Perhaps it was.
I don’t want you.
And yet, Gray had forced her to be with Tavish anyway.
Gently, Tavish lifted her into his arms, cradling her close as he walked back to Ross and Goliath. His friend’s gaze held only empathy and understanding. Setting Isla in front of his saddle, Tavish swung up behind her and gathered her to his chest. She melted into him—one hand clutching his lapel, the other snaking inside his coat and around his waist to grip a fistful of his waistcoat, her face pressed to his shirt.
He nudged Goliath to walk on, letting the sounds of her heartbroken sobs drift along the road behind them.
Tavish, Isla, andRoss arrived late at an inn on the southwest outskirts of Aberdeen, the distance between Kingswell and Castle Balfour being too great to travel in one day. They would spend the night here and then go their separate ways come morning—Ross to his family north, and Tavish to his in the south.
While Ross saw to the horses, Tavish stepped into the entryway and requested two rooms—one for Captain Ross, the other for Captain Balfour and Mrs. Balfour.
The innkeep frowned at Tavish’s black eye, but only asked if they had a preference for a room to the back or front of the building.
Tavish kept a tight arm around Isla’s waist as he spoke with the man. Hergreitinghad been replaced by a chilling silence. A sort of lethargic melancholy that worried Tavish far more than her weeping ever would.
Isla didn’t so much as twitch when the innkeep asked, “Would Mrs. Balfour like a bath to be drawn?”
Tavish nodded for her and then followed a maid to their bedchamber. He studiously didnotlook at the single bed to the left of the door.Why torment himself? Isla would never be joining him there. Not now. Not ever.
He waited until the maids had finished pouring hot water into a hip bath before turning for the door.
“I will sort this out, Isla, and convince Grayburn to see reason. Don’t despair. Not yet.”
“Thank you,” she whispered, gaze dead and unseeing. “Thank you for . . . for all of this.” She gestured at the room.
Silence descended.
Tavish didn’t know how to reply.My pleasurecertainly felt out of place.
He went with, “I’ll be in the bedchamber through the wall there with Ross, if ye have need of me.”
She didn’t reply, merely nodded, her face splotchy and eyes bloodshot.
Ross raised an eyebrow when Tavish knocked on his door.
“I don’t wish to discuss it,” Tavish said, entering the room.
To Ross’s credit, he spent the rest of the evening acting as if Tavish didn’t have a wife sleeping on the opposite side of the hearth.
And just as he had many times in the past, Tavish blew out the lamp and lay down to sleep beside Ross. Brothers in arms and all that. At least they were on a mattress this time and not wrapped in their greatcoats on the hard earth.
Neither of them spoke. They merely listened to the creak of floorboards and the scuttle of some rodent in the attic overhead.
Finally, Ross sighed. “The problem, Balfour, is that ye don’t want a different wife, do ye?”
“Nae.”
“Ye want to find a way to keep the one ye have.”
“Aye.”
If Tavish could establish an income, he might be able to provide for Isla—a way for them to move forward together. Or, if she refused him entirely, it would distract him from the pain of losing her yet again.
He felt more than saw Ross nod. “I’ll ask around for another investor.”
The olive branch . . . the kindness of it . . .
