That somehow made the whole exchange feel more intimate.
Ava stood very still, her hands folded before her because she did not trust them not to twitch. The kiss remained alive beneath everything. Her father’s entrance had not erased it. Ciaran’s calm had not erased it. Even this conversation about men, strongholds, and support had only layered itself over what had passed between them instead of wiping it away.
When Rory looked back at her, warmth returned to his face at once. “I only wished ye both to ken that the offer stands.”
Ava nodded. “Thank ye, Da.”
Rory’s gaze rested on her a moment longer. “If ye wish, ye may come stay with me for a while.”
The words came out so softly that for a second, Ava almost failed to understand them.
“What?”
Rory shrugged. “If ye want. Ye ken I want nothing more than for ye to be safe. If ye think ye will be safer back home with me, he may come too.”
Ava swallowed, and everything in her went completely still.
She could tell her father wasn’t trying to command or pressure her. He wasn’t trying to challenge Ciaran’s authority either. He was only offering her the kind of safety she was already used to. A place at his side. Familiar terrain. A little more time before the full weight of this new life settled around her.
The tenderness of it made her stomach twist.
She looked at him and saw no impatience on his face, no judgment, only love deep enough to open the door and leave it unguarded. He would take her back at once if she asked it. There was no doubt about that. No condition tied to the offer. No demand that she prove the depth of her distress before she earned refuge.
Before she could answer, Ciaran spoke. “If that is what she wants, I willnae oppose it either. I would never let any harm come to her, but I would understand if she chose to leave.”
Her eyes went to him at once. He did not look at her as he said it, at least not at first. His tone remained even, stripped of possessiveness, stripped of any plea she might have had to answer or resist.
He wasn’t begging her to stay or offering even more reassurances to her father than he already had. He was only making her realize that she had the option to leave if she wanted.
For some reason, that mattered more than she had expected it to.
For the first time since her father had spoken, the full shape of the moment stood plainly before her. She could leave. Not in theory. Not as some fantasy she turned over in sleepless hours.
She could actuallyleave.
The path away existed, and it was lined with nothing but love and warmth.
She lowered her eyes for a moment and thought of home. She could almost see the halls. She could almost hear Bruce tearing through familiar rooms with his crooked little bark and even smell the kitchens in the winter. Her old bed. Her old routine. The comfort of going back to something she was already used to. All she had to do was leave all of this behind.
The temptation of it was not small.
To leave now would mean rest. Breathing space. A gentler landing after blood and vows and fear and the bewildering heat of what had happened between her and Ciaran only moments before. It would mean time to gather herself in a place where she did not have to think about who she was becoming.
But that was the truth of it, was it not? Leaving would delay what she was becoming, not completely erase it.
This life had begun around her already. The wedding, even broken as it was. The attack. The kiss. The chamber she now stood in, wearing a fresh gown, while the ruined one waited tobe burned. None of it could be neatly undone by returning to her father’s castle for a few soothing weeks.
More than that, a bigger part of her knew with uncomfortable clarity that what troubled her most would follow her there untouched. Especially the pull she now started to feel toward Ciaran.
She had been offered escape before, but she had not taken it. And now, with the choice laid before her again in a kinder, quieter shape, she found the answer had not changed.
Eventually, she lifted her head.
“Nay,” she said, the word calm enough to surprise even her.
Ciaran raised an eyebrow, while her father narrowed his eyes. “Nay?”
Ava nodded slowly.
