Salty tears burned her eyes before the wind whipped them away. Her goat skin slippers were no match for sludgy puddles of melting snow, and soon the damp had seeped all the way through to her stockings. But she would sooner face mud and cold than the concern and disappointment of the people she loved. She had an urgent desire to visit the lake: perchance gazing out over the clear expanse of rippling water might help to clear her mind. But when she finally reached the shingled shoreline, Isabella saw that a fog lingered over the water, so she could see no further than twenty feet ahead.
Even the weather was conspiring against her.
Uncaring of dirt, Isabella sank down onto a fallen tree trunk and hugged her knees.
She had hoped to be transported back to her childhood, when the lake was a magical place where rules were relaxed and almost anything could happen. The five de Neville siblings had played in the trees along the shore, skimmed stones on the water, paddled and even swam. She recalled one summer when she privately decided to swim out further than either Frida or Tristan; determined to prove to them that she was stronger than they believed. But she had not taken account of the bone-chilling cold of the deeper waters in the center of the lake; nor of the larger waves that washed right over her head. Panic had her in its grip, before she felt the strong arms of her brother pulling her to safety.
Tristan had always been there when she needed him. But he could not save her from Lord Gaunt. As the future Earl of Wolvesley, and the son of the King’s judiciary, he could no more break contract with a peer of the realm than she could storm a keep.
She sighed deeply, the pain in her heart far exceeding the numbing cold of her hands and feet.
As powerful as they were, neither her father nor her brother could help her in this. ’Twas all down to her. Isabella would marry Lord Gaunt because saving young Elena from that same fate was the right and proper thing to do.
And because it would be her final gift to Hamish.
At the thought of his name, Isabella’s final vestiges of self-control left her, and she began to sob.
“Dinna cry, lass. I canna bear it.”
Mayhap the spirits of the lake had conjured the man she most wanted to see. Somehow he was here before her, gathering her into his strong arms so that, for a fleeting moment, shebelieved that everything may yet be well. He was warm, solid and reassuring.
She sniffed in a most unladylike fashion. “You should not have come.”
How could she take comfort from him when she was to marry another?
“I couldna stay away.”
She pressed her forehead into the center of his chest and breathed deeply. “You must. We cannot be together, you and I. You have seen how it is.”
“I canna let this happen.”
She pulled back and looked into his honest blue eyes. What she saw there convinced her that he meant what he said. He was a man used to fighting for what he believed in, using both brawn and brain and never giving up.
But this was a fight he could never win.
A flare of anger shot through her chest. She had been resigned to her fate. What good could it do for him to come here and stir up hope?Futilehope.
She pursed her lips, feeling the same flush of defiance as the young girl who had swum too far into the lake. “How can you possibly prevent it?”
He recoiled as if she had slapped him. Slowly he got to his feet, his shoulders slumped.
“Ye are right to doubt me, for I dinna ken what I can do ter save either ye or Elena.”
Regret coiled inside her. She rose up from the log and put her hands on his shoulders. “Nay, I am wrong to put distance between us when we have so little time left.” She cupped a hand around his stubbled cheek. “We should not spend it squabbling.”
“I am so very sorry.” Emotion rippled across his face. “And I canna bear the thought of ye and him—”
“Hush.” She put her finger to her lips. “There is no more to say.”
“Then what can I do to help?” His plea was anguished.
She rose up on tiptoes and entwined her fingers in his tousled hair, so that her lips were all but pressed against his when she gave her answer.
“Love me,” she whispered. “No more questions. No more regrets. Just love me.”
Hamish lifted her easily into his arms and carried her to a copse of trees on higher ground, where the melted snow had all drained away. He spread his cloak on a bed of dry leaves and reverently, tenderly, did as she asked. Their two souls joined as lovers, coming together after a storm, each freely giving what comfort and warmth they could. Comfort which spiraled into peaks of pleasure, so that for a long time, Isabella forgot all about the ordeals ahead. There was only now. Only Hamish. His large body covering hers, his lips crying out her name. Their limbs tangled together so she no longer knew where she ended and he began. They were as one, and naught could ever part them.
But after, when their pounding hearts had slowed and their breathing returned to normal, she felt a wave of desolation which was colder than the fog rolling in off the lake. Tears pooled in her eyes but she held herself still and quiet so he would not notice her distress.
