Chapter 24
Later that afternoon, Emma made her way to the Great Hall for lunch. It was already packed when she entered.
The afternoon sun filtered through the high windows, falling across the table and painting the wooden surface a bright gold. The maids moved between the benches, setting down platters of cakes, honey, and bannocks.
The smell should have been comforting, but for some reason, it was not. Her stomach felt as though it were tied in knots.
She chose a seat by the window, where the light caught her cup, and kept her gaze on the table. She could feel Ava watching her.
Ava leaned closer, her voice low enough so that only Emma and their mother could hear. “Ye took yer time dressing. Were ye waiting for someone to notice?”
Emma’s jaw tightened. “Eat,” she muttered, then raised her voice so the others would hear. “Uncle will be on me soon about marriage again. Whether it’s to Jack or nae, I’ll need to decide. He willnae rest till we’re all settled.”
Olivia’s spoon stopped halfway to her lips. “After what ye did to Laird MacLeod, child, I doubt many men will offer.”
The words struck sharply. Emma set down her own spoon and looked at her mother. Her voice trembled, more from anger than hurt. “What I did? After what I did?”
“Ye daenae remember how fast news traveled back then?”
“I was being forced to marry him. Uncle was using me to forge an alliance with Clan MacLeod. He had little to nay regard for what I felt about the matter. I had to run. How am I the one getting blamed in this?”
Olivia sighed and lowered her spoon to her plate. “A laird who tries to force a lass into marriage doesnae make as good a story as a lass who runs away on her wedding day. The people daenae trust ye.”
A gasp of disbelief escaped Emma’s lips. “‘Tis us who shouldnae trust them, Ma. Even the best of them can ruin a family.”
Silence fell over the table, punctuated only by the pop of the fire.
Her mother’s eyes, soft and crinkled, were weary. “Aye,” she relented. “Maybe. But ye might still find luck—even love. There’s comfort in companionship.”
Emma let out a thin laugh that scraped her throat.
“I daenae want love. That isnae what this arrangement is about. Love blinds ye. Love destroys people. We still daenae ken what truly happened to Jack’s first wife.
And I watched ye fade after Faither died.
I daenae want that, Ma. I want freedom. That is what Jack is offering.
I daenae love him or care for him in any way. ”
Ava stopped cutting her bannock. She lowered her eyes, the faint color in her face gone.
Their mother folded her hands, her voice barely above a whisper. “Then pray that freedom brings ye peace, lass.”
Those words cut deeper than a scolding. Emma could not bear it. The bench scraped across the floor as she stood up. “Kindly excuse me.”
She left before anyone could speak again.
The corridor upstairs was quiet and cold. Her footsteps echoed off the stone, too loud in the silence. By the time she reached her chamber, her pulse had not slowed. She shut the door and leaned against it, both palms flat against the wood.
The weight of the morning pressed hard on her ribs.
She turned toward the window. On the table beside it lay the small book she had tried not to think about, its worn spine glinting faintly in the light. For a moment, she only looked at it. The air seemed to press in on her from every corner, almost as if nature itself was reacting to the book.
She crossed the room, each step slower than the last. She reached out and touched the cover. The leather felt warm from the sun.
Her throat ached.
She should burn the book. She should toss it into the fire and be done with it once and for all. Yet her hand stayed still. She couldn’t bring herself to do any of that.
“It meant nothing,” she whispered, a last-ditch effort to convince herself, but it didn’t work. The words sounded wrong the moment they left her mouth.
She sat on the edge of her bed, her fingers tracing the edge of the book.
Her heartbeat still carried the rhythm of last night.
She had told herself that she was done with him.
She had said it again this morning, clear and steady, right after waking up.
But now, with the castle quiet and the sun being her only entertainment, she could no longer find peace in the words.
Freedom. That was what she wanted. That was what Jack had promised her.
A clean start.
There was never love in the equation. She could live without love. She had told Ava as much. So why did the memory of his face… of his words refuse to loosen its hold on her?
She could still feel his fingers against her wrist when he passed her Stella this morning.
She could still hear the low murmur of his voice as he proudly showed her his collection of rare books.
She had never expected to see that side of him because she had never thought it existed in the first place.
But it did. And it had unsettled her more than any threat ever could.
She rose to her feet and walked to the window. Below, the courtyard stirred with afternoon activities. She could hear the sound of buckets clanging near the well. Her eyes landed on one of the grooms leading a horse to the gate. Two maids crossed the courtyard with baskets of laundry.
Everything looked ordinary and calm. Everything looked freeing.
She turned back to the table, staring down at the book again. It seemed harmless enough. Just words inked on paper, accompanied by a memory she could forget.
A memory she could pretend to forget.
If she kept the book, the memory would not stop haunting her. What then?
She should return it to the library. It was the best choice.
But then she had two more nights. Soon enough, this would cease to be a dilemma. She would have made her choice, and something in the pit of her stomach told her that she already knew what that choice was.
Dropping the book on the bedsheets, she drew a long breath and stepped out again. Solitude was not helping matters in the slightest.
Freedom, she told herself. That was all she wanted. Yet, as she walked down the hall, the word felt smaller than before and far less certain.
Later that evening, steam curled up from the bath as Emma splashed water on her face. She had tried to slow her thoughts all day, but the words at breakfast still niggled at her.
Doubt.
Her mother’s caution.
Her own sharp reply.
She breathed out and cupped more water to her cheeks, feeling the heat help even if just a little. Then, she lifted her head and looked in the small mirror. Her cheeks were flushed, and damp strands of hair clung to her temples. She barely knew the girl who was staring back at her.
She stepped out, reached for a towel, and stilled. A shadow moved in the glass, sending waves of terror down her spine. Without thinking too fast or too hard, she whipped around, ready to attack with whatever she could find.
