Page 70 of A Virgin for the Icy Highlander
Grace smiled. “My wedding day will hopefully be a happy day, but some of myhappiesthave already passed.” She reached for Maddie’s and Lilian’s hands. “These past three years, my darling girls… These past three years have been the happiest days of my life so far.”
“Oh… mercy me.” Miss Sutton clasped a hand to her chest, misty-eyed as she watched the three of them.
Maddie’s back straightened, her eyes lighting up behind her spectacles. She squeezed Grace’s hand and promptly strained to take Lilian’s other hand, squeezing it too. “I second that.”
“I agree,” Lilian said, her lip trembling. “Oh, heavens… I promised Ellie I would not start crying again. I shall be a waterless husk, a raisin, by the time the wedding day is here, though I will at least have time to replenish my stores before ourfinishing ceremony. Onthatday, I simply will not stop weeping; I will not be able to.”
“My dear girls,” Miss Sutton mumbled, looking away as she wiped something from her cheek. “Oh, you cannot know how proud I am of all of you. To see you all flourish and become such… strong women—it will always be the greatest gift of my life.”
Grace blinked rapidly, but it was no good. “Oh, look at that, and I was doing so well!” She laughed, letting a bittersweet tear spill over. “Ishall not stop once I start, and I fear that Hunter might be rather alarmed if I bawl through our wedding.”
“To us,” Maddie proposed. Her eyes twitched like she was fighting some tears of her own. “To us, and to bright and prosperous futures for us all, whatever that may look like.”
Lilian nodded. “To us, and to never forgetting to write, and to always finding time to see one another, no matter where we may be in the world.”
“To us, to the past three years, and to the countless more happy times we have ahead of us, even if we are apart.” Grace choked on her own words and was forced to anchor herself with her steady grip on their hands.
For although she wasn’t yet ready to be parted from her dearest friends—the only ones she had ever had—she knew better than to fear change. After all, it was a dramatic change that had brought her to Scotland in the first place, giving her the gift ofthe most wonderful years with the most treasured people, and, from that, she now stood to gain the most delicious husband and the loveliest stepdaughter.
Change was good. It was the old that had a way of rotting, and as she held her friends’ hands a few moments longer, she was determined to ensure that the ghosts of her worstyears did not threaten the happiness of her future.
My brother can’t be here. I will not let him ruin this.
As if reading her mind, Maddie and Lilian both squeezed her hands at the exact same moment, letting her know that they were at her side, ready to do whatever she asked to keep her past at bay.
“Maddie?” Grace said, sitting up straighter. “Where is that port I know you have been hiding? Let’s not be maudlin; this is a time for celebration.”
Maddie flashed a grin. “Oh, you know me far too well.”
Head foggy with the quantity of port she had consumed just to clear her mind of her sibling problem, Grace stirred from beneath a mountain of coverlets.
“Is someone there?” she hissed into the dark, cracking open one heavy eyelid.
Somethinghad woken her up, and though it could have been the tremendous thirst in her throat, she doubted it. It wasn’t like her to be roused by something so trivial.
A faint sound had her sitting bolt upright. It was a strangeclick, coming from the other side of the room.
“Maddie? Lilian?” she whispered, realizing she had left out the most obvious possibility. “Ellie, is that you?”
The sound came again, and this time it was more of atapthan aclick. The noise was familiar, though she couldn’t quite figure out what it was through the haze in her head.
Throwing back the coverlets with some trepidation, reaching for the heavy book on her bedside table, she crept toward where the sound seemed to be coming from: the window, or close to it. A bird, probably, or the wind knocking something against the pane.
A third tap sounded, confirming the location.
She was almost at the window, reaching out to yank back the drapes, when a very different sound almost made her jump out of her skin, whirling around to face the opposite direction. Footsteps, pounding on the flagstones outside, the drum of them thundering through the stillness of the room, shattering it completely.
“Search every room!” a gruff voice boomed. “Leave nothin’ unturned!”
Are we under attack?
Grace’s heart lurched.
“Maddie!” Lilian’s voice joined the thud of footsteps. “Maddie, are you awake?”
“What’s going on?” Maddie shouted, her voice cutting through the din.
Grace was at her door in an instant, bursting out into the hallway. “Is something the matter?”
