Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
“Do ye have everythin’ ye need?” Laura asked, standing in front of the abbey as the morning sun shone down on them.
The rest of the girls, as well as a couple of the nuns, were standing around them as well, staring at Emilie with soft, encouraging smiles.
As soon as Emilie had woken up that morning, she’d told everyone of her plans to return. Since she had been so clearly unhappy the past few days at the abbey, everyone had been more than excited to assist her in her efforts to return.
The nuns had even supplied her with a horse, which was currently waiting, laden with snacks and going-away gifts in its saddlebags.
“I have everythin’ and more,” Emilie said, giving everyone around her a soft, gentle smile. “Thank ye all for helpin’ me this mornin’. And, if I’m nae successful, ye’ll be seein’ me soon.”
Whinnying sounded behind her, and, at first, Emilie figured it was only the horse that she’d been given by the nuns. But then she realized it was too far away.
She glanced at Laura, who Emilie only now noticed was staring far beyond her shoulder, eyes dancing with mirth as they focused on something in the distance.
Whirling, Emilie spotted a carriage riding up the dirt road that led to the abbey. As it drew closer, she realized that the carriage was familiar, and Emilie’s heart began to pound.
“What is this?” she whispered to herself, stepping forward without thinking about it.
She waited with bated breath as the carriage approached, finally rolling to a stop. The door opened immediately, and Emilie sucked in a gasp as Archer stepped out.
His gray eyes lit with confusion at the scene in front of him, sweeping over the horse and all the women unexpectedly standing around him. But then, those alluring gray eyes landed on her, and all the confusion began to fade.
“What are ye doin’ here?” Emilie croaked, her voice breaking.
She coughed to clear her throat, taking a step to bring herself a little bit closer to him.
“What are ye doin’ here?” she asked again, her tone stronger than it had been a moment before.
“I came for ye,” Archer explained, his gruff voice like music to her ears. “I came to bring ye home.”
Emilie crossed her arms, shifting her weight from foot to foot.
“And ye thought, what?” she asked, suddenly combative. “Ye thought that I’d come ridin’ back with ye like nothin’ had happened?”
Emilie’s heart was beating so loudly she thought for sure that everyone around her would be able to hear it. Archer walked forward, bringing himself to within only a few inches of her.
“I shouldnae have ever asked ye to go,” he said, his voice more earnest than Emilie had ever heard it.
She shifted nervously, suddenly all too aware of all the eyes that were on her. Glancing around, Emilie locked eyes with Laura, who gave her a self-satisfied smirk.
“Come with me,” Emilie ordered, turning on her heel and stalking back toward the nunnery.
She didn’t look behind her to see if Archer was actually following, and there was a large part of her that didn’t expect him to. Her husband was not the type of man who took kindly to being ordered around.
But when she made it to the nearest courtyard, a beautiful space filled with flowers and the chirping of birds, she whirled around and found Archer right there with her, having followed her the entire way.
“Emilie,” Archer breathed the moment that she turned to face him. “I told ye already that I never should have asked ye to leave. The bairns miss ye.”
“And ye?” she asked, cocking her eyebrow at him.
Emilie had no idea why she was behaving like this. Why could she not just accept that he had returned for her? Had she not been about to return to the castle and ask him to let her back? Was this not exactly what she wanted?
But now that he was here, now that she realized that all this time Archer had been on her way to her as well, she finally allowed her hurt to rise up.
“What do ye mean?” Archer asked.
“Oh, is it yer turn to play daft now?”
Emilie stared at him hard, her glare pointed as she waited for him to answer. A muscle in Archer’s jaw ticked, and she could tell that she was making him uncomfortable.
In that moment, however, Emilie did not care. There was no one around but them. And she wanted to hear him say it.
She knew without a shadow of a doubt that if Archer didn’t miss her, he would not be here. She knew that he would not come running all this way just to convince her to come back for the twins and the twins alone.
They were six. In a few months, their wounds would heal, and they likely wouldn’t even remember her anymore, as much as that pained her to admit.
