Chapter Sixteen
The next morning, Alana sat by the hearth sipping honeyed tea whilst she watched Rory chat with the innkeeper’s grandchildren. They’d learned that the innkeeper’s daughter and her children lived with him and helped him run the inn. Her husband had tragically perished in a fire two years afore.
Rory picked up a lad and spun him around whilst pulling a funny face and Alana nearly choked on her drink.
A fit of coughs erupted and Rory looked at her with concern, but she waved him off to continue playing with the children.
He hesitated, but as she dismissed him with her hand once more, he turned back to the child, crossing his eyes and sticking out his tongue.
The lad and his sister broke out in fits of laughter.
Their giggles filling the room with a happiness and cheer that Alana hadn’t realized she longed for.
Her brothers were older than her and neither of them had any children.
Auchenford Castle was usually quiet. It missed the liveliness that laddies and lassies brought with them.
“Twirl me, twirl me,” the lass begged, reaching up her arms so Rory could spin her around the same way he had spun her brother. “Weeeee,” she squealed, grasping at Rory’s neck, and squeezing.
He stopped and set her on her wobbly feet, waiting for her world to right itself afore he let go.
The lad tugged on his tunic and when Rory looked at him, he pointed to his boot, which had come untied.
Quickly, Rory knelt, tying the boy’s shoe, listening to him ramble on with a huge smile on his face.
The scene hit Alana like a rock had just fallen on her.
The image of Rory seared into her mind. She burned the pictures in her memory.
Rory as a father. Rory with a home. Rory as hers.
A dream she wanted but didn’t dare dream of.
It would only lead to her ruin and disappointment at what her future held.
But at that moment in time, it was so easy to believe he was hers. That the children were theirs, and that the inn was their home. That they were spending a normal morn as a family.
Later, Alana helped the innkeeper’s daughter, Joanna, wash the dishes.
She listened intently as the woman gossiped about Rory and his family.
“The Hart’s are a caring and loving family.
No’ one of them has a bad bone in their body.
But Rory,” she dipped her head toward the corner where Rory sat with the children on his lap as he told them a story that had them both enraptured.
That familiar tug flipping her stomach as was beginning to be commonplace when it came to thoughts of Rory.
“He is special,” Joanna continued. “He has a heart for the highlands. He may look wild and untamed, but under all that wilderness is a heart of gold,” she said kenningly.
“Ye ken him weel, then?” Alana asked, an unexpected jolt of jealousy ripping through her body.
“The Hart’s are weel kenned e’erywhere. Rory especially so since he travels the lands so much. He is always visiting the different villages.”
Alana dried the trencher that Joanna handed to her.
“I thank ye for the help. ’Twas most kind of ye.”
“’Twas the least I could do,” she said with a smile and she meant it.
It was nice to feel useful—and not in the sense of what she could do for her clan.
But in the physical sense. At home she would never had entertained the idea of washing or drying dishes.
They had servants for all that. But she found the work gratifying.
“I will put together food for ye to take on the road with ye as ye continue yer journey.” Joanna disappeared only to return a short time later, a bundle wrapped in linen and twine in her hands. She handed it to Alana with a hug. “This should sate ye weel as ye carry on.”
“Thank ye for yer kindness.”
Joanna nodded. “Remember,” she whispered, a twinkle in her eye and a kenning smile on her lips. “A heart of gold.”
Alana gave her a wistful smile. If only she kenned how much it couldn’t be so.
“Ready?” Rory asked, hobbling over to her, the two children each clinging on to a leg.
“Come now, ye wee beasties,” Joanna chided. “Let Master Rory be on his way. He has much traveling to do this day.”
They grumbled but reluctantly released Rory’s legs. He bent and gave them each a warm hug. The children looked so tiny enveloped in his muscled arms. “I will see ye again soon, aye?” They nodded simultaneously, each sticking out their lower lip in a pout. “Now be good for yer mama. Understand?”
“Aye, Master Rory.” They answered and moved to grab their mother’s skirts as Rory and Alana left the inn.
“Lady Alana!”
Alana spun to see the lad running toward her. “I forgot to give ye this.” He thrust a purple flower toward her.
Smiling, she knelt and gave the boy a hug. “Thank ye. I shall treasure it fore’er.”
With a toothy grin he gave her a wave and turned to run back inside the inn.
“Those wee children are adorable.”
“Aye. ’Tis hard for Joanna since her husband has passed, but she seems to be doing weel with her da.”
Back on the road, Rory carried both of their packs, one of them stored the food from Joanna. Her mind was wandering as they walked. Her thoughts consumed her. And the man walking beside her was the main attraction in those thoughts.
At the inn, Rory had revealed a side to him she hadn’t yet seen.
She found herself liking it. Very much. Whilst he wasn’t as cold and standoffish now as he was when they had first met, she had never seen him let down his guard so much as he did with the children.
It was as if he was a whole different person.
She realized that was his true self. The person he was when he let down all the walls he had built up around him.
She wished she could see that man always.
She hugged the flower close. Had Rory given the lad the idea to gift it to her? She couldn’t help but wonder. But then, she also found herself wishing it to be true.
“What ’tis on yer mind, Bluebell? Ye are off in yer own wee world it seems.”
“’Tis naught. Just…thank ye.” She quickened her pace and moved ahead of him a bit. She could feel his eyes watching her. She kenned they were. She didn’t need to see his stare to ken it was there.
He didn’t call her back. He let her walk and kept the distance betwixt them. Her consuming thoughts continued, and for the first time, she wondered if she was for this world after all.
Mayhap, she was meant for the Highlands.
But with who?