Chapter 12
Twelve
Braden didn’t know which of them was more stunned by her confession. As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Maggie looked terrified.
He felt terrified.
Indeed, he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, as he stared at her while her words tore through him.
Eternity seemed to pass as they stood just a foot apart with her words hanging like a pall between them.
“Nay,” he said at last. “You can’t love me.”
“Why not?” she asked, her voice filled with the same pain he saw reflected in her amber eyes.
“Because you can’t.”
Before she could move, he turned about and left the stable in search of a way to cope with the news she had given him.
But all he could focus on was the raw agony tearing through his soul. He didn’t want her to love him. He didn’t want any woman to love him, at least not for any longer than an hour or two.
Dear saints, how had this happened?
And why?
Braden paused at the edge of the stable and leaned back against the faded wood as he covered his eyes with his hand. The rain wasn’t quite as bad as it had been earlier, but it still soaked him as he sought some place safe from her clutches.
Over and over, her words echoed in his mind. She loved him. Loved him and knew things about him that he didn’t think any woman had ever known. Not even his mother.
And all the while, he had ignored her. Had never paid a bit of attention to her.
He didn’t know which made him feel worse.
Pain sliced through his heart. Emotions he couldn’t define assailed him. Dear God, it literally felt as if someone were cleaving his chest in two.
“Braden?” he heard Maggie calling to him.
“Saints preserve me…” He was torn between the desire to make love to her and to run as fast as he could.
Before he could make his decision, she came rushing to his side.
Braden glared at her and cursed. “Woman, have you no sense to be running back out into the rain?”
She arched a brow at him as she crossed her arms over her chest in a feeble effort to keep herself warm. “I could say the same of you.”
“One would think you’d know I wanted to be alone.”
“Why?”
“Because I do, now go back inside and dry off.”
She lifted her chin stubbornly. “I’ll go in when you do.”
Exasperation filled him. “I canna believe you’ve made it to adulthood without one of your brothers choking the life out of your stubborn throat.”
She took his angry words without flinching. “They have little room to talk since they were such good teachers on that account. Now, I would have an answer from you.”
Braden closed his eyes as he struggled for control of himself. He didn’t know what to do or say. “Go back inside.”
“Answer me.”
Braden wished it were that simple. His feelings were complex and deep. All his life he had been loved. Every woman he’d ever known had whispered her undying devotion to him while they frolicked and played, and at the end of the day they had all married someone else.
At ten-and-six he had made the mistake of asking Nera ingen Alward to marry him. Two weeks later, she had sworn herself to Colum.
Her reason stung him to this day. “Braden, why would I marry you? You’ve a pretty face and are a hot tumble between my legs, but Colum has money the likes of which you canna fathom. Besides, he travels much which will leave us time aplenty to play.”
He ground his teeth. He had shown her in the end. His current assets made a mockery of Colum’s puny home. Even so, it had never erased the pain in his youthful, broken heart.
Nay, women were fickle, faithless creatures. And unlike his brothers, he would never believe their honied lies.
But therein was the problem. When such words came from the lips of Maggie, he wanted to believe them.
Why that was so, he didn’t know. He only knew that it would destroy what little was left of his heart to find out she was playing him falsely.
Maggie narrowed her gaze on him. “You call me stubborn, yet here you stand ready to drown yourself than answer a simple question.”
Against his will, Braden reached out to her. He cupped her icy cheek in his hand. “You’re freezing.”
“I know.”
He gave a half-laugh at her matter-of-fact tone. “If you have loved me for so long, why have you never spoken of it?”
“Because I didn’t think you’d want to hear it.”
Maggie was far too astute. But then she’d always been that way.
Her eyes turned dull. “Look, Braden, I’m not a fool. I know I can never have you. I know you don’t share my feelings and I wished I’d never spoken of them. Unfortunately, I can’t take them back. Can we just forget what I said and go back inside before both of us catch our deaths?”
Braden nodded. Not because he was afraid for himself, he’d survived much worse conditions than this, but because he didn’t want to see her sick.
The depths to which he would go to keep her safe didn’t bear investigating.
In truth, that place in his heart where he found concern for her frightened him more than anything else ever had.
Reluctantly, he took her by the arm and led her inside.
When they entered the stable, Sin’s voice rang out, “Guess you two will have to run around naked for a bit since all your clothes are now wet.”
“Actually,” Braden said as he wrung the rain from his hair, “I was thinking of raiding your pack for some clothes.”
“I somehow thought as much.”
Braden handed Maggie one of Sin’s plaids and his spare shirt.
Maggie took them and quickly changed in private, all the while her thoughts churned. Why had she ever spoken those words? And why did they torment Braden so?
The man had always been an enigma to her, but no more so than he was tonight. Shouldn’t love make someone happy?
She scoffed at the thought. When had loving Braden ever made her happy? The sad truth of the matter was that loving Braden had only caused her misery. Nothing but misery.
Crestfallen, she belted the plaid.
When she returned to the center of the stable, she saw Braden wrapped only in a plaid, his chest bare and glistening in the low light. Her throat dried at the sight.
It was going to be a long, long night.
Before she could give the matter anymore thought, Sin jumped to the floor. “Hope there’s a way to bolt the doors.”
Maggie frowned at his odd behavior and comment. “Why?”
“There’s a sortie of women headed our way and by the looks of them, we could be in for a nasty battle.” Sin made his way to the door.
Maggie’s frown deepened. What was he talking about?
Braden cursed as he reached the door first and searched for a latch. “Wouldn’t you know it,” he said bitterly.
“There’s nothing to bar it,” Sin finished for him. “Well, doesn’t this beat the devil?”
Even more perplexed, she stared at them. They looked as if the angel of death were upon them and they had forgotten to get Last Rites. “They’re just women. Tell them you’re not interested—”
“And they’ll try and change our minds,” Braden said, interrupting her.
Maggie rolled her eyes at his dire tone. “No, they won’t. You forget I’m a woman. I know how they think.”
“And I know how they act,” Braden said as he rejoined her. “They’ll not leave until they get what they want.”
Maggie laughed at his ego. “You’re being ridiculous, Braden. You’re not that irresistible.”
His look bore into hers. “You think not? Then explain to me why Tara is on her way here after I already told her I had no interest in taking her.”
Before she could think to respond, Seamus’s three eldest daughters threw back the doors to the stable.
“Knock, knock, lads,” Tara said, her hands on her hips as she surveyed them. “We’ve come to see to your comfort.”