“Lie down beside me, Maggie, and let me hold you. That’s all I need right now.”
She did so gladly, so overcome by Gabriel finally returning to their room that she trembled.
She couldn’t say what hour it might be, but she sensed it was deep in the night, dawn mayhap only a few hours away. He smelled of sweat and wood smoke, his body so warm as he drew her close and rested his chin upon her shoulder, her back pressed to his chest and his arm beneath her breasts.
A few moments more and she wondered if he had fallen asleep, overcome by weariness, his breathing slow and steady. Only when she shifted a little and he kissed the curve of her neck did she realize he was still awake, if only barely, Magdalene shivering at the warmth of his lips.
“Sleep, my love. We leave in the morn for home.”
“Home?” she echoed, elation sweeping her. “I feared you might leave tae fight alongside King Robert—”
“Aye, that day will come—but not yet. I’ll be staying in Argyll tae ensure the MacDougalls dinna rally, though Cameron will help tae keep things in hand with the Campbells supporting him. One moment my captain and now a baron with title and castle—poor bastard. Soon his clan will demand he take a wife when no woman thus far has cured him—”
“Cured him, Gabriel?” she queried, confused. “Is he ill?”
“Aye, with shyness for as long as I’ve known him when it comes tae the fairer sex.” Gabriel gave a small chuckle. “He and Conall couldna be more different when it comes tae women. One a glutton and the other, starving—och, Maggie, will you deny me a few hours’ sleep with your questions?”
His voice was low and teasing, but she sensed his great fatigue when his arm loosened around her and she felt his head drop against the pillow—aye, she was keeping him awake while he desperately needed rest!
She grew very still and surely enough, within moments his arm was a leaden weight, his body heavy against her.
His breathing so deep and quiet that she closed her eyes, too, though one word kept ringing in her mind.
Home. She and Gabriel would be returning together to MacLachlan Castle where they could truly start their life together as husband and wife.
No more pretending to anyone that she was a lunatic.
No more Seoras plaguing Gabriel with his summonses and demands.
Keira and Rhona waiting for them, aye, their little family—and mayhap a bairn already on the way, Magdalene pressing her hand to her abdomen as fresh elation swept her.
Yet a cold chill soon followed, gnawing at the edges of her happiness as Cora’s words came back to her…his poor grandmother fell down the stairs and broke her neck, his mother went for a swim and drowned in the lough, and Malcolm’s wife died from burns after her gown caught fire in the kitchen.
How could such tragedies have come to pass? A horrendous coincidence, surely!
In quiet defiance, Magdalene nestled her hand in Gabriel’s and laced her fingers with his, which made him stir against her.
Yet only for a moment, his low snore telling her that he slept still, which made her close her eyes again.
“Nothingwill wrench us apart…not curses or war or fear,” she whispered fiercely to herself, even as she sensed that sleep, for the rest of the night, would elude her.
* * *
“Maggie!”
As Rhona ran on chubby legs, her arms outstretched, Magdalene felt almost guilty that the little girl made a beeline for her and ignored Gabriel altogether.
Keira, too, who beat her little sister by two lengths and flung herself against Magdalene and encircled her legs in a tight embrace.
“You’re home, you’re home!”
Magdalene sank to her knees in her dark green traveling gown to embrace both girls, not caring at all about the dirt. They hugged her back and giggled, their faces alight with joy that lifted her heart…made heavy by Gabriel’s strange silence during much of their journey back to MacLachlan Castle.
She had tried to talk with him as they had ridden side by side, for this time she’d had her own mount, a beautiful gray mare presented to her by King Robert. She had pointed out this or that along the way, but he had spoken little and she had finally left him alone to his brooding thoughts—och, mayhap it was simply that Cameron and Conall hadn’t accompanied them that had lowered his spirits.
Their goodbyes that morning had been heartfelt with manly hugs and claps on the back between what looked more like brothers, Magdalene knowing how close they were to each other. She was glad when Keira and Rhona left her to run to Gabriel and hug him, too, which brought the first smile to his face since they had left the fortress.
Stung a little that she hadn’t been able to coax such a response from him, Magdalene glanced around the bailey that bustled with commotion upon their return: Stable hands leading the horses away, Gabriel’s warriors released by his command and dispersing to their barracks, and Finlay’s booming voice rising above the din.
