“I do not know what you are talking about, Meghan,” he said coolly. “If you have been hurt by…” Longing for someone who could never be yours… “Something or someone, I am sorry.” He flexed his jaw. “But we are not the same.”
A faint, sorrow-tinged smile touched his cousin’s lips. “Very well, Arran. If you insist.” She dipped a curtsy, her frosty meaning clear. “If you’ll excuse me.”
Arran held himself rigid as Meghan hastened back to rejoin the festivities. He watched in unblinking silence until she ducked inside Campbell’s rooms.
The moment she’d gone, the panic he’d held at bay ran riot.
Christ help him.
She’d seen so damned much.
His innocent, young, trusting cousin, Meghan.
And if she had? Arran’s gaze snapped down the corridor; panic clawed up his throat. God above. What of the others? A blade of icy dread sliced straight through him.
I have to get the hell out. Now!
He should have never come for the Yuletide. Never should have agreed to smile at Meghan and the Duke of Hartwell’s blessed wedding as if he weren’t a walking curse.
He all but ran for the stables.
It didn’t matter where he went, how far, how long. A tempest to rival the Great Snow of 1717 could have swallowed him whole. Better than staying here with Lucy and Campbell.
His breath came in sharp, white spurts, and with shaking hands he saddled his chestnut stallion, Kelpie. One foot found the stirrup.
Freedom was within reach.
“Here you are, little brother!”
Of course. Thwarted. This time by Dallin—the viscount. The one bloody roadblock in Arran’s damned path.
Arran shut his eyes. The last person he wished to face was his cheerful, blissfully married brother. He swung fully into the saddle and aimed Kelpie at the doors—
Dallin stepped directly into the stallion’s path. “Whoa.”
When Arran didn’t budge, his brother gave his eyebrows a droll lift. “What now, Arran? Planning to trample me?”
“And then I become viscount and future earl?” Arran slid down from the saddle. “Not a chance.”
His brother smiled as though everything was right in the world.
But then, for the bloody viscount everything was.
“Mm, yes. That and all the sentimental nonsense about loving me and being devastated if anything happened to me.” With casual authority, Dallin took Kelpie’s reins and handed them off. “What is going on with you, little brother? Campbell’s alive, the family’s celebrating, and you look as if someone’s dropped him into the grave again.”
“Of course not,” Arran whispered. Horror clawed up his chest. “Why would you ever—How could you—?”
Dallin froze. Understanding hit him like a stone.
He turned to the stable lads. “Cider and biscuits in the kitchens—on us.” A cheer erupted; the men filed out, grateful as pups, leaving the stable blessedly empty.
Arran’s strength bled out of him. He dropped onto the straw-scattered floor, back against Kelpie’s stall. Head bowed. Hands over his face.
Dallin sank beside him, shoulder to shoulder.
Silence stretched.
“Christ, Arran.”
