Page 86 of Sweet Home Highlander
“M’laird, the lady’s carriage is ready,” Mrs. Wingate said. Though she was his cook, she’d taken on a few of Fenella’s old duties at the keep for the time being.
Of course it was ready. It had come from Maclaren with Aisla and Leclerc inside it, already packed and prepared for their journey. There was truly no need for her to state as much right now, and Niall felt a barb of annoyance at her for interrupting him.
“Thank ye, Mrs. Wingate, we’ll be down in a moment,” he said.
“Yes, laird. Will there be anything else?” she asked.
He fought the desire to groan. “Nae.”
Aisla looked up at him, her gaze following the cook’s departure. “We haven’t had a chance to speak, but I am sorry for your loss. I know you cared for Fenella.”
Niall felt a twinge of pain in his breast. They’d had her funeral the day before, and despite her confession of what she’d told Dougal and the things she’d done, Niall had let his anger go. He would not carry such a burden, not when she was dead. Love sometimes drove people to madness. She’d had no one else but him, and she’d been his friend.
“I’m sorry she was unkind to ye,” he said. “She told me what she did to break us apart then and now. I should have been…better. I should have been better at many things.”
“Me, too,” she whispered. “I should have been as well.”
He smiled. “We were happy some of the time, were we no’, Aisla?”
Tears brimmed in her eyes. “Aye, more than most of the time.”
Leclerc chose that moment to stride into the hall, halting awkwardly upon seeing the two of them as well as the obvious intimacy of the moment. He cleared his throat, stuffing his hands in his trouser pockets. “We should leave before this Scottish weather gets any worse.”
Niall stared at Aisla, wanting more than the seconds they had left. To tell her everything he’d wanted to say in the moments before Mrs. Wingate and then Leclerc interrupted them. But there was a wall up between them now, and with Leclerc standing waiting and the front doors to the castle teeming with a barrage of servants moving Aisla’s remaining trunks to the carriage, the wall seemed impenetrable.
Niall felt everything start to close in on him. This was it. He rubbed his hand on his coat and felt something in the pocket. He wanted to hold on to it, but it was hers.
“Before I forget,” he said, reaching in for the dagger and handing it to her. “This is yers.”
“My dagger! Thank you.”
He stared at the woman he’d loved his whole life. “Thank ye, for saving Tarbendale and its people. If ye hadn’t discovered what ye did about Buchanan, more would have died.”
Her fingers shook as she pocketed the dagger. “You’re a good laird, Niall. You’re a good man.” Her voice caught and trembled. “I wish…”
“Ye wish?”
Her throat worked. “That we had met at a different time.” She reached up swiftly and kissed him on the cheek, the soft touch of her lips burning an imprint there. “Good luck, but I know you won’t need it. I’m proud of you, Niall.”
Her words stunned him. Humbled him. He loved that she was proud of him. He’d done it all for her, after all. He only wished she loved him enough to stay.
“Niall?” he heard Ronan calling. He was grateful for the distraction. Yet all he wished to do was stare at the woman he’d always believed was his wife. Stare at her and hold her in this place, forever.
“Your brother needs you,” Aisla said with a teary smile, and clearing her throat, looked to where Leclerc was waiting. “We should go.”
The Frenchman inclined his head. “Tarbendale.”
“Leclerc,” Niall said. “Take care of her.”
“I will.”
He took her arm and gestured toward the steps. Niall’s heart ached as she took the first few steps down, but he said nothing. It was what she wanted, he had to remind himself.
Aisla paused, turning to look at him over her shoulder. Her lips tugged into a half-hearted smile, and then, in another blink, she was gone.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Niall climbed out of Tarbendale’s newly opened mine shaft to an outburst of raucous cheers, and nearly fell backward at the unexpected noise and commotion. He saw his laborers smiling and laughing, and felt hands clapping onto his back and shoulders, the dust from the tunnels puffing up into the air. And finally, Niall snapped out of it.
