Page 49 of Kilted Sins

Cillian hoped she would warm up to him. He knew how important Enya was to Thora, how her sister meant the world to her. The last thing he wanted was to give her a reason to dislike him.

“Lady MacLeod,” Cillian said, turning to look at Enya. He could have sworn she jumped a little at being addressed, but Cillian looked past it. “Perhaps ye would like somethin’ tae eat? Some wine, perhaps?”

“Nay, thank ye,” Enya said, and it struck him for the first time how remarkably alike their voices were, too. “I am quite tired from me travels. I think I will retire soon.”

Cillian, too, thought that was for the best. The only other way he could now tell the sisters apart was through their complexions; Enya now seemed to have turned sickly pale, her skin taking on a yellow hue, her bottom lip trembling with every breath she took.

“Aye, I think we all should,” Kai said, his gaze flitting back and forth between his two sisters. “Perhaps it would be best tae continue this on the morrow, Laird MacDonald. Our apologies fer bein’ unable tae spend any more time with ye.”

“Please,” said Cillian, waving a hand dismissively as he stood, Kai and the rest of them following his lead. “There is nay need tae apologize, I understand.”

As the others made their way out of the room—all of them save for Enya, who waited for her sister—Thora tried to walk past Cillian without a word, but he was quick to grab her, a small frown forming between his brows as he looked at her. She, too, frowned at him in confusion, her gaze falling to the hand on her waist as though she disapproved of it.

Perhaps she, too, is shy in front of her family.

A quick kiss couldn’t hurt, though, Cillian figured and so he claimed her lips in a chaste one, his eyes falling shut—but only for a moment. Instantly, he knew something was wrong and he wrenched himself back from Thora, a strange, disturbing sensation crawling down his spine.

“Ye’re nae Thora,” he said. He was certain of it. He would be able to tell Thora’s kiss apart from any other.

“I am,” the woman said simply. Cillian didn’t miss the way she quickly glanced at her sister, before taking a small step back from him.

“Then ye’re nae the woman with whom I’ve spent the past days,” Cillian said. “Is that right?”

The woman in front of him—Thora, Enya, Cillian didn’t know and at that point, he didn’t care—nodded once, biting nervously on her bottom lip.

It was as though the world was crashing down around him, tilting on its axis. Everyone else had come to a sudden halt as they were exiting the room, but Cillian hardly registered any of them. He stumbled backwards, trying to put some distance between himself and the woman before him, but when his knees hit the couch, he collapsed on it, bile rising to the back of his throat.

There was a sob, small and heartbroken. Cillian looked up to see Enya, still frozen by the door, a hand pressed over her mouth to muffle the sobs that followed as the tears spilled like rivers from her eyes.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

“How could ye have done this?”

Enya had dreaded this question from the moment she realized she would one day have to tell Cillian the truth. Deep down, she had always known he would be unable to understand or even if he did, he would never forgive her.

She didn’t blame him for it. If their roles were reversed, she would be feeling just as betrayed.

Cillian was hunched over the window in his study, now that they had been left alone, staring out at the festivities that were still going strong, the clansmen and women celebrating around the bonfire. The sound of their laughter filled the room, a stark contrast to the heartbroken look on Cillian’s face, half of it dimly illuminated by the distant flames in the courtyard while the rest was cast in shadow.

“I was scared,” Enya said. It was not an excuse, but rather the simple truth. “I was scared fer Ava an’ fer Thora. An’ then… then it was already too late. I wished tae tell ye, but I could never find the right moment.”

“The right moment?” Cillian asked, craning his neck to look at her. “The right moment would have been at the beginnin’. Ye lied tae me fer weeks! Ye wove this web o’ lies an’… an’ trapped me in it!”

Cillian’s words were like a dagger to the heart, cutting Enya’s breath short. She felt as though there wasn’t enough air in the room, all the oxygen pushed out by the weight of her betrayal. Biting the inside of her cheek, she willed herself to keep her tears from spilling, but they still carved burning paths down her cheeks.

“I came here with the thought o’ savin’ me sister,” she said. She had apologized for her lies, but she would never apologize for trying to save her sister from a marriage she didn’t want or her family from the embarrassment and hostility that would come from disobeying the king’s orders. Everything she had done had been for her family and though it saddened her that Cillian was too hurt by her actions to understand that, she didn’t regret the end—only the means. “Ye must see, Cillian. I never wished tae hurt ye. I never kent I would⁠—”

I never kent I would love him.

She couldn’t speak those words, though. Simply thinking them was almost too much to bear, the truth of her feelings so startling even to her that she could only remain silent.

What she said instead was, “I never kent it would get so far.”

The look Cillian gave her was scathing, chilling her to the bone. With a sigh, he pushed himself away from the window and began to pace back and forth in front of his desk, restless and twitching. He parted his lips, closed them, then parted them again, but no sound came out. It was as though he was at a total loss for words and no matter how much he tried, his thoughts were too jumbled, too disorganized for him to even argue.

“I can only ask fer yer forgiveness,” Enya said, hoping he would at least listen to her. “I should never have lied tae ye an’ I understand if ye cannae forgive me, but I did it fer me sister, an’ if I had nay other choice, I would dae it again.”

“How can ye claim tae be sorry when ye say ye would dae it again?” Cillian hissed, his head whipping to the side to glare at her.