Chapter Twenty-Three #2
She would have argued, but why? She could not deny she loved him—loved him in spite of everything—but that did not mean she would act the fool in this and beg him. Handfasting aside, he did not deserve to know about this bairn. Her hand moved across her still-flat belly.
‘I think you should speak to your father soon about this, Lilidh. He should learn of it from you and not through rumours, as he will if you delay.’
‘I know,’ she said, nodding. ‘I have other questions to ask him, about something Rob said, but I just cannot bring myself to do it.’
‘What about Rob?’ her mother asked. ‘Mayhap I can help you? He was my foster son, too.’
‘Ah, yes,’ she said, laughing softly then.
‘You were in charge of teaching him correct manners.’ She knew her mother remembered her encounter and comment to Rob about remembering his manners and losing his wits.
‘There is something that happened, between him and Father, that he would not speak of. I suspect Father will not, either.’
‘Why not ask him?’ her father said from behind them. How could so large a man be so quiet when he wanted to sneak up on someone? He kissed her on the forehead and rubbed her back. ‘What is it you wish to know?’
Did she dare? Did she want to know the truth, no matter what? Yes, she did.
‘What happened when Rob came to you for permission to marry me?’ she asked.
Her mother gasped and turned to her father. ‘Connor? Pray tell me he did not!’ Her tall, dangerous father wore a sheepish expression now and Lilidh knew she would find out the truth. ‘Rob asked for her hand?’
‘Aye, he did.’ Her father looked from her to her mother and back again. ‘I said no.’
‘When? You never told me he had,’ her mother asked now. When her father hesitated, her mother grabbed his arm and tugged on it. Deciding that her mother could wring more truth from him than she could,
Lilidh waited silently for it to be revealed.
‘He came to me after I’d heard talk of what you two were doing together. Running wild, being seen together too much, then he was overheard boasting about...’ He paused and met her gaze then. ‘Enjoying your favours, Lilidh. He boasted of what the two of you did together.’
‘We were pledged!’ she cried out.
‘Pledged? I gave permission for no such thing. He overstepped the boundaries I set for him.’ He crossed his arms across his massive chest and glared at her. ‘He was too low for you to consider as a match.’
‘Because he is a bastard?’ she challenged.
‘Because he is unworthy of you!’ he yelled back. His words surprised her, partly because of the word but more so because of the vehemence.
‘Unworthy? He came to you as a foster son and you accepted him. You trained him as a warrior and as a man. He would not take my honour, Father, before our marriage. I offered, he refused! Then he came to you, seeking the honourable way.’
‘And when I refused it, he left.’
‘He did not simply leave, Connor,’ her mother said softly. ‘Please tell me you had nothing to do with the manner in which he...broke from Lilidh.’
No words were needed, for the guilt was written boldly across his face. Lilidh gasped, feeling sick and faint. ‘You made him do that? How? Why?’
‘I challenged him. I told him he had disobeyed me and my orders. I’d told him you were no bitch for him to sniff after.
But he disobeyed me and broke our bond.’ His voice quieted then for the rest of it.
‘I told him it would be war if he did not break things cleanly and completely with you. In a way that would guarantee you would not want anything to do with him again.’
‘Oh, dear God in Heaven!’ her mother cried.
‘And he did it, did he not? If he had been worthy of you, he would have told me to go to hell and claimed you. But he didn’t.’
‘Connor, he was just a boy.’
‘Old enough to be involved with my daughter,’ he said.
‘He would never have stood up to you. Your men fear you. He was too young.’ Even she could hear the sadness in her mother’s voice. Sadness and disappointment, not in Rob, but in her father. Lilidh understood she was witnessing something between them she’d never seen before.
‘He had another chance and, once more, he did not choose you, Lilidh. He chose his clan and my gold instead of you,’ he explained. ‘He is still not worthy of you.’
Her stomach rolled then and she knew she was going to be sick. Whether the bairn or the facts she’d just learned, it mattered not the cause. Without a word, she raced from the solar and sought her chambers.
Lilidh discovered that her chambers were the worst place for her to seek relief from the pounding in her head or the piercing pain of her breaking heart.
Something she’d not thought possible since that terrible day long ago—carrying Rob’s child—was now a reality and was now her responsibility to handle.
To her shame, part of her would have taken Rob back this moment if he returned to her and asked.
Another warring part made her spine stiffen and her chin tilt up and want to refuse him no matter her condition.
But now, now there was a bairn to consider, another life—her child’s—to care for and that put this in a different light for her.
Walking to the battlements above her chambers, she stood, eyes closed, allowing the winds to buffet her along until she reached the corner.
The fact that it was her parents’ favourite place to stand and watch the yard below was not missed by her and she waited for some idea, some plan, to strike her.
* * *
Hours later, her head was clear but her heart was no less heavy than before. But since Rob had had two months to come back to her, if he was going to do it, she had little choice but to look elsewhere for solutions to her dilemma.
And once more, her heart would bear the cost of giving her love to a man who wished it not.