Page 14 of The Groom Wore Plaid
“Because your father had so many estates?”
She shook her head. “Larig Castle was the homeof my childhood, and although it means much to my clan, it has sad, frightening memories for me.”
He came to stand beside the rock she sat upon, gazing where she did, at the castle. It was a relief that he wasn’t intently studying her.
“I think I was too shy to tell ye the details when we were younger, but my mother took Hugh and me away to Edinburgh to live with her family,” Maggie said slowly. Since she was about to tell him of her dream, she wanted him to know something about her, to understand what formed her.
“I remember you telling me your father was a drunkard.”
“Aye, and that was the main reason. But she also wanted to take Hugh away from the friends he’d gotten into trouble with. Edinburgh was a good place for us. Ye remember our tenement—there were so many people to meet. But . . . was it home? Nay, it never seemed like it, though I’ve mostly lived there these last ten years.” She sighed. “Part of me longed for the mountains that cradled Loch Voil and seemed to rim my world.”
“You’re back in the Highlands now,” Owen said. “Soon you will feel at home here.”
She stiffened, knowing he’d given her the perfect opening. She stood up, speaking with cool determination. “I won’t ever be at home here, Owen. I cannot marry ye.”
She faced him head on, but he was still looking at the castle. For a long minute neither of them said a thing. Then at last he turned and squared off against her, folding his arms across his chest and regarding her with narrowed brown eyes.
“You’ve changed your mind already? You give fickle women a bad name, Maggie.”
She took a deep, steadying breath and resisted the urge to insult him back. “I thought I could marry ye. Though I was angry about everything that had happened between us, and having to fix everyone else’s mistakes, I accepted my role in all of this. But last night changed everything.”
“Last night,” he echoed with sarcasm.
“Owen, I dreamed a terrible dream.”
He simply blinked at her as if confused.
“Don’t tell me ye don’t remember.” As anger rose up inside her, hot enough to make her ears burn, she pushed at his chest and he barely moved. “Ye don’twantto remember. I have dreams, Owen, vivid haunting dreams that come true. I’ve never known themnotto come true. I had dreams of ye when ye were just a laddie. You were the secret friend of my childhood.”
She was spilling it all and he was just regarding her as if she were a new species of plant life. And that made her even more furious.
“I’ve spent my life hiding what I am from people,” she continued, words flowing fast, “knowing I could be accused of being a witch. It kept me from deepfriendships, from being myself. And then after everything that happened with ye ten years ago, I pushed it all down inside me, learning how to force myself not to dream, even learning to wake myself up if I felt it happening. Getting a decent night’s sleep took a long time to achieve. I thought I was over this curse—until ye told me ye’d have me to wife. And then I dreamed.” She shuddered and wrapped her arms around herself, and the dream unfolded in her mind as if it had been waiting to spring up and terrorize her. “When I screamed, ye woke me from the dream of our wedding day.” Her voice became rough. “I’m in my wedding clothes, and ye’re covered in blood, lying on the floor, white with impending death. I fall on ye and my gown becomes spattered with your blood . . .” She couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t think, might never feel warm again. The terror of it was so real, overwhelming, incapacitating.
And then she came back to herself to find him shaking her.
“Maggie.” He looked exasperated and angry. “This is why you won’t marry me? You’re allowing a foolish nightmare to upset you?”
Her head jerked away from him as if he’d slapped her, and he let her go.
“Andnowye see why I hesitated to tell ye,” she said. “Ten years ago ye reacted even worse. Ye don’t have to take my word for it. Ye can ask my brother, my mother—oh, silly me, they’re not here to confirm my story, don’t ye ken.” His disbelief had haunted herall these years, and it was there again. “Aye,youtry to tell the mother whose child is thought drowned that I don’t have dreams that come true. I was the only one who never gave up; I saw where he was, led them right there. Do ye ken how often my dreams saved Hugh and me from terrible beatings?” All the emotion pouring out of her left her drained, and she regarded him with an exhaustion that seemed older than time. “Ye haven’t changed one bit, Owen Duff. Ye still think ye ken all there is in the world. But ye didn’t ken enough to save Lady Emily when I warned ye to.”
“I cannot believe you’re bringing up that tragedy,” he scoffed.
“At least ye didn’t remind me what a jealous liar I am.”
He shot her a look. “I did not—”
“Ye did. And when my dream came true, and the poor lassie died, ye never acknowledged it, did ye.”
“I don’t acknowledge coincidences.”
“Is that what ye told yourself? How ye slept at night? I never got over the guilt that I trustedyouto do something to help her, when I should have gone to her myself.”
He clenched his jaw. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“That ye’ll help me find a way to salvage this marriage contract between our clans.”
He stared down at her. She well remembered when they’d been together in their youth, when they’d hunchedover a snake for an hour, and she’d thought Owen would take notes, he was so intent. She felt that way now, exceptshewas his science experiment.
