oranges and sweet words and made her wish that maybe, for once, she could find the courage to fight her desolate brokenness.
That she did not have to choose between two undesirable options—living trapped in the pain of black memories or compressing her emotions into a frozen white glacier.
That somehow, she could be whole.
He made herwantto be whole. To live again—
Give him a chance.
No. It felt . . . impossible.
The more she came to know Kieran, the more she poked a cautious finger into the blankness of her missing memories, the more fear and darkness swarmed out to torment her.
She simply couldn’t do it. She didn’t have the courage—
“You’re stronger than ye ken,” Kieran said from the other side of her bedchamber door.
Eilidh let her hands fall from her eyes.
At the very least, Kieran MacTavish could stop reading her mind.
But he continued on, voice muted but still clear through the heavy oak between them.
“Cuthie and that voyage took too much from ye. Why continue to let him hold your future hostage? Why allow the fear of hidden memories to dictate your path? Take charge, lass. Remember in truth and prove Cuthie’s accusations wrong.”
Eilidh bit her lip.
Remembering was the problem, was it not?
At least at the moment, her memories were unknown.
But what happened when she knew?
When the unspecified terror she felt had defined edges—a voice, a face, a body?
How wasknowinggoing to do anything other than varnish her pain in colors as vivid as one of Ewan’s paintings?
“There is beauty in your memories, lass,” he continued. “I know I keep saying it, but it’s true. It might not be all good, but I believe that if ye were tae remember . . . if ye could just see in your head the way I cared for ye . . . ye would say . . .” A deep breath sounded, followed by another soft thunk of his head against the door. “. . . ye would see that the good outweighs the bad. Ye would not be so . . .afeart.”
Quiet.
So quiet, she thought he might have left.
