Page 105 of Love with a Scottish Outlaw
The ache of what he’d lost was almost too much to bear.
He stepped back. “My lady, what brings ye to Carlyle Castle?”
“Finn tells me ye’ve begun to work on the place. Show me what ye’ve accomplished.”
He cleared his throat. “Little enough. It’ll take time.”
“Aye. But show me.”
She stretched her hand out in a ladylike gesture that he remembered from long ago. He found himself putting out his arm for her to rest her hand upon it as he escorted her inside.
He heard Finn snort behind him, but the girl didn’t follow them.
“Ah, I can see a difference already,” Cat said.
He tried to see the great hall as she might see it. The floors were clean of broken furniture and dirt, but the hearths were empty, the stone walls bare of tapestries.
He frowned at her. “Ye’re just being polite, my lady.”
She suddenly rounded on him. “Stop that nonsense at once.”
“What nonsense?” he asked, arching one brow.
“Ye’re my-ladying me as if ye don’t know me, as if I’m not Cat, as if we’d never—” She broke off, glancing at the doorway as if Finn might appear.
But the lass had wisely left them alone.
“Calling ye by your title reminds me that ye can’t be just Cat to me,” he said quietly.
“I want to be.”
It was a whisper, and he wasn’t certain he heard her correctly. “What did ye say?”
“I want to be Cat—your Cat. I liked who I was, what I was doing, when I was with ye.”
He had no response. No words came to him for a long moment, and he squashed some unnamed emotion as it struggled to surface. “Ye’re just unhappy right now,” he finally said. “When ye go off to Edinburgh—”
“I’ve been to all those places. They’re fine, but . . . they’re not here.”
Shocked, he spread his arms wide. “Here?”
“Aye, here. Your castle. Or your manor near the village.”
He stepped closer, frowning. “Cat, are ye with child? Is that what this is about? I never wanted a child of mine to be as unwanted as I felt, in a marriage that wasn’t about love.”
“Nay!” she cried, putting both her hands on his chest as if she would push him over. “Why cannot it be about love between us? Do ye love me, Duncan?”
He opened his mouth, but again, could find no words. She was full of surprises, his Cat.
His Cat.
“I’ve promised your brother I’d never see ye again,” he said stonily. “’Tis not my place to—”
She slid her hands from his chest to his face, forcing him to look down upon her. “Do ye love me?” she whispered, her voice an ache that pierced him.
He gripped her upper arms, as if he’d shove her away—but he couldn’t. “Aye, I love ye. I’ve loved ye, maybe from the moment ye opened your eyes and stared at me as if only I could save ye. And then I betrayed ye. What does my love matter?”
She closed her eyes, as everything in her seemed to relax. A smile spread slowly, and when she looked at him again, he was struck by the tenderness and thankfulness.