“I miss ye, too,” Archer said finally, his gray eyes molten as they stared at her.
“And what else?” Emilie prompted, staring hard at her husband.
Archer threw up his hands, a clear sign of exasperation.
“What do ye mean, what else?” he asked, staring at her.
“I mean, what else?” Emilie said.
She waved her hand, pointing her fingers out toward the front of the abbey where they’d just come from.
“Ye saw what everythin’ was like when ye arrived,” Emilie said.
“I was about to leave. I was about to come back to Castle McGregor and ask ye to nae do this. But now, with ye standin’ in front of me, I realize I hadnae been aware of the hurt I was by all of this.
So, ye want me to come back? Convince me. ”
She crossed her arms, staring daggers at her husband. Her cheeks were flushed with heat, but whether that was from frustration or desire for the man standing right across from her, Emilie did not know. That wasn’t something that she could currently spend her energy thinking about.
“Ye want me to convince ye,” Archer growled, and he took several steps forward.
They were only a few inches away now. Emilie could feel the body heat rolling off of him. She wanted to lean into him, to place her head on his chest and listen to his steady, beating heart while she reveled in his warmth. But she couldn’t do that. Not yet.
“I have thought about ye every second since the moment that ye walked out that door,” Archer explained, his voice gruff as he spoke. “I have pondered what ye were doin’ and if I made the right decision. When I asked ye to leave, I thought I was doin’ the right thing.”
“When I went to Thrums that day,” he continued, his words coming out of him so quickly that Emilie was having a hard time keeping up.
“I found out that someone, a competitor, had tainted me stores of whisky. It might have been poison, we have nay way of knowin’.
I thought about ye in that storage room with me, and how, had ye asked, I would have given ye some of me own drink without thinkin’ about it at all.
I thought it was only a matter of time before someone got to ye to hurt me. ”
The story made Emilie’s head spin. She hadn’t known anything about what had taken place at Thrums. She hadn’t even known where Archer had gone when he’d left that day.
It made sense. From everything that she knew about him, she knew that he would want to run when something like that happened.
Archer thought himself a monster, thought that he was a danger to all those who grew close to him. So, when faced with the possibility that others would want to harm those around him? That they would be fighting on all fronts, and in danger from both him and everyone else in the world?
It made sense that he would run. But that didn’t mean that Emilie had to accept it.
“Ye should have talked to me about it,” Emilie insisted, straightening her spine.
She didn’t want to forgive him. Not just yet.
“I ken,” Archer admitted, taking another step forward.
They were a hair’s breadth away from each other. All Emilie had to do was flinch, and she would be touching him. And she wanted to touch him so badly.
Her fingertips itched with the urge to reach out and run along his chest. But she would not do that.
“I should have talked to ye,” Archer admitted. “I should have told ye what happened and let ye make yer own choice.”
He stared at her, and she stared at him. Emilie could tell that he expected his words to be enough.
But they were not.
“Say it,” Emilie commanded, voice laced with steel. “I need to hear ye say it.”
“Say what?” Archer asked, that same exasperation seeping into his tone.
Emilie just cocked an eyebrow at him. Archer knew exactly what he needed to say, knew exactly what she needed to hear. She was not going to lead him to it, not any more than she already had.
Finally, Archer sighed.
“I should have never asked ye to leave,” he said, tone filled with honesty. “I am sorry.”
There it was. The words that Emilie had been so desperate to hear, soothing over the pain of the last few days like a balm to the soul.
She grinned at Archer, stepping forward and touching him, finally, at long last.
Emilie wrapped her arms around his waist, gazing up into the eyes of her husband.
“That’s all I needed,” she murmured, going up onto her toes and kissing her husband.
The kiss was long and luxurious, filled with all the things that neither of them wanted to say in that moment. She allowed herself to lean into it.
When they parted, they were both panting, and Archer grinned down at her.
“Let’s go, wife,” he murmured, causing butterflies to dance within her belly. “We need to get ye home.”