Chapter 29
The first thing Ariella became aware of was warmth.
Not the coarse heat of a hearth or the heavy press of blankets, but something steadier. Something alive. A presence near enough that she could feel it even before she opened her eyes.
Her lashes fluttered.
Stone walls came into focus slowly. The familiar carved post of her bed. The faint smell of herbs and smoke lingering in the air. She shifted, and her body answered with a dull ache that reminded her she had fallen.
That she had frightened everyone.
She swallowed, throat dry. “Maxwell.”
“The laird is just outside,” she heard the healer whisper softly. “As ye have asked me to ensure.”
“Let him in, Lara.”
She watched as the healer stood and walked to the door to let him in. She watched as her husband ducked into her chambers and walked across the room. She watched as the chair scraped softly against the stone as he sat next to her.
“Ye’re awake,” he said, voice low and rough. “Thank God.”
The words caught her off guard.
She studied his face. He looked stripped. Not the laird carved from stone, not the warrior hardened by blood. Just a man who had been sitting vigil too long.
“How long?” she asked quietly.
“Long enough,” he replied. Then, after a pause, “The healer says ye must rest.”
She nodded faintly. “I will.”
Silence fell between them.
It was not uncomfortable. But it was heavy.
She waited for him to say something else. To ask how she felt. To tell her she had frightened him. To retreat behind courtesy and rules and duty.
Instead, he spoke her name again.
“Ariella.”
The way he said it made her chest tighten.
“I ken ye havenae wished to see me, and frankly I understand yer reasons and I deserve it, but I need to tell ye something,” he said.
She shifted slightly, propping herself up against the pillows. “All right.”
He drew a slow breath, as if steadying himself before stepping off a cliff.
“When I was a boy,” he began, “I prayed for peace.”
Her brows knit slightly. She had not expected that.
“Me parents fought constantly with O’Douglas,” he continued. “Raids. Retaliation. Death by inches. I was young, but I remember standing in the chapel, begging God to make it stop.”
His gaze fixed on a point somewhere beyond the wall.
“When they died, the fighting didnae stop. It only became mine.”
Ariella’s fingers curled into the blanket.
“I learned quickly that wanting peace made men think ye were weak,” he said. “So I learned nae to want.”
Her throat tightened.
“Duty came easily after that. Guilt did too. I told myself that if I carried it all, if I made the hard choices and denied myself anything that might soften me, then perhaps fewer others would suffer.”
She saw it then. Not the rule about heirs. But the shape of it. The way it had grown out of fear rather than cruelty.
“And joy,” he said quietly, “felt like a betrayal.”
She squeezed his arm gently. “That has an affect on young men.”
He looked at her then, really looked, and something in his eyes shifted. As if he was confused by the chill in her voice. “Aye, it does. Do ye ken why I am telling ye this now,” he asked.
Her mouth tightened. “Why?”
“Because I nearly lost ye,” he said. “And because I realized that all me rules, all me fear, they did nae protect ye. They hurt ye.”
Her chest ached.
“And because,” he continued, voice barely above a whisper, “I love ye.”
The words landed softly. Not like a blow. Like a hand laid over her heart.
Her breath hitched.
She searched his face for doubt. For retreat.
There was none.
“I love ye,” he repeated, steadier now. “And I am done hiding from it.”
Tears burned at the backs of her eyes.
For a long moment, Ariella could not speak.
The world seemed to tilt, not with dizziness this time, but with possibility.
“Ye… love me,” she said, as if testing the words.
“Aye,” Maxwell replied. “With everything I tried to bury. With everything I tried to control.”
Her voice trembled. “Why now?”
“Because I never want ye to be afraid of me again,” he said. “Because I want us to ken everything about each other. Even the things no one else does.”
Her hand drifted instinctively to her stomach.
“And because,” he added, softer still, “ye are about to give me a blessing I never thought I deserved.”
Her breath stuttered. “Our child.”
Ariella’s face was calm, but still pale, and he worried that this conversation might be wearing on her. He watched as her gaze swept the room once, then landed back on Maxwell.
She did not smile.
She did not look away either.
Maxwell leaned forward but kept a respectful distance.
“Our child,” he repeated quietly.
“Me laird,” she replied.
The title stung.
Maxwell nodded once, accepting it. “I ken ye wish to stay with Mairi. If that is yer desire, then I will ensure the healer visit each day, and I will grant ye this peace and time.”
Ariella’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Ye’ve approved it?”
“I didnae have to approve anything. Ye are yer own person. But I have met with Mairi, aye,” Maxwell said. “It remains yer choice.”
Her fingers tightened on her cloak. “It is nae that I am ungrateful.”
“I ken,” Maxwell replied. “And I didnae just tell ye all of that to sway yer decision.”
Silence stretched.
Isla entered the chambers then, standing in the darker corner, clearly wanting to tend to Ariella before Maxwell said something wrong and upset her again.
Maxwell did not look at Isla. He kept his focus on his wife.
“I will nae follow ye,” Maxwell said, voice steady. “But I will send a guard far back on the road. For safety. Ye will ken he’s there. He will nae approach unless ye call for him.”
Ariella’s throat worked. “All right.”
Maxwell hesitated. He had always believed duty mattered more than desire.
That love was something to be earned later.
He no longer knew when later had become never.
“May I speak plainly?” he said.
Ariella held his gaze. “Ye’ve never struggled to do so.”
He almost smiled. Almost.
“Last night,” Maxwell said, voice low, “I answered ye like a fool.”
A flicker crossed her face. Pain, quick and controlled.
Maxwell continued anyway. “When ye asked about an heir, I said ‘nay’ without thinking. Without hearing what ye were really asking.”
Ariella’s chin lifted a fraction. “And what was I asking?”
Maxwell’s throat tightened. “Ye were asking if ye were safe to hope.”
Ariella went still Her eyes never leaving his.
Maxwell forced himself onward, each word chosen like stepping stones across a river. “Ye have been safe to hope since the day ye walked into me life. I simply didnae ken how to hold that truth without fear.”
Her eyes glistened, but she blinked it away stubbornly.
Maxwell’s voice roughened. “I am glad, Ariella. About the bairn. About ye. About all of it.”
Ariella’s breath hitched.
“But,” Maxwell added, because he would not lie by omission, “I understand if gladness is nae enough to mend what I broke.”
Ariella’s mouth tightened. She looked at him for a long moment, measuring.
Then she said quietly, “I daenae ken what I feel yet.”
Maxwell nodded once. “That’s fair.”
Isla exhaled as if she’d been holding her breath for weeks.
Ariella’s gaze dropped briefly to Maxwell’s hands, then back to his face. “Ye’ll let me have time.”
It was not a request.
It was a test.
Maxwell swallowed. “Aye.”
Ariella nodded once, small and decisive. Then she nodded toward Isla.
Maxwell stood and bowed to his lady as he stepped away and out of her chambers.
He closed the door quietly.
He did turn back around.
He stood in the passageway and let her choose herself, even as it tore at him in two.
Because this was the cost. Or rather, the consequence.
And if he wanted her trust, he would earn it the only way it could be earned.
With patience, humility, and a love that was given freely and without strings attached to it.