Chapter Seventeen
Emer stood there in the pouring rain, watching Broccan disappear down the road. Her heart still raced like the river during a flood, her breath coming in intermittent gulps as she fought to get her mind working again.
Incredible did not begin to describe that kiss. Unexpected, certainly. But the way it felt to be in his arms, to be the focus of that kind of passion—Emer could have called lightning to strike with as hot as she burned for him.
Broccan didn’t say much. He didn’t let anyone in past the palisades he’d put up to protect his broken heart.
Anyone with half a brain could see as much.
But when he kissed her, Emer felt everything between them fall away.
She felt like she finally could see the man Broccan was beneath all that pain.
And she hoped, so desperately, that he’d found a glimpse of that man, too.
That he’d had a moment’s respite from being always on his guard.
The rain slowed to a drizzle, the scent of petrichor rising from the ground like ghosts at Samhain.
He hadn’t left anything for her to carry, so she followed behind him at a leisurely pace.
That man was wound so tight that he fired like a mis-strung bow, shooting out in anger, unable to aim his arrows.
Emer didn’t want to be there when this one flew.
Especially as she suspected that it was the first one that really did have something to do with her.
It was only last night, after all, that he’d told her he’d not touched a woman since his wife passed.
In nine years, she was the first woman to tempt him, to force him to face his loss in that way.
She hadn’t done it on purpose, but she hadn’t tried to stop it or slow it, either.
So when Emer stepped into the common room and Broccan was nowhere to be found, this time she didn’t go searching. He’d come back when he was ready to face her.
Or so she thought.
But one night turned to one day, and then another. If he didn’t have food and water in that cottage where he’d buried himself, then he was a few hours from serious trouble. The morning of the third day, when he still hadn’t opened the door, Emer had no choice but to check on him.
She fully expected her knock to go unanswered, so much so that she jumped when the door opened, nearly spilling the bowl of hot oats she carried.
Broccan looked like a boulder had rolled over him several times. His short, straight pale hair shot in every direction. His eyes had sunk, with dark, sooty circles telling her he hadn’t slept much. “What?”
“You’re not well,” she said softly, as though he were a wolf she was trying to tame. “You need to leave this cottage.”
“No.”
Emer swallowed the frustration that rose. He was in pain, she reminded herself. She could be patient. Of all people, she should understand that. “You don’t have to come into the hostelry. Just, please, get some fresh air. And eat this.” She held out the bowl of oats.
He looked at it like it was full of worms. “I’m not hungry.”
“That doesn’t mean your body doesn’t need food.”
His steel eyes stared at her, dull as a worn blade. They’d gone straight back to that first day. All the walls were back up.
“I order you to eat this porridge, chop more firewood, then go down to the river and bathe. Then you can wallow the rest of the afternoon.”
He took the bowl and slammed the door.
Emer wouldn’t quite call it a victory, but it was progress. She’d already finished her morning chores and she wanted to give Broccan some space when he finally emerged, so she headed down the path into Ath Luain to work at stitching more of the fabric into bedcovers.
She was halfway across the market square when an idea struck her like that lightning bolt she’d imagined when they kissed.
Scanlon’s stall was restocked. She could tell by the overflowing baskets of herbs and spices.
Hurrying back to where he stood calling out his wares, Emer searched the piles of ingredients until she found it.
Prize in hand, she went about the rest of her morning, a plan forming as she worked. A plan that maybe, just maybe, could get him talking to her again.
She did the same thing for the next two days.
Knocking on his door in the morn to give him his oats, ordering him to chop wood and get outside, then walking down to Oran’s guesting house.
The third morn, he came and ate on his own, returning more or less to his old routine but keeping to himself.
He’d gone back to nodding as his primary form of communication.
Emer let it continue like that for four more days, letting him fall into old habits and get more comfortable.
Early in the afternoon on the tenth day after the kiss, Emer put her plan into action.
Broccan swept the floor, cleaning up before dinner began.
With a deep breath, Emer approached him. “Broccan,” she tried. “Will you please talk to me?”
He stilled but didn’t look at her. “Why?”
“I hate that you’re not speaking with me.” And it stung that she’d gone from a friend walking by his side to an observer watching him through a window. “I miss having a friend.”
Piercing gray eyes found hers.
“I hoped you might help me cook dinner tonight.”
His grip tightened on the broom, his throat bobbing. “I don’t know how to cook.”
“If your companions are to be believed, you’re competent with a blade.
” She tossed him a small smile. “I trust you to chop vegetables.” Emer wanted Broccan to agree.
She wanted him to choose to do it instead of having to boss him around.
She held her breath as she waited for him to make his decision, her chest pinching in protest at the trapped air.
When he walked past her to the kitchen, Emer thought she might laugh. Or cry. Or both.
Probably both.
She fetched him a knife and some onions, showing him the most efficient way to chop them as she started in on the pie crusts. They fell into an easy rhythm, and she left him alone until she finished with the crusts.
Today, no matter how much he protested, she’d get him to talk.