Scarlett stared up at him, searching his chiseled face for the answers. He’d always been able to provide them for her, but now Laird looked as troubled as she. His calloused fingertips traced the edge of her jaw and down the long line of her neck.
“Come, lass, I ken ye’ve always an opinion.”
“I don’t want to go.” Scarlett swept a hand over her rounded belly. She hadn’t had another contraction yet, but with her water broken, it was only a matter of time. “I mean, I suppose I have to go given the option, but I don’t want to.”
“Ye ken ye dinnae hae to,” came his soft response.
Choices.
But to not go could mean losing their child if it was too premature to survive on its own. High infant mortality rates in the sixteenth century had provided Laird a far more philosophical outlook than she had on the subject.
Babies often died, it was a part of life here. Accepted. When Laird’s young sister, Aileen, had recently miscarried during her first pregnancy, she and her husband had been saddened. Already they had moved on, however, thinking ahead to their next child.
If she and Laird lost this baby, he would mourn. Fully. Perhaps forever in his heart. But life would move on.
For him.
Even after so many years in the sixteenth century, Scarlett couldn’t fully embrace their fatalistic attitude. When she’d begged Donell to return her to 1513, to Laird, she’d assured him she would accept whatever fate had in store for her. Mostly, as he’d pointed out. However, she hadn’t fully realized how a medieval lifestyle might affect her until their daughter had been born. The realization that at any moment some disease, or even infection from the most miniscule injury could take Hermione from her had turned Scarlett into the worst sort of helicopter mom for a long while.
Taking a philosophical view on life had been a difficult process for her. She still didn’t excel at it.
Hugging her stomach to cradle the babe within, she considered the alternative. Hope mingled with fear. Laird’s big hand covered the top of her belly, his thumb caressing back and forth. He loved to feel the baby move, feel the life growing.
Hermione, with all the energy of a three-year-old, burst into the room and bounced up on the bed between them. She snuggled against Scarlett’s side and Scarlett hugged her close, rocking her gently.
Laird moved his hand to Hermione, stroking her cheek tenderly. He was torn, Scarlett knew. Torn between the safety and security of each of them. In this moment, though, she knew without a doubt he’d choose Hermione’s safety and future over their unborn babe. He’d had three years of loving her to cement the choice. However medieval the logic, Hermione’s loss would crush him more than that of a child he’d yet to meet, as much as he loved that child already.
“My love for ye all consumes me.” His low brogue was rough with emotion. “I ne’er imagined such joy in my life. Nor nae greater sorrow at the thought of losing one of my dear lassies. I cannae risk ye. Risk this.”
In a way, she understood this thought process, understood his loyalty to his precious daughter. To the family he had in his reach. But Scarlett had that new life within her. Felt it. The love she had for her unborn baby was as powerful to her as it was for her daughter.
Still…
“I don’t want to take any chances that I might not make it back either,” she admitted quietly. Hermione’s eyelids began to droop and soft, breathy snores ruffled her hair. Scarlett brushed the strands back from her face with a smile. Gambling on the future of her whole family petrified her.
Unaware of her inner debate, Laird gave a short, harsh laugh. “If it ‘twere to happen at all.”
Scarlett grinned at his skepticism. “Part of you still doesn’t believe in Donell’s magic, does it?”
“Do ye? Deep down?”
“Of course. That magic showed me a whole new way of perceiving life. The world.” She reached up and ran her fingertips along his bearded jaw, brushing them back and forth. “It brought me to you, Laird. It gave me this life. There’s nothing more real to me than what I have with you.”
A little shudder of trepidation rattled her. God, she really didn’t want to lose what she had here. But she didn’t want to lose her baby either.
“What am I to do?” Low and husky, her voice trembled with the same indecision quaking in her soul. “I can’t leave you. Can’t leave her. Yet I cannot knowingly sentence our unborn child to a certain death when there is the tiniest chance I can save it.” A hot tear blazed a trail down her cheek before Laird brushed the drop away. “I just can’t, Laird. I’m sorry.”
He clasped her trembling hand, pressing it to his cheek then turned his head to kiss her palm. The action soothing in its warmth, comforting her with his quiet strength, just as he had for the past five years.
“Dinnae be. Ye willnae leave us. Or rather, I willnae let ye leave wi’oot us. I swore long ago to protect ye wi’ my life. To ne’er leave yer side,mo chroí.If Auld Donell is to work his magic, he will take us all.”
Love for this marvelous man infused her but a flash of amusement pushed to the forefront. Laird was a wonderful man, loving husband, amazing father, and she adored him beyond reason, but for all his strength and solidity, he wasn’t one to appreciate unpredictability. Especially since she’d delivered him the biggest shock of his life in the revelation of time travel.
Like Emmy, he was a man who liked to be in control. Of his life. His destiny.
He hated surprises, and unlike Connor who was a few hundred years closer to the innovation and changes, the experience and understanding betwixt them, that’s all Laird would find in the twenty-first century. One appalling surprise after another.
Sending Laird to the future would be like strapping him into a roller coaster and letting him roll. No escape, no control.
