Page 10 of Owned by the Scarred Laird

A shiver moved through her before she could stop it, visible enough that the man beside her caught it. He did not look at her directly. His eyes stayed forward.

“Are ye cold?” he asked, low enough that only she could hear.

She considered lying. “The kirk is drafty.”

“Aye.” A pause. “Most of them are.”

She glanced sideways at him. “Is that meant to be a comfort?”

“It’s meant to be a fact.”

She almost said something sharp back. She stopped herself, surprised to find that the impulse was there at all.

Her father stepped forward then, extending his hand to Edward. “A fine thing,” he said. “Done cleanly.”

Laird O’Brien looked at the offered hand for a moment before taking it. His grip was brief. “Aye,” he said. Nothing more.

Her father turned to Chloe with the same expression, as though he expected some acknowledgment of the occasion. She gave him none.

The man beside her shifted his weight and leaned down toward her, close enough that she felt the warmth of him before she heard his voice. She went very still. Every muscle in her body pulled tight at once. It came low and quiet, meant for no one but her.

"One of the guards will see ye to yer rooms." His voice had gone flatter now, businesslike, though his eyes held on her face a beat longer than the words needed. "I have matters to finish here first."

She nodded, not trusting herself to say anything back, and turned before he could see whatever crossed her face at being handed off yet again, this time to a stranger she hadn't even been given a name for.

Edward watched her go.

He did not move from where he stood. The priest was saying something to his man about the paperwork, and the witnesses were collecting their cloaks. The candles were burning down, and none of it required anything from him. He was good at standing still in rooms that were finishing around him. He had had enough practice at it.

He had not expected his bride to look at him the way she had.

He had expected fear. Most people showed at least some of it. The scars helped, or the silence, or simply his presence in a room. She looked at the scars then looked away, then looked back into his eyes, and she never looked at the floor.

Foolish. Or brave.

He did not know what to do with that.

The priest finished his business. Edward’s man handed him a document that was already signed on his end. He took it without looking.

She has freckles across her nose.

The observation arrived unbidden, and he dismissed it immediately. It was irrelevant. None of it mattered. He had asked for a wife because the clan needed stability, and the bairn needed a mother. Those were practical needs with practical solutions. He had drafted a contract to settle a debt. He had signed it. He had stood in a kirk and said the words. That was what he had agreed to, and he was a man who kept to his word.

His hand was still warm where she had pressed her fingers against his palm. It had been a small, ordinary thing he had not expected to notice.

Her eyes are brown.

He cleared his throat.

Enough!

He placed the document on the altar and walked out into the darkness without looking back. The air outside was cold and pure. He took a deep breath and let it settle in. The arrangement was complete. The contract was fulfilled. What he felt while standing in that kirk was simply surprise, the kind any man might feel when something turned out differently than expected.

It will pass.

He would make sure of it.

5