Catherine lifted her gaze. “Very little, I’m afraid. She died giving birth to us, and I don’t know why we were separated. My only hope is that once we return to Drumloch someone will know the answer to that question.”
Lachlan stepped forward.“Catherine…”
She glanced across at him and saw the look of warning in his eyes. Clearly he did not think it would be wise to bring Raonaid to Drumloch. It was not his choice to make, however.
Catherine spoke to him in a polite tone but with a firm note of resolve. “If you would be so kind, Lachlan, I would like some time alone with my sister. Will you please wait outside?”
His dark eyes shifted to Raonaid again, and Catherine saw the look of triumph she gave him in return.
“If you wish,” he gruffly said. “But I will wait outside the door, and I will send Gawyn around to the back, to make sure no one comes or goes.”
The corner of Raonaid’s mouth curled up in a subtle grin of self-satisfaction.
The instant he was gone, Catherine turned her eyes on Raonaid and spoke with reproach. “That was disrespectful.”
Raonaid frowned. “Does it really matter to you?”
“Of course it matters. If it weren’t for Lachlan, I would not be sitting here now. He has done nothing but try to help me recover the life that was lost to me.”
“And how did he do that?” Raonaid asked, sitting forward and perching an elbow on her knee. “By making love to you? It’s odd. You and I look exactly the same, but you lack a certain…” She bit her lip, as if she needed more time to ponder it.
“A certainwhat?” Catherine asked, challenging her sister to say exactly what she was thinking.
“A certainworldliness.How could you have given yourself to him, Catherine? He is the worst rogue in Scotland, and he took you to bed when he believed he was cursed. Did you know of it? Or did he tell you afterward, when it was too late to change it?”
Catherine clenched her teeth. “He told you about that?”
“Aye, it’s thefirstthing he told me—that he had bedded some lassie the day before and that’s why he needed me to lift the curse. Clearly he was using you to force my hand. Do you not see that?”
The chill in her sister’s voice caused all the hairs on Catherine’s neck to stand on end.
“He slept with you,” Raonaid continued, “when he believed he was cursed. What does that tell you about him?”
“It was my fault, too,” Catherine insisted.
Raonaid sat back and regarded her closely. “I doubt that very much. The man has a certain power over women, and he knows it. There is something about him that makes most women go completely mad with infatuation. I’ve seen it. He has the power to seduce, and that’s why I cursed him—to save a few broken hearts once the word got out about his…situation.So do not look at me like that, as if I am some sort of villain.”
Raonaid was not entirely wrong about Lachlan’s sexual power over women. Catherine had experienced it herself and had seen it in Abigail, the young barmaid, on the first night of their escape. But that did not justify Raonaid’s actions. She had cast a cruel spell on him—one that harkened back to his wife’s death and made him relive it over and over.
“Do you feel it is your place to judge people?” Catherine asked. “To hand out punishment and control their lives, as if you were God?”
Raonaid’s eyes darkened. “Are you in love with him?”
“That is none of your concern.”
Her sister regarded her shrewdly. “Youare.I can see it in your eyes. Does he know it?”
Catherine was not sure. She had never spoken the words aloud, and she had refused his offer of marriage and suggested that what they felt for each other was not real.
“No, he does not,” she said at last.
Raonaid scoffed bitterly. “Then you’d best keep it that way, lass. He’s not the sort of man you want to pin your hopes on.”
***
Outside, Lachlan paced back and forth under the wide portico, wondering what poison Raonaid was feeding to Catherine now, when Alex approached and rested one booted foot on the bottom step.
“Don’t worry, Lachlan,” he said. “Lady Catherine will be fine. I just took a look through the back window. They’re only talking.”
