Page 41 of Hard-Hearted Highlander
But what if itwastrue, any part, or all of it? And Bernadette had so eagerly made assumptions about his demeanor. She didn’t like to think what that said of her. She didn’t want to think that she’d failed to give a man she scarcely knew the courtesy of doubt. That was precisely the sort of thing that had had harmed her through the years, when people who really didn’t know her at all were so quick to judge. Had she done the same to him?
She paused on the path when she reached the small bluff that led down to the beach and squatted to pick some of the wildflowers that had sprouted. She stood up, opened her palm and let the breeze carry them off. They fluttered to the beach, disappearing from sight.
Had the girl really disappeared?How horrifying that must have been for him. Bernadette knew how unanswered questions of where someone had gone could torment a person until she no longer knew herself, because it had happened to her. One moment, she was lying in bed with Albert, giggling at some silly thing he’d said to her. And the next moment, he was gone, dragged away by two men while a third threw her clothes at her and commanded her to “make herself decent.”
Bernadette never saw Albert again.
She’d gone for months without knowing what had happened to him. Her father had been without remorse or conscience, and had refused to answer any of her entreaties or pleas for information about Albert. She kept expecting Albert to appear, to try and reach her in some way.
Her aunt, her father’s sister, had finally taken pity on Bernadette and freed her from her private prison. There were no details as to how it had happened. “A storm, an accident, I really can’t say what,” her aunt had said, clearly distressed.
After the shock of it, and the grief, Bernadette had not wanted to believe the worst about her father...but she’d never looked at him the same. She could never keep the doubts about him from creeping into her mind.
The feeling was entirely mutual. Her father despised her so much for what she’d done that she couldn’t be entirely sure she wouldn’t be the next person lost at sea.
Knowing Albert’s fate had not eased her pain at all—if anything, she’d felt responsible for his demise. She’d imagined his death—still did, at times—over and over, torturing her through many sleepless nights. She convinced herself she should have understood how deep and vicious her father’s vengeance would run, that she should have understood he was a man who would not be crossed.
She should never have eloped. It had cost her everything.Everything.
She couldn’t allow herself to think of it, lest she would cry for the thousandth time, so she wiped her palms on her skirts and turned to carry on—but was startled by the sight of a man and a horse on the path ahead of her.
There was something vaguely familiar about him, but Bernadette was too startled to think why. He didn’t move until she did, then spurred his horse forward and began to move toward her.
The hair on the back of Bernadette’s neck rose, and she glanced over her shoulder, assessing how far it was to Killeaven from here, Mr. MacDonald’s warning entering her thoughts. She thought she might be closer to Balhaire, but she wasn’t certain of it and tried frantically to work out which way to run as the man neared her.
He slowed as he approached and doffed his hat. His hair was wild and unkempt, his face unshaven, his clothes unwashed. He brazenly eyed her, making her feel queasy.“Madainn mhath.”
“Ah...good morning,” she said. Her voice was shaking.
“Lost?”
“Not at all,” Bernadette said, willing the tremor out of her voice.
He could see her fear, Bernadette was certain of it, because of the way he smirked. “Aye, good, then. A bonny thing like you would no’ want to be lost round here.”
“I am not lost,” she insisted.
He reseated his hat and set his horse to walk again. But he continued to smirk as he and his horse ambled by. When he passed, he looked back at her, his gaze moving up and down her body.
Bernadette whirled about and walked as fast as she could in her ill-fitting boots in the opposite direction.
She must have stumbled on for another quarter of an hour or more, her heart pounding, and constantly looked over her shoulder. She wasn’t thinking of Albert anymore, or of Mackenzie, or anything other than putting distance between herself and that man, so she was startled nearly out of her boots for the second time that morning when she climbed the path near the cove, and saw Mackenzie on the cliff, standing so desperately close to the edge again.
Just like the first time she’d seen him there, it seemed a private moment. But he stood soclose,and now that she knew the source of his despair, she couldn’t bear it—there was something quite ominous about standing on the edge as he was. “Sir!” she shouted into the wind, surprising herself. “Mr. Mackenzie!”
He seemed almost in a trance as he slowly turned his head. When he saw her, he stepped back and ran a hand through his hair. He wore no hat, or a neck cloth, for that matter. He wore only a lawn shirt whose tail billowed over his pantaloons, and a cloak thrown over them. He looked bedraggled.
“Again?” he said gruffly when she climbed up the path toward him. “Do you no’ have something you ought to be doing for your mistress rather than spying on me?”
“I wasn’t spying,” she said breathlessly. “I like to walk by the sea in the mornings.” Except this morning, which had had been very disconcerting thus far. She peered at him curiously, seeking any sign of his intentions in his expression and finding none.
Her study of him displeased him—his frown deepened. “Why do you look at me like that?”
“Pardon?”
“As if you’ve never met me.”
“I don’t...was I?” she sputtered.
