ELEVEN
Alistair stared at Chris propped against the bed pillows—pale, disheveled, hair frayed in its braid and slowly unraveling . . .
She had never appeared more lovely.
“Regretting your actions does not remove the consequences of them,” she said, voice quiet.
“Aye, I agree. But can we not try? Can ye find forgiveness in your heart for me?”
He would never forget the gut-punched horror of realizing that Chris had simply . . . left. That after their argument in the carriage, she had decided to leave Fiesole without another word. With her father’s assistance, she had packed her trunk and taken the next train out of Florence.
She had left a note, at least. A terse missive that he could still recall word for word nine years on:
I am too angry and wounded in my soul to be with you at present. I am returning to Oxford for a while. I shall write when I feel able to speak without screaming. You, of course, may write me at will. May I recommend you begin with groveling apologies?
Her eyes dropped to the bap on the tray, her finger touching its crusty exterior.
“You never wrote,” she whispered. “I waited and hoped—”
“I should have. I was twenty-one years old, clod-headed, and an arrogant arse. That is the only justification I can offer.”
She nodded. “I should have written, too. I planned on it, but then . . .”
“Your father was angry.”
“Yes. He was. So very angry over your actions.”
“A few weeks after ye left, he tossed me out on my ear. He prevented the publication of your article in Rome and told me that I would never work in archeology again.”
Dr. Rutherford had been true to his word. All doors into antiquarian work had been shut to Alistair. Surely Dr. Newton, Chris’s husband, had played a part in that as well, Alistair now realized.
“Papa told me as much.”
“I ran into your father two years later in London. He roundly informed me that ye had married well and were the happier for it.”
Chris nodded again, her eyes still downcast. “Stephen helped me heal. Not from the article, per se, but from loss.” A pause. “From the loss of you.”
Silence hung for a long moment, neither of them moving or speaking.
Alistair stared at her profile—the sloping curve of her pert nose, the plump roundness of her lips, the stubborn jut of her chin.
So close.
He had come so close to losing her forever yesterday. The sight of her pale and half-buried under rubble would haunt him to the grave.
It rushed through him then—emotions and memories of their shared past . . .
The sound of her helpless giggles as he mimed antics from his days at St Andrews.
Chris reaching for him, tugging his mouth down to her hungry lips.
Her whispered words in the dusk of a Tuscan evening, fireflies winking in his peripheral vision—I shall love you forever, Alistair Maclagan.
Her love might have faded, but his . . .
No.
He loved her.
It was truly that simple.
She awakened him and made him see how dreary and Chris-less his life had been.
Once, he had permitted wounded pride to stem his apologies.
Never again.
This time he would fight for her. For them.
Without thinking, he reached for her slim hand resting on the counterpane.
Unlike other ladies, Chris’s hands were not paragons of milky-white ease—soft and unblemished.
No. Hers were the hands of a woman at work—chafed knuckles, dirt beneath nails, the raised white scar on her thumb from a cut, courtesy of her absurdly sharp trowel.
Slipping her fingers through his, he could feel the callouses on her palm, the strength in her grip.
And like him, she gasped at the unexpected touch, her eyes flying to their joined hands.
Electricity hummed at the connection, licking heat up Alistair’s arm.
He ached to kiss her. To lift her chin with a finger and draw her lips to his. To crawl into the bed beside her and urge her head to nap on his chest.
He merely studied her instead.
“Please, Chris,” he whispered. “Can we try again? It’s been nine years. Could ye possibly forgive the hurt of my betrayal and learn to trust me once more?”
She stared at their hands, threaded together.
And then she shifted, her palm moving to rest atop his hand, her thumb tracing the blue vein from his middle knuckle to his wrist bone.
Alistair rather forgot to breathe.
Finally, she lifted her gaze. Something haunted and pained lingered there. Perhaps merely a reflection of his own beating heart.
“I am not sure forgiveness will be possible, Alis. I cannot say . . . given all that—”
“Please, lass. I ken that I am nine years too late with my groveling, but can we not give it another go?”
“Alis—” she began, tone so weary.
“Please.”
Her bottom lip trembled and she bit it, her top teeth sinking deep to stem her tears. Reaching for the napkin atop the breakfast tray, she dabbed at her eyes.
“It w-won’t end well,” she gasped.
“Perhaps not. But I think we owe it to the memory of our past selves, to those happy months in Fiesole, to at least try.”
Chris didn’t agree with him in words.
But she did nod before picking up her bap again and reaching for the jam pot.
It wasn’t a resounding declaration, but Alistair’s heart took flight.
He would give her space. A chance to breathe freely again.
And in the meanwhile, he would do everything in his power to rebuild the trust he had once shattered.
“I come bearing gifts,” Alis announced the next day, shouldering his way into Chrissi’s bedchamber, a large wooden box in his arms.
Chrissi looked up from her position on the bed, ankle propped once more on an obliging cushion.
“Gifts?” she asked, alarm chasing her spine.
Normally, she adored presents.
But given the current state of matters between herself and Alis, gifts made her leery. She could not bear growing more indebted to him, losing more of herself in his happy smile.
“I ken ye might be a wee bit crabbit, being forced to rest as ye are,” he grinned. “So I brought ye some cheer.”
Alis placed the box on the counterpane with a grunt. Battered and somewhat dirty, it appeared anything but a gift.
