Page 32 of Claimed
He shook his head, gesturing to where they’d left the others. “They have ridden off, Drew … there’s only me and ye here.”
A glance to the left revealed that he’d spoken true. Her escort had gone.
“I won’t be returning to Dunan with them,” Carr continued, his voice roughening now. “I will travel to the coast and take a boat to Éire, where I will seek out what remains of my kin. I wish for ye to join me … as my wife.”
Drew stared up at him. Her heart was beating so hard that she felt sick. “I’ve already told ye why I can’t do that,” she replied, hating the tremor in her voice.
“I don’t believe that ye don’t care for me,” he cut in, a nerve flickering under one eye. “I think ye are lying … to me and to yerself.”
Drew stiffened. “Excuse me?”
“Ye tell me ye must do this … ye tell me it’s because we are too different, that ye have made yer mother a promise, that ye somehow deserve a life of penance.” His voice was strained now, each word an effort, and yet he pushed himself on. “But all of it is a weak excuse. The truth, Drew MacKinnon, is that ye are afraid.”
Drew’s jaw tightened. “I am not.”
“Aye, ye are terrified,” he countered. “Ye are scared of taking a risk, scared of letting anyone see who ye really are. Ye are afraid oflove.”
His words hung between them, while Drew struggled to breathe. She didn’t know what was stronger—the urge to slap his face, or to weep.
Before she could do either, Carr continued. “I know ye have been hurt, but ye can trust me Drew. Ye know that I have only ever cared for ye. I’m offering ye a new life … I’m offering yehope, and yet ye would throw it all away for certainty. Ye have made yerself a prisoner of yer own fears. If ye do this … if ye throw this chance away … ye are nothing more than a coward.”
Drew took a shaky step back from him, and then another. A sob welled up in her throat, yet she choked it back. She was crumbling inside, but she couldn’t let him see her pain. “Then I am a coward,” she whispered.
Carr continued to watch her, his blue-grey eyes narrowing. “I will make camp near the priory … five furlongs north-east of these walls,” he said, his tone harsh with the grief and disappointment that vibrated from him now. “If ye do not come to me by morning, I shall ride away.” He paused then, letting his words sink in. “Please don’t throw this chance of happiness aside so lightly.”
Drew didn’t answer. She physically couldn’t. Her throat had closed. Her pulse thundered in her ears, and her eyes burned from the urge to cry. But she wouldn’t. Not here, not now.
She turned her back on him then. Gathering the last of her self-control, Drew stepped toward the gates. She reached out, her fingers grasping around cold iron, and she knocked.
Coward. Coward. Coward.
With each breath, those words mocked her.
Alone in the prioress’s hall, Drew started to pace. As she’d entered the priory during Vespers, she was being made to wait.
The nun who’d met her at the gate hadn’t been overly welcoming. She’d cast a jaundiced look at Carr before beckoning Drew inside.
The dull thud of the gate closing behind her had made Drew start to sweat, even as her legs began to tremble. With a huge effort, she’d managed to shove the panic down, and had followed the nun to the stables, where she’d seen to her horse before waiting for the prioress.
Completing another circuit of the narrow hall, her boots whispering upon the flagstones, Drew twisted her fingers together.
Fury now pulsed through her, hot and galvanizing, as she inwardly raged at Carr.How dare he call me a coward? Who does he think he is?
And yet, part of her loved that he’d stood up to her. He always had.
But she hadn’t been able to look at his face as she’d entered the priory. She hadn’t the strength.
The click of a door opening roused Drew from her tormented thoughts. Relieved that she was no longer alone to torture herself, she glanced toward the entrance and saw two women enter.
One was small, with a sharp-featured face that might have once been pretty if sourness hadn’t withered it; while the other woman was heavy-set and jowly, a large iron cross resting upon her ample breast.
Drew’s gaze immediately went to the first woman. Lorna MacKinnon—now Sister Lorna of Inishail—met her daughter’s eye and favored her with a cool smile. “Ye have come sooner than we expected,” she greeted her.
Years apart, Ma and that’s the best ye can manage?
Her mother had never been the warmest of women, but her years in the priory had made her even colder than Drew remembered.
Drew forced an answering smile. “Aye … we made good time on the road south.”