Jack stood in the doorway with his arms folded across his chest. His expression was calm, but the sheer anger beneath it was obvious.
“Jack?” she called almost involuntarily, watching him step further into the room.
The look on his face didn’t exactly inspire confidence. He looked very angry at her, and she spent the next few seconds wondering what he could be angry about. Was it the book? Was it the way she had told him to forget what had happened between them the previous night?
Was it something else?
“Lovely speech during lunch,” he said, interrupting her thoughts, almost like he intended to help her find the cause. “I didnae ken that was how ye felt about me.”
“How I felt—”
“Daenae play coy with me, Emma. I heard ye talking to yer maither and yer sister this afternoon. I heard everything.”
Her heart lurched. “Ye were eavesdropping?”
“I fought in the wilderness for a year, Emma. I learned to listen even to the softest of noises. Plus, it is hard nae to listen when me name is tossed around a table,” he said, his voice clear. “I thought we had begun to trust each other, lassie.”
Emma felt a knot loosen in her stomach. “Trust?”
“I thought after last night we—”
“Last night was a mistake.”
“So ye keep saying.”
She wrapped the towel tighter around herself, trying to look fierce despite the cold biting into her skin. “How can I trust ye when all ye do is show me how good life could be with ye and tell me nothing about yer past?”
“I told ye—”
“Nay!” she snapped, raising an index finger.
A brief silence settled between them before he broke it, his voice sharpening. “What is it ye want to hear?”
“What happened to yer first wife, for example,” she began, her voice rising again. “Were ye good to her at first, like ye’re being to me, before ye—”
“Before I killed her?” he cut in. “We are back to that?”
“Of course, we are. Ye think I wouldnae ask?”
“What do ye mean to ask, exactly?”
“Why did ye kill yer wife? Why is her portrait gone from the gallery? I saw the space where it used to hang, Jack. Ye cannae pretend it never existed.”
His jaw tightened. “Her portrait—”
“Ye cannae explain it away,” she said. “Yer rule about me nae asking makes nay sense. Ye want me trust while keeping secrets I can see on the walls.”
“Emma—”
“Nay,” she hissed. “Ye cannae keep trying to get out of this. Why did ye kill her? Did she try to take Stella, and ye wouldnae let her? People say that she was caught with a guard. Is that it? Did ye kill her for that?”
“I didnae kill her,” he snapped. “She tried to kill me.”
The words echoed in the air, and the silence that followed felt like a knife slicing through bodies in the frosty cold. Emma felt her heartbeat slow for a minute, catching her breath and evening it out.
Did she hear that right?
“She tried to kill ye.”
He exhaled and ran his fingers through his hair. “Aye.”
She stared at him. “How? How did she try to kill ye?”
His lips flattened. “Ye have the truth ye asked for. Are ye satisfied?”
“That isnae an answer,” she huffed. “Ye cannae just say that without offering an explanation, Jack. Does anyone else ken about it? Did ye tell yer maither? Did ye tell the council?”
“I willnae be tried in me own home,” he said. “This is between us.”
“Then act like it is between us,” she fired back. “Tell me what I am walking into.”
He shook his head once. “Enough.”
Silence fell like a dropped door.
Neither of them moved. Emma heard only breaths. His. Hers. Fast and uneven. His eyes blazed with anger, yet she saw something else now. Something that ran deeper than just anger. Something she had seen in a lot of people. Something she had experienced herself and wrote about in her poems.
Betrayal.
“Ye set rules for me,” she said, her voice softer now. “Nay questions, and distance, and care for the bairn. Ye want me word. How can I give it with gaps this wide?”
“I set rules to keep ye safe,” he argued. “Some truths keep nay one safe.”
“Then ye ask me to marry a shadow,” she continued. “I am nae a fool.”
He held her gaze. “I am nae asking ye to be a fool,” he said. “I am asking ye to drop this matter.”
“I cannae.” She shook her head. “Nae until I ken the truth. The full truth.”
He stepped back. “Believe what ye will,” he grunted. “But that is the truth.”
Emma opened her mouth to speak again, but the sound of knuckles rapping against the door pierced the air. Troy walked in and stopped short at the sight of them.
“What do ye want?” Jack asked quickly. Emma could tell he didn’t want the situation to get more awkward.
Troy bowed his head and shot her a quick look. “Me Laird, ye are needed. ’Tis quite urgent, and private.”
Jack did not look away from her. “We are in the middle of a discussion, Troy.”
“I am afraid it cannae wait, me Laird,” Troy insisted.
Jack’s jaw tightened before he gave a short nod. “Fine.”
Emma found her voice. “Jack.”
He paused on the threshold.
“If ye want trust,” she said, “ye will need to give some of it back.”
His eyes held hers for a beat. “I ken,” he sighed.
He moved past his man-at-arms and out into the corridor. The door stayed ajar, but his footsteps faded.
Emma stood where he had left her, the towel clutched in both hands. Her pulse would not settle. She tried to swallow, but the sound was loud in the silence.
She walked to the window and then back again, as if the floor might answer for him. She could still hear his voice, harsh and clear.
“She tried to kill me.”
The words echoed again and again. She thought of the empty spot in the gallery. She thought of Stella’s small hand on his jaw. She thought of the way he had looked at her in the library.
None of it fit with a murderer. None of it proved that he was innocent either. If it was true, why had he never said it before? Why would he let her just believe the worst of him?
She placed a hand on the dressing table to steady herself. She had come so far to keep her head clear. Now, her heart was pulled in the other way.
“What in God’s name just happened?” she muttered to herself, to the air that seemed to press close around her.
To no one in particular.