She eyed it warily.
Alis busied himself with opening the wooden lid.
“You chose this box . . . why?” she asked. “Because you find wildflowers too pedestrian?”
He froze, pinning her with a look. “Would ye have liked flowers?”
“They are pretty. And spring has finally arrived.”
As Alis had predicted, the landscape around the castle had come to life over the past week—trees leafing out and gorse blooming. Even the gowk stane had yellow Scots broom brushing against its side.
“Noted,” Alis nodded before turning back to the box.
Chrissi’s curiosity rose.
Thankfully, he didn’t keep her long in suspense. With a flourish, he lifted out several jute bags.
She instantly recognized the telltale clink of pottery.
Her expression brightened. “You brought me sherds to sort! What type of sherds? Italian? Scottish?”
“And ye claim to prefer flowers,” he snorted. “Ye regard pottery sherds with the same excitement that a débutante views bonnet ribbons.”
“Nonsense. Sherds are much more interesting.”
Laughing, Alis set about prepping the sherds, placing a large square of canvas atop the counterpane for her to spread out the bits of broken pottery.
Oh! She had forgotten this—the thrumming delight of being the focus of Alis’s care.
Emotion pricked her eyes.
“How goes the excavation today?” She cleared her throat.
“Excellent.” He dumped a bag of mixed sherds on the canvas . . . Scottish pottery, by the look of it. Chrissi immediately recognized bits of Grooved Ware and perhaps a few pieces of Rothesay. Her fingers reached for them.
“You know I need more information than merely ‘excellent,’ correct?” She rubbed a piece of pottery between her fingers, testing its texture.
He laughed. “Today, the workers hope to finish the scaffolding to retain the embankment surrounding the entrance tunnel. Once that is in place, I thought perhaps I could begin a careful exploration of the tunnel. It appears to have some debris and dirt blocking it about three feet in.”
“Ah.” She glanced at her foot, hating that her injury would prevent her from being on-site to witness it all. “Thank you for moving slowly and methodically. Many archaeologists would simply shovel out the dirt in their eagerness to reach the center chamber.”
“Aye, but I learned from the best.” His fond look gave no doubt as to his meaning. “I shall do ye proud, Chris.”
Such glowing affirmation . . .
Chrissi had to swallow again, her throat aching.
Sunlight streamed through the window at his back, rimming his head and catching coppery highlights in his dark hair. The beard suited his features, she decided. It lent him a dangerous air, as if he had just set down his sword after an afternoon of marauding.
At twenty-one, he had been virile and unnervingly attractive.
Now at thirty, he seemed a fortress unto himself. An immovable block of muscle and determination.
She ached for that strength. To crawl into the comfort of his arms and let him battle her demons and the memories that still haunted her. To grow old together, secure in the other’s affections.
But that wasn’t how their story would end.
The more he pushed, the more inevitable it became that her own sins would tumble loose, burying them both in a rubble pile of hurt and betrayal.
Chrissi had survived his loss once, if just barely.
But a second time?
No.
Alis would destroy her in truth this time around.
Particularly when he left her bedchamber and returned an hour later, a bouquet of freshly cut wildflowers—Highland thistle, wild rose, and dog violet—clutched in his fist.
Chris was melancholy.
The development puzzled Alistair.
When he had determined to woo her, he had expected resistance—anger and recriminations.
Instead, with every kind act, she seemed to sink a wee bit more inside herself, becoming more wan with each passing hour.
After two days, Alistair decided a change of scenery was in order.
Surely, Chris was simply upset to relinquish the excavations to his care.
He ordered a roaring fire built in the library and installed her there, ankle propped on a footstool and the pottery sherds on a table within easy reach.
She seemed content enough, sorting and cataloging as he read across from her.
From time to time, he would feel her eyes upon him. But when he glanced up, she would immediately look away. And the one time their eyes met, Chris blushed.
He considered that to be progress.
But his attempts to draw her into easy conversation were stymied.
The next day, he moved her to the great hall, placing her in an overstuffed chair before the enormous windows.
“If ye lean to the right here, lass”—he pointed—“ye will be able to see the excavations.”
Her expression brightened at that.
“And how fares the digging?” Chris pressed him for updates.
“Well! The workers are slowly removing the dirt I marked from the tunnel. They are to summon me should they find anything. In the meantime, I shall enjoy keeping ye company.”
“Thank you,” she replied, almost absently, adjusting her ankle on the footstool.
Alistair frowned. Her words felt . . . blasé.
For not the first time, he wondered if something was wrong. It was as if the more he wooed her—the kinder his actions—the sadder she became.
Was she melancholy, in truth? The Chris of his memory had never suffered from a depression of spirit. But perhaps she had over the intervening years, particularly given the twin losses of husband and father and the financial instability their deaths had brought.
Regardless of its source, Chris’s sadness weighed on him. Was there some piece of this puzzle that he was missing?
He thought of it as he watched her stare listlessly out the window. Her stark expression remained with him as he troweled away the remaining dirt blocking the tunnel, revealing a path to the chambered cairn beyond.
Chris was clearly eager to return to the excavation site. Refusing crutches, she began limping across the great hall, testing her ankle for how much weight it could sustain.
A week after her injury, Alistair arrived at her bedchamber to find her bed tousled and empty.
No Chris to be seen.
Mmmm.
He knew where he would find her.