All the myriad duties as laird that he had neglected over his grief for Sylvia—including time spent with his children.
Yet that heartache was behind him now, though another torment had taken its place since he had wed Julianna.
What would she do when she learned that William had slain her brother? Hate Roger, hate all of them?
He doubted William had gleaned anything from her or he would have gloated about his discovery, which gave Roger some small comfort.
Aye, she would hear the brutal truth fromhim, and not William, but when that moment would come, he could not say.
He had seen something in her beautiful eyes earlier that day with all the children around them, a softness giving him hope that the emotion burning inside him now was flickering within her heart, too. Mayhap in time it would be enough to withstand the fiercest storm—och, why was he sitting here thinking about the woman he loved when he could be lying in bed at her side?
“Ale, Laird?”
Roger waved away the redheaded serving maid and lunged from the chair, only to stop short to stare at the young woman’s decidedly rounded belly. She had no husband, that he recalled—
“Damn you, William.” Roger strode from the great hall, not counting days any longer until his brother was gone, but hours.
* * *
Julianna sighedand threw her arms over her head, her eyes still closed, and stretched languorously, not having felt so well-rested in days.
The bed so comfortable and the covers so soft and warm…
“Bed?” She had half-whispered the word, her eyes flying open to discover she wasn’t lying upon the cot in Aran’s room, but in another bedchamber altogether that she had never seen before—
“Good morning, wife.”
Julianna gasped at the husky sound of Roger’s voice and turned her head to find him lying on his side next to her, propped up on his elbow.
His face so handsome in the flickering light of a candle on the table beside the bed that her heart seemed to jump, she was so startled.
“Well, not daylight yet—but soon it will be dawn.”
“Dawn?” Suddenly panicking, Julianna sat bolt upright and started to throw aside the covers. “Aran…I must go to him!”
“Ease yourself, he’s fine,” Roger said as he stayed her hand and drew the covers back to her waist. “I just returned from his side. He’s suckling quite contentedly—och, Juli, you were so exhausted last night that you barely stirred when I brought you here.”
“Here?” she echoed as she settled back upon the pillow, her gaze moving around a large bedchamber sumptuously furnished and warmed by a fireplace with an ornately carved mantel. “I-Is this your room?”
“Ourroom.”
She sharply sucked in her breath, noticing, too, that Roger’s powerful chest was bare except for a white bandage wound tightly around his ribs—
“Oh, no, are you in pain?” Without thinking, she reached out to touch the linen covering his upper abdomen only for Roger to heave a sigh, shaking his head.
“You’ve been busy with Aran, so our healer examined me after I removed my armor and he affirmed that no ribs were broken—”
“I could have told him as much,” Julianna interrupted him with some annoyance, though Roger only chuckled.
“Horas is an old man and I canna have him thinking he’s been replaced altogether—but aye, lass. You could have told him as much.”
Lass. Julianna felt a flip-flop in her stomach at how Roger had said the word like an endearment, the huskiness in his voice making her shiver.
He stared at her so intently, reminding her of how he had looked at her yesterday when he and his daughters were gathered around Aran’s cradle…until his expression suddenly hardened.
“Did my brother hurt you?”
Julianna shook her head, wondering how he would have known of William’s unexpected visit even as Roger gave a low curse.
