When the skinny bloke with the pointed moustache had popped up in Sterling’s foyer like a bloody jester-in-a-box, Lachlan’s first instinct was to take the official stack of legal jargon he’d been presented with and tear all the papers in half. To hell with a judicial separation. Then he had reconsidered. If this was what Brynne wanted, then he’d give it to her. Wasn’t that what courting entailed? He’d have preferred a bouquet of tulips but, this time, he was trying something different: actually listening to his wife instead of assumingheknew whatsheneeded.
“You signed the papers,” she repeated.
“Wasna that what I was supposed tae do?”
When her eyes filled with tears, he cursed and crossed the distance between them to gather her in his arms. She was slender as a willow, bright as a star, delicate as a rose. And he loved every inch of her. Inside and out. He always would, separation or no separation. Brynne was his and he was hers, their souls twined together in such a way that even if they were to part and never see each other again, a piece of her would exist in him for all of eternity.
“I’m sorry,” she said, lifting her damp countenance from his chest to gaze at him with wide, haunted eyes brimming with regret. “I’m sorry, Lachlan. I…I have made a mess of everything. Of us. Of our marriage. I ruined–”
“Aye and it’s me duty as yer husband tae stop ye there,” he said, tracing his knuckle across her cheek to catch a tear before it could fall. “Ye didna ruin anything, Bry. Or if ye did, then so did I. There’s blame tae be handed out in parcels, and we each have our fair share of it, but then that’s life. That’s learning. That’s moving forward even when things get rough. Because seedlings canna grow in fallow soil, and love canna bloom when ye allow yerself tae be trapped in the blame, and the hurt, and the mistakes.”
“I made so many mistakes.Toomany. I–I can’t breathe,” she gasped, and Lachlan’s arms tightened around her in alarm when she began to slip through them.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded as fear coursed through his veins. “Bry? Bry! Can ye hear me?”
Her eyes were closed. Her face waxen. Her breaths quick and shallow. She made no sign that she heard him. No sign that she was even cognizant of him holding her.
Frantic, he ripped at the buttons running the length of her gown. Found the metal teeth securing her corset and tore those apart, too.
He was about to shout for help when her lashes trembled, and her eyes slowly opened.
“Lachlan,” she said weakly.
“Aye, I’m here. I’ve got ye.”And I’m never letting ye go again,he thought grimly as he carried her to a chaise lounge and gently laid her down, then sat beside her and took her hand, her fingers ice cold in his. “Do ye need water?” he asked. “Or a doctor?”
“You.” She struggled to sit up, then sagged against him, her head resting in the crook of space beneath his chin. “I need you.”
“Ye have me, little bird.” He pressed his lips to the top of her head. “Forever.”
“That doesn’t seem nearly long enough.”
He wanted to ask her what had happened. The old Lachlan would have. Would have pushed, and prodded, and demanded until she gave him answers whether she wanted to or not. But the new Lachlan–at least, the new parts of him that he was trying on, rather like a coat at the tailors–reminded him to be patient. To wait. To let Brynne choose when she was ready. In the meantime, he’d enjoy the simplicity of just holding her. Stroking her back. Listening to her heartbeat as its erratic rhythm gradually slowed and evened out.
“The doctor called them anxious mannerisms,” she said finally. “I had my first when Weston left for school. The doctor said they were very rare, and I was only the second case he’d ever seen. He was going to write a paper. I don’t know if he ever did.”
Lachlan’s hand continued to follow the line of her spine. Up and down. Up and down. “What does it feel like?” he asked. “When it happens.”
“A shortness of breath, as if all the oxygen has been sucked out of the room but I’m the only one who seems to have noticed. Sometimes my head swims, as if I was underwater, and dots dance in front of my eyes. I call them Episodes. I had them frequently as a child…and several since you came back to Hawkridge Manor.”
He recalled the gazebo where she’d gone as pale as a ghost and he’d assumed she was with child. “Is there any treatment? Or medicine tae take?”
“No, not that I’ve found. The doctor suggested I merely tell myself not to have them.”
Aye, Lachlan thought sourly, and why didn’t this doctor ask a patient with a broken leg to will themselves better? Admittedly, his knowledge of the medical field was sorely lacking. But even he recognized that an illness brought on by someone’s own mind was no less severe than an injury or disease of the body.
“The doctor sounds like a bluidy useless prat.”
“I never saw him again. Mrs. Grimsby, the housekeeper, who was only a maid then, helped me learn how to breathe through them when they happened. I came to realize they were tied to my emotions. If I was upset, they occurred with more frequency.”
Which meant he was to blame for the Episodes she’d had recently, and wasn’t he a bastard for causing her such suffering?
“Bry,” he said hoarsely, “I never meant–”
“It’s not your fault.” Here, she raised her head to stare him in the eyes. Her own were dry and remarkably clear. “It’s not mine, either. It took a long while to understand that. To accept it. To love myself for who I am, and not what others expect me to be. I never should have agreed to your proposal, Lachlan.”
A knife twisted in his gut. “If that’s how ye feel–”
“I never should have agreed to it,” she said steadily, “because I wasn’t ready. I didn’t know who I was yet, let alone who I was supposed to be as a wife. But your coming here has forced me to reflect on some difficult choices. And I’ve had to ask myself some difficult questions. About who I am, where I want to go, and what I deserve.”
