Page 55 of In Bed with a Highland Liar

Maybe it was the one thing Ruadh still hadn’t revealed to his son.

Maybe it is time fer him tae find out.

If he already thought little of his mother, then what difference did it make? It wouldn’t change his perception of her. Perhaps it would hurt him, but he deserved it. It was the least Aaden could do, the smallest punishment he could give him.

Everyone around them had fallen silent, even Laird Stewart, who was looking back and forth between them, trying to figure out what it was happening. Evander, too, was silent, though not for long.

“What are ye sayin’?” he asked with a small, confused frown. “O’ course I ken. How could I nae? I’m part o’ the plan.”

In his rage, Aaden’s hand reached for his blade on instinct, but he stopped himself before he could unsheathe it. Surrounded as he was by so many guards, he doubted he would get too far before he was struck down, and the last thing he wanted was to cause yet another commotion.

“I kent ye were a fool, but I never thought ye would be so cruel,” Aaden spat. He had even gone as far as to defend Evander when Lilith suggested he could be on Ruadh’s side, that he could know everything and still be helping his father. “How could ye dae this tae her? Have ye nae heart?”

“Her?” Evander asked, his frown deepening. Then, his confusion turned into a simmering rage, his hands curling into tight fists by his sides. “As if ye didnae dae the same tae Lilith! How can ye claim that what I’ve done is any worse than what ye did? Is it because ye claim tae be in love now? Dae ye think that erases everythin’ else ye’ve done?”

It was Aaden’s turn to be confused. In fact, everyone around him seemed entirely uncertain, as if no one knew what the two of them were talking about or what to even think.

“I’m nae talkin’ about Freya,” Aaden said. “I’m talkin’ about yer maither. I’m talkin’ about Ruadh.”

“Me parents?” Evander asked. “What about them?”

“Ruadh—” Aaden began, but then he quickly fell silent and looked around him. For the first time since their arrival, he noticed that Ruadh was nowhere to be seen. “Where is he?”

“What?” asked Evander. “Aaden, yer nae makin’ any sense. What’s wrong?”

Closing the distance between him and Evander, Aaden grabbed him by the front of his shirt, shaking him. He was vaguely aware of the guards around him, some of them stepping forward to put an end to a fight that had not yet begun, others standing still, uncertain of what to do, but he didn’t let go of his cousin.

“Where is he?” he demanded once more. “Is he gone?”

“He went for a ride.” Evander’s voice was small, terrified as he spoke, his hand coming up to rest placatingly on Aaden’s forearm. “It hasnae been long since he left.”

Aaden cursed under his breath. Ruadh had been there for the entire argument with Lilith and he surely knew what had happened between the two of them. He was wise enough to know he had already lost, that there was no coming back from this, no matter what lies he tried to spin. What would he do now that his plan had been revealed? He knew Laird Stewart would never give Freya to Evander and he certainly suspected—as Aaden did—that he wouldn’t give Lilith to Aaden either.

Everything had crumbled around Ruadh. He had nothing left to lose.

Me maither! Is he goin’ tae hurt her?

“Would anyone like tae explain any o’ this?” Laird Stewart asked, pulling Aaden out of his thoughts. “What, precisely, is the truth? The actual truth, nae whatever lies ye’ve told Freya an’ Lilith.”

With a huff, Aaden let go of Evander, pushing him back a little. He stumbled but caught himself, smoothing down his shirt with two shaky hands, though the look he gave Aaden now that he was at a relatively safe distance from him was nothing but haughty.

Before Aaden could say anything in response to Laird Stewart, Lilith jumped in. “Laird MacEwan has been hidin’ a lot more than ye ken, faither. Aaden told me all about it an’ he has the means tae prove it.”

Aaden was only half-listening to what Lilith was saying, too preoccupied with his concern about his mother. He had to go after Ruadh. He had to find him before he could get his hands on his mother—if he hadn’t already done so.

“Aaden, tell him,” Lilith prompted, drawing his attention back to her. “The letters, where are ye keepin’ them?”

“Right,” said Aaden, taking a deep, steeling breath. It did little to calm his racing heart, its rhythm so erratic it seemed to rattle the bones of his ribcage. “The letters… they are in me chambers. I can bring them tae ye, me laird.”

Laird Stewart dismissed Aaden with a wary sigh and a shake of his hand, and Aaden rushed to his chambers while the others watched him retreat. The sooner he could explain to the laird just what Ruadh had done and what he was planning, the sooner he could go after him. Perhaps Laird Stewart would even be gracious enough to give him some troops, if Aaden played his cards right.

Once he was in his chambers, Aaden rummaged through the bags he had brought with him, reaching under all the layers of clothes in there to get to the letters. He had taken great precautions to keep them hidden from prying eyes, keeping them all at the bottom of his bag where one could only find them if one was looking for them.

There were over a dozen letters his mother had sent him and Aaden had kept all of them. Some of them were creased and rumpled from all the times he had read them. There was a risk, he knew, in keeping them—one of those letters could cause great damage if it fell in the wrong hands—but he could never bring himself to burn them or otherwise dispose of them. They were the only things he had from his mother, the only way in which he could claim a connection to her. He could only hope his mother had kept the ones he had sent her, too, that she couldn’t bring herself to throw them away.

Aaden grabbed all the letters and headed back out to the courtyard, where everyone was still waiting for him to return. They seemed to have hardly moved in the minutes it took him to fetch the letters, as though they were frozen in place, rendered inanimate by the shock of it all until the moment he came back.

“Here,” he told the laird as he handed him the letters. “These are from me maither. She–”