Fiona turned to her. “Ye seem close with the baby.”
Emma nodded.
“It is clear she trusts ye, lass,” Fiona added. “She’s settled better with ye than with anyone I’ve ever seen. Even her faither.”
Emma crossed the threshold. “I’ll do me best by her. And thank ye for comin’. It couldnae have been easy for ye.”
“Nay,” Fiona said, her gaze returning to the child. “But it’s necessary. Whatever lies behind us, we’re allies now. Me daughter’s death was a tragedy, but we are still bonded by Stella. We must honor the peace.”
Emma swallowed, thinking hard about what to say. She could try to find a way to appease the older woman. Perhaps tell her how sorry she was for her loss.
Losing a child was incredibly difficult, and it was hard for her to imagine what Fiona had gone through when it had happened or was going through now, in the castle where it had happened.
Unsure of exactly how to articulate her thoughts, Emma drew nearer to the chair. “Would ye like a cushion behind ye?”
“I am fine,” Fiona answered, then touched the quilt, smoothing a crease with careful fingers. “She has her maither’s mouth when she sleeps.”
“A pretty mouth, that is,” Emma remarked.
“Aye.”
They fell silent for a minute, and Emma let her senses focus on the smell of fresh towels that lingered in the nursery. That was perhaps the one thing that quelled her anxiety.
“Ye ken, I never wanted to come.”
Emma swallowed. “Really?”
“Aye. But Arthur insisted. He had been planning this journey for quite a while. Thought we owed Stella the courtesy. As if the baby would ken what that is.”
A nervous laugh escaped Emma’s lips. Down the corridor, someone laughed and then fell silent. The baby’s lashesfluttered, and Emma folded her arms to keep from reaching for her.
“It’s nay small sacrifice,” she said softly, “for any lady to marry one of the bravest and most protective men in Scotland.”
Why would ye say that, Emma?
It took every shred of her will not to palm her face.
Fiona’s jaw tightened. “Protective,” she repeated. “He failed to protect me daughter, if he wasnae the one who…” Her voice thinned, and color drained from her face. “Forgive me. Grief makes a fool of me tongue.”
“There’s nothing to forgive,” Emma assured her. “Loss isnae and will never be rational.”
Fiona nodded once. “Ye’re right about that, me dear. Loss never leaves a maither. It only grows quieter, like breathing in the dark.”
Emma allowed a small pause. It was not her place to tell Fiona the truth. Therealtruth. Plus, what good would it do? Fiona and Arthur only knew the version of the story where Jack upped and killed their daughter for no reason. To them, she was still a saint who never had an affair with her husband’s best friend or tried to kill her husband.
No, it would be merciful to let them keep that memory.
“I daenae ken what I can do to help. Ye must understand that I daenae?—”
“I kent he would eventually remarry, Emma. Emma, is it?” Fiona asked, to which Emma nodded. “I was surprised he held out for as long as he did.”
“Aye,” Emma said. “This is more of an arrangement than it is a marriage.”
Fiona studied her. “I would like to think that ye ken the man ye’re about to marry.”
Emma held the look and shrugged. “I ken him as much as a woman kens a man she wants to marry.”
“So I daenae need to tell ye to be safe?”
