That stopped her. Her expression faltered, confusion flashing through her eyes. “What do ye mean?” she asked though Kieran had the sense she already knew what he was trying to tell her.
He exhaled through his nose, looking past her to the rain-slick road. There was no easy way to say it, and he could hardly meet her eyes when he spoke about it. Every time he thought about his wives, he couldn’t help but think of the way he had failed them all.
“Someone’s targetin’ me wives,” he said at last, his tone flat with the weight of the truth. “That’s how the past three have died.”
Silence fell between them—the kind that was thick enough to carve with a blade. The color drained from Lydia’s face, but she didn’t seem surprised to hear it—only unsettled to have her suspicions confirmed.
“Ye’re sayin’—”
“I’m sayin’ there’s a killer near us,” Kieran cut in quietly. “An enemy who wants the McDawson line to end with me, and if ye wish to live long enough to curse me for marryin’ ye, ye’ll keep to me side or Michael’s. Always.”
For a long moment, there was only the sound of the horses and the wind rattling the carriage windows. Lydia’s eyes were wide, searching his face—for mockery, for cruelty, perhaps for reassurance.
He let her see none of it. By binding himself to her, he had already condemned her to a life of fear and risk. Unless he found out who had been targeting his wives all this time, Lydia would always have to look over her shoulder, searching for a danger that may or may not be there.
Then, slowly, she nodded. “I understand.” Her voice trembled, but she forced it steady again. “I daenae need yer protection, Me Laird, but I… I’ll do as ye say. For now.”
Kieran felt a reluctant tug at his mouth, the faintest, most unwilling hint of a smile. She was a stubborn girl, but he could be stubborn too, more so than most people. The only way he hadkept his councilmen in check for so long was because he was willing to fight to the last breath.
Yet despite her brave words, fear still lingered behind her eyes.
Kieran leaned forward slightly, lowering his voice. “Daenae worry, lass. Ye’re safe as long as ye’re by me side.”
Something in his tone made her eyes snap to his. Her throat moved as she swallowed with an audible click, her breath hitching. She turned her face away but not before he caught the faint blush beneath her skin.
And damn if he didn’t like the look of it.
She was supposed to be a duty, nothing more, a necessary sacrifice to silence his council’s whispers. Yet already, sitting beside her in the dim carriage light, her defiance and strength stirred things in him he had thought long buried under grief.
He looked away from her, reluctant to give in to this sudden beating of his heart. He couldn’t afford this: the distraction, the pull, the thoughts that followed when he averted his gaze. His clan depended on his focus, and so did the life of this woman.
And she, his last bride, could not end up in the ground.
The night air was heavy with rain and smoke. The torches in the corridors hissed as Lydia followed the maid through the winding stone halls, her slippers silent against the floor. The castle felt alive, not with warmth but with whispers. Every flicker of firelight seemed to hide movement, and every draft carried the scent of sea and peat, sharp and cold.
When the maid left her at the door of the Laird’s chambers, Lydia’s stomach twisted into knots.
“Goodnight, Me Lady,” Chloe said softly, a smile always dancing at her lips.
Lydia tried to smile back. “Goodnight.”
When the door closed behind her, the silence deepened. The room was vast, larger than any she had ever seen. At the far end, a roaring hearth painted the walls in gold and shadow. A fur rug sprawled before it, and a wide bed sat in the corner under a carved lintel, heavy with dark blankets. She caught her reflection in the window glass—a pale, nervous ghost in a cream nightgown, her hair loose over her shoulders.
Ye are a wife now. A Lady. Ye cannae be afraid.
And yet, she was. Kieran wasn’t there, but the anticipation of his arrival was more than enough to twist her stomach intoknots, to make her tremble where she stood in the middle of the chambers.
Moving near the fire, Lydia wrung her hands until the skin under her rings ached. The more she waited there, alone, the more her thoughts drifted to Kieran’s late wives. What had happened to them? Were they standing just where she stood now, trembling, waiting for the same thing?
Suddenly, the door opened behind her, and Lydia turned sharply, her pulse leaping.
Kieran stepped in, tall and broad-shouldered, his coat removed, his dark hair still damp from the rain. The firelight caught the hard lines of his jaw, the shadow of his beard, the faint scar near his temple. He looked every bit the dangerous man she had been warned about, and yet he didn’t seem cruel or indifferent to her, like she had feared—just weary, as though the weight of the whole world rested upon his shoulders.
“Ye should rest,” he said after a moment, his deep voice rough in the quiet.
Lydia nodded though her heart pounded so violently she thought he must hear it. “Aye, Me Laird.”
The words felt strange on her tongue, like her mouth was filled with cotton. Her throat was dry, her eyes hot. A strange emptiness grew in her stomach, as if a pit was opening up there, and she could do nothing to stop it.
