She reached up and touched his face, a sense of sadness crossing her eyes. “I love ye. I have loved ye from the moment I found ye in that alley, kicking that crate. But I cannae be yer wife. I’m not sure I want tae be.”
Her words clawed at his very soul. She didn’t want to marry him? But he had taken her maidenhood, been the first Scot to lay with her. She was his first for nearly everything, including his first love. It was only a matter of time before she wed him.
“I dinnae understand.”
Isabel dropped her hand. “I’m sorry, Erik, but I have tae go.”
“But ye love me!” he forced out, feeling as if his world was crashing down on him. “That should be more than enough for ye tae stay. I am not yer da, nor am I mine.”
“I know,” she said quietly, removing her arm from his grip. “Ye are a good Scot, Erik. I just, I need more.”
More. She wanted more. What more could he give her? He had given her everything—his heart, his soul, everything.
Yet it wasn’t enough for her. “Fine,” he gritted, stepping away from her. “I wilnae stop ye.”
She let out a sob as she placed the dresses in the bag. “I dinnae want tae hurt ye, Erik.”
“Well, ’tis too late,” he forced out as he moved to the door. “Ye have hurt me far more than ye can understand, Isabel.”
Erik shook out of the painful memory. “I was never enough for ye,” he answered, clearing his throat. “So why are ye here now, Isabel? Wot are ye doing like this?”
She sighed, wiping the tear from her cheek. “I need yer help, Erik. I...mah husband is a brute, and I want tae leave him, but cannae find a way tae do so.”
Erik snorted. “Tell me another lie.” He knew that she had dealt with far worse from her father, just like he had. They used to tend to each other’s injuries, though Isabel’s were not as visible as Erik’s had been. Together, they had learned to fight through the pain, both physical and mental, saving their tears for each other.
That was how they had transitioned from friends to lovers, and Erik had thought he had found his other half, his mate that would give him the family he hadn’t had as a bairn.
Unfortunately, she had brought him nothing but heartache, and it had taken him years to get over her, over what he had lost.
“I’m not lying,” Isabel stated, stepping toward him. Erik watched as she opened her cloak to show him her arms, dotted with fading bruises. “There’s more in other areas,” she said softly, closing her cloak and hiding the damage. “Where no one can see them.”
He wanted to feel bad for her. Isabel had been his love, the woman he had pictured as his wife, the mother of his children.
She had put herself in this situation, however, and he didn’t know what she wanted from him. “I can discuss yer situation with the Lady Edna,” he finally said. “She will protect ye if she can.”
Isabel reached out and gripped his arm, her eyes wide. “Nay! If he finds out I have told anyone, then he will kill me.”
“Then I cannae help ye,” he ground out, removing her hand from his arm and brushing past her. It was the hardest thing he ever had to do, to walk away, but if she wasn’t going to let him tell anyone, then he couldn’t very well help her at all. While he detested a wife beater, he wasn’t going to insert himself into someone else’s marriage if she wasn’t going to let him get her the help she needed.
“Erik...”
He closed his eyes, her soft voice vibrating through his body. There was a time that his name on her lips had been like heaven. She had breathed it, screamed it, sighed it as he had done to her name.
No longer. It just brought hurt to him now, a reminder of what she had taken from him. He turned and saw her standing alone in the hallway, looking as lovely as he had remembered. He knew everything about her—her former life, the way she gasped when he would touch her in a certain spot. He knew her fears, her wants. And he thought he knew her heart until she shattered his by leaving.
“Tell me ye dinnae still love me,” she said tearfully, “and I will leave ye be.”
“Does he know who ye are?” he asked instead. “Does he know that ye are a McGregor?”
“Nay,” she answered, shaking her head. “I...I used another surname. He was desperate for a wife that could bear him another son, and I needed a home.”
“Ye had a home,” he reminded her, clenching his jaw. “Yet ye decided tae throw that all away.”
She whimpered, but he was already striding away, ignoring the startled servants in the great hall as he passed. He couldn’t breathe, his throat tight at what they had discussed and what she had wanted from him.
A few years ago, he might have stormed into the bedchamber and killed her husband for her, eliminating the source of her pain. He had loved her fiercely, and not once had she flinched at who he was or the scars that dotted his body. She had been everything to him, though every time he had proposed they wed so that he could remove her from her father’s brutality, she had changed the subject.
Now Erik understood why. He was never good enough for her. He was nothing but gutter trash himself, with no future, save his warrior status at the time. He hadn’t become a second-in-command until much later, earning a room in the keep and a lofty position with some measure of authority, like what he was doing now.
Would Isabel have stayed if he had done it sooner? Would she have become his wife?
Erik snorted as he stepped out into the cool morning air, letting it clear his addled mind. It mattered not. What was done was done between them, and they couldn’t go back in time to change any of it.
Sighing, he walked toward the warrior’s circle, his breathing ragged. Why did she have to come now, after all these years? He had suffered through her leaving and the months that followed, and it hadn’t been until he had saved Kaiden’s life and started a friendship with the laird’s son that Isabel had become a distant memory.
Now he wanted that again.
Erik rolled his shoulders to relieve the tension, no longer concerned about his aching head or rolling stomach. She had nearly devastated him, and he would be wise to remember that the next time she brought those tears to him.
He couldn’t help her any longer.
