“My owntroubles?”
“Ye want her, daenae ye?” she interrupted.
He clenched his jaw. “Flora, ye go too far. I am yer laird.”
“Aye, and I’m a pregnant woman who is too tired and sore to care much,” she responded, meeting his eye squarely and holding it. “I am the one who’ll have to console Alaina and Sophie after I tell them that Megan is gone. Me Laird, it’s clear to everyone that ye care for Megan. Why are ye letting her leave?”
He hadn’t expected this, not from Flora. Turning away, Ryder strode over to the fireplace, staring down at the dying embers.
“I am not the marrying kind,” he said at last. “Marriage and love bring pain.”
“They also bring happiness,” Flora countered. “A deep and lasting happiness. I’ve felt it myself, my laird. For every couple whose lives ended tragically, I can point out two more couples who spent a lifetime with each other, and wouldnae swap it for the world.”
Ryder closed his eyes. “If ye love someone, ye do not condemn them to a terrible fate and eventual misery. I will not put Megan through that. She’ll forget me.”
There was silence in the room behind him for a long moment, so long that he thought Flora might have slipped soundlessly away. When he glanced behind him, however, there she was, watching him with a faint frown.
“True love comes only once in a lifetime,” she said at last, her voice soft. “A few rare, lucky ones find it twice, and some unfortunates never find true love at all. The terrible fate and misery ye describe here comes only from ye pushing Megan away from where she wants to be. Only a great fool turns away from love, me laird, and neither ye nor Megan are fools of any description.”
Ryder clenched his fist so hard he was sure it would bleed.
“Ye should not speak to me that way, Flora,” he said at last, although there was no bite or anger in his voice.
Flora nodded, seeming to deflate a little.
“I suppose I have said too much,” she sighed. “Ewan will be angry when he knows that I’ve spoken to ye about this. I will say only this, me laird. Love is worth sacrificing for. All the best things in life carry risk, daenae they? If there was nay risk, it would nae be worth having.”
He didn’t answer that. He wasn’t sure what to say. Flora slipped quietly out of the room, closing the door behind her. Long after she had gone, Ryder found that he still had nothing to say. He could only think. And it wasn’t any logical thoughts. No. It was Megan’s smile. Megan’s fight. Megan’s touch. Megan’s devotion. Megan, Megan, Megan. God, what had he done?
There wasn’t much to pack. Megan had changed into one of her old dresses, a plain brown wool gown that laced at the front, stuffed her few belongings into a burlap sack, and then sat on her bed, staring at nothing.
It had been at least an hour and a half since she’d left Ryder’s room, and she’d taken steps to reduce her tears. There had been some tears, of course. That was unavoidable. She had wept for a while, then forced herself to stop. Those were enough tears.
He doesnae care for me,she thought woodenly.It will be better for all of us when I leave.
Perhaps that wasn’t entirely true. She was sure that Ryder hadsomefondness for her, but fondness was such a lukewarm emotion. One was fond of one’s old grandmother. One was fond of a good stew or a hot bath.
Fondness wasn’tlove. It was a weaker copy of it. Good enough in its way, of course—a person couldn’t loveeverything.
It would be all well and good,she thought,if I were only fond of him in return. That would be fair.
She already knew that wasn’t the case. Whatever Megan felt for Ryder was beyond fondness. She was beginning to fear that it might be love.
It occurred to her that she’d never talked much with her sisters about their romances. She’d always assumed that love was pleasantly evident, and that one could sit back and let it grow, like a flower in a garden.
She was rapidly beginning to suspect that love was not a bank of wildflowers, which grew on their own and looked lovely as long as you kept the worst of the weeds away. No, love was a vegetable patch. A lot of work went into growing vegetables—lots of maintenance, lots of watchful care. Not quite as pretty as the wildflowers, but by heaven, they lasted longer, and they kept you alive.
Closing her eyes, Megan allowed herself to sag backward onto her bed. Outside, the moon was high. Noise from the cèilidh still echoed through the Keep, laughter and music. It all seemed very far away.
I might as well be in a different world.
There had been no footsteps going past her door, so Megan assumed that Ryder was still in his room. Of course, she wasn’t going to humiliate herself by going up to speak to him. He’d been clear—no brides for Laird MacCulloch.
Suddenly, it seemed unbearable to just lie on her bed and wallow, so Megan hauled herself onto her feet and rifled through her just-packed bag. She found what she was looking for at the bottom.
Da’s book.
She passed a hand reverentially across the cover. Megan had intended to read the book for the first time with her sisters. After all, it belonged to them all. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to get at least a sense of what was inside first? It might just be a plain diary, but what if it hid terrible secrets, like a second family or a habit of murdering young women?
