“I won’t give him back.”
Ire began to bubble under the surface of his stolid demeanor.What was it about this coo?Was it some sort of magical beast?He’d gone out of his way to come to the lady’s rescue.And now he was offering to bend over backwards for her to keep her out of trouble.To think she was refusing his help…
He clamped his teeth together hard enough to crack walnuts.It would do no good to lose his temper with the lass.He had to try to use reason.
But before he could explain to her that she couldn’t keep the coo, that stealing was wrong, she blurted out, “I can’t return him.I don’t expect ye to understand why.Nobody does.”
Her words—so raw, so hurt, so vulnerable—shot him straight through the heart, wounding him to the core.His ire dissolved like iron in a crucible.
If there was one thing Hew prided himself on, it was understanding women.
He knew they sometimes felt small and powerless.Insignificant and unheard.As if their thoughts and hopes and dreams didn’t matter.
But they did matter.They mattered to him.
“I want to understand,” he told her.
“Ye don’t mean that.”
“I do.”
She blinked in surprise, then lowered her gaze.“Ye’ll only think me foolish.”
“Tell me.”He clasped her arm.“I pray you.”
Carenza never let men touch her unbidden.She was skilled at diplomatically ducking away from their attempts.She could peel their fingers off of her person, smiling all the while.Make them feel as if they’d earned her affections even while she sidled out of their reach.
But the Viking’s massive hand wrapped around her arm didn’t feel like a dalliance or an intrusion.It felt curiously like a comfort.
Through his touch, she could feel the warmth of his blood.The strength of his muscles.The sincerity of his words.
She had no desire to wrest free of him.
Indeed, shewantedto tell him her reasons for keeping Hamish, even though she knew he wouldn’t understand.
She gazed at the ground and murmured, “My da means to kill him.”
His thumb rubbed along her arm as he considered his response.“Heis…a coo.”
She sighed.She knew that.
“And he’s, what, five, six years old?”
“Six.”
“And your clan,” he ventured, “they have roast for supper, aye?”
She nodded, and her eyes began to fill with tears.She knew he wouldn’t understand.She hardly understood herself.
“And you?”he asked softly.“You eat roast for supper?”
“Aye,” she confessed, sniffling as she spoke her hypocrisy aloud.“But ’tisn’t Hamish.’Tisn’t the coo I raised from a calf…who lays his head upon my lap…and lets me sing him to sleep.’Tisn’t the beast who comes trottin’ across the field to me when I call.Who lets me scratch him behind the ears…and helps me watch o’er the new bairns.”
“He does all that?”
She nodded.
“Ah, my lady,” he said, giving her arm a reassuring squeeze.“But I do understand.You have a gentle nature and a kind heart.’Tis a commendable thing in a person.”
