A cry went up, joyful revelry robbing him of whatever she’d intended to say.
The stable doors burst open.
Andromena came exploding through the doors.
“It is a Yuletide miracle!” she cried. “Come quick—Campbell is awake.” Her excited eyes landed on Lucy. “And he is asking for you, Miss LeBeau.”
Chapter 15
“You saved me, Miss LeBeau.”
The last words between the loving couple, as far as Arran heard, and he was grateful for failing to hear a word more.
A veritable chorus of McQuoids’ and Smiths’ joyous tears and relief-infused laughter as they united in happiness filled the room.
Arran gritted his teeth.
A veritablecelebration.
Lucy’s and Campbell’s murmurs were soft, private. Not drowned out. No, the pair simply carved a space for themselves amid the noise. The bold, maddening Scotswoman who’d seized Arran’s sanity…leaning into his cousin with an ease that gutted Arran clean.
Arran hung by the doorway of his own hell, inhaling slowly, deliberately through his nostrils and then releasing the air through tightly compressed lips.
Satan had come to exact his due for all the sins on Arran’s soul. Of course he had.
His gaze stayed locked on Lucy, on the graceful column of her swan-like neck he’d kissed, the slight dimple in her cheek he’d memorized. Even across the length of a room, and her profile only partially to him, she was all he saw.
Campbell, newly roused from his head injury, spoke cheerfully beside her.
The family adored it—Arran’s present self excluded.Hedespised it with the heat of a thousand burning infernos.
Did Lucy hear any of the revelry? Could she when she remained trapped in a world with Campbell?
The moment Lucy had arrived, dragging a half-frozen Campbell inside, Arran had known she held secrets. Somethingin her carriage, in Campbell’s silence about her… She was a puzzle he’d wanted to solve.
Then a single night beside a kitchen fire had torn down every suspicion and replaced it with something far worse: hope.
The doorjamb he’d fixed his left shoulder to upon arriving was the only thing that kept Arran upright.
Christ, if he didn’t toss his head back and laugh at the bloody irony of it all, he might shatter.
All the prattling and laughter dimmed around him.
Lucy had made him feel alive again. Not because his year had been bleak, though it had been. No—because she’d reminded him of who he once was. A brother. A son. A man who loved and forgave and fought for others.
In a clan like the McQuoids, a person didn’t become lost, one was born lost—swallowed up in laughter and overlapping voices.
Loved absolutely.
Seen? Rarely.
Hell, one Christmas, they’d actually forgotten Myrtle in London.
Cease this! You are not a bloody fool. You’ve known the lady less than a handful of days.
But in this brief window of time, she’d brought so much into his life. She’d shown him that his intentions for Linnie and Tremaine had been good, that forgiveness still had a place in his soul.
A spasm wracked his throat.
