Chapter Twenty
At the soundof banging and then yelling, Willamina looked toward the study door.
Gerard swore and pushed Esme away from him most unceremoniously and left the room, Willamina close on his heels.
Harold was hurrying toward them, and behind him, eyes ablaze, Finlay was charging down the hall. “Mina!”
She couldn’t help it. Forget the promises she’d made to herself that she would let him go. She ran to him, closing the distance until he wrapped his strong arms around her and she nuzzled into the warmth of his neck.
He hugged her like she was his world and she clung to him for dear life. Pulling his head away, he assessed her. “Are ye well?” He brushed her hair back from her face, his eyes crinkled with concern as he waited for her to answer.
She nodded. “I am fine.”
“Isna that sweet? Get out of my house!” Gerard demanded, pointing down the hall.
Finlay extricated himself from Willamina’s arms and held her at his side. “I dinna ken what ye’ve discussed this morn, but I need to speak to my wife.”
“She isna your—”
“My wife,” Finlay growled. “I will speak with her in private. I am no’ leaving until I do.”
Gerard seemed to get his wits about him and nodded stiffly. “Ye may have the library,” he finally ceded, before turning on his heel and disappearing down the hall.
“What are ye doing here?” She asked, but he only shook his head as they made their way to the library.
Shutting the door behind them, Willamina didn’t know what to say. Or where to look. The pain etched on Finlay’s face was heartbreaking. And she got the sense that he was barely containing a simmering rage.
His eyes burned into hers. “Ye left.”
Those two words hung in the air. Heavy and sad.
She pressed her lips together, and took a deep breath through her nose, before collapsing into a chair. “I had to.”
“The hell ye did,” he snapped.
“I left ye a letter,” she whispered.
“Och, I got it. I didna understand it.” He shook his head. “No’ after last night. What we shared. Did it mean naught to ye?” His voice broke with the pain pulsing through him.
“It meant e’erything to me, Finlay. Ye made me feel things I had only dreamt about.” She couldn’t stop wringing her hands in her lap.
“Then why did ye run?”
The pain lancing his voice was hard to hear. She closed her eyes against it. “For ye. I ran for ye.”
He laughed. A maniacal laugh sounding like naught she had ever heard from him before. “Nay,” he said, shaking his head. “Ye didna leave for me. If ’twas for me, ye would have stayed.”
“Finlay,” she said softly, trying to figure out how to explain to him her actions. “Our marriage isna real. We said that from the beginning.”
“Things changed between us. Ye canna deny it. I ken ye felt it, too.”
Her heart was shattering because he was right. She had. But it didn’t change the circumstances they now found themselves in.
“Ye are right. But e’erything has changed now. Our marriage on paper isna e’en real now. It canna be. But,” she took a deep breath and continued. “We still accomplished what we planned. Ye have your title. I hope ye are able to keep it. If no’, ye are free to make another pact with another woman. ’Tis what ye wanted.”
“Damn my title, Mina. ’Tis ye I want. Ye I long for. Ye that I dream about at night.”
“But I am already married—”
