Something pulled sharply beneath his ribs. He exhaled slowly through his nose.
He faced the men again. “Form up,” he said. “We continue.”
Later that evening, Erica stood at the window with her palms flat on the sill. The yard lay dark and still, and her breath fogged the pane with each slow exhale that she refused to notice.
Thoughts of what had happened over the past few days crowded her mind. First, Alex tried to protect her, then he said that he wasn’t in the mood to get married. Like marriage was just something decided.
She was still lost in her thoughts when a knock sounded at the door.
“Ye may enter,” she said, expecting Leah or Grandmamma.
Alex stepped in, and her spine stiffened.
“Nay.”
“We need to talk,” he said.
“We have nothing to discuss.”
“Good,” he replied, closing the door. “Then I will talk, and ye will listen.”
He did not come close. Instead, he took the space by the fire, rested one hand on the chair’s back, and kept his gaze steady on her face.
She stared past his shoulder. “What do ye want?”
He drew a breath that seemed to catch halfway. “Me first wife,” he said, then stopped. The fire popped. He tried again. “Ye ken very well what she did to me. I told ye all about it.”
His hand moved, a small, rough sweep over his scarred eye, his chest, the air between them. Words thinned in his mouth, as if speaking them hurt.
Erica did not move.
He pushed on. “What I didnae tell ye before was that she didnae start out as the vindictive woman I described to ye. Ye see, I once kent Isabella as a rather kind woman. Nae once did I think she would become… well, what she became. I was wrong. She cut me, and she would have cut more if Calum hadnae stopped her. After that, I learned what trust costs. I learned it with blood.” His jaw set. “I cannae pay that price twice.”
Silence filled the gaps he left.
He gave her a pointed look. “I cannae trust anyone. Especially nae ye.”
Her mouth dropped open before she could stop it. “Me?”
“Aye.” His voice was quiet, and that was worse. “If ye betrayed me the way she did, I daenae ken what I would do, and frankly speaking, I daenae want to find out.”
The words landed clean. No heat. No plea. Fact, like a blade set on a table.
Erica’s fingers curled against the sill. “Then why are ye here?”
“Because the world presses in,” he said. “Because I said I will keep ye safe, and I still intend to do that. But we cannae make a mistake that we willnae be able to pull back from.”
“Ye have yet to answer me question. Why are ye here?”
He watched her for a heartbeat longer, as if judging whether she would bolt, then spoke. “We will keep our distance andtryto be courteous in public. Ye cannae see me and hurry the other way like ye did this afternoon. That would only feed rumors, and I ken ye daenae want that. I will post guards at yer door, and I will read every letter that comes in or goes out. Ye will tell me if any man comes near ye that ye didnae ask for.”
“Any man,” she repeated, her voice flat.
“Aye.”
Something about the irony of that statement almost made her laugh, but she didn’t. Instead, the line of her mouth hardened. “Ye speak of trust like it is a coin ye own alone.”
“I speak of what I can survive,” he said.
