Page 79 of The Iron Earl

He looked up at her through hooded eyes. “I do a lot of things, Evalyn. You’re going to have to be more specific.”

“Domnall.” The name dripped from her lips, full of spite.

“What about Domnall?”

“You pawned me off to him.”

“I did what?”

“You made him promise to marry me if anything should happen to you. Do you have some sort of death wish that I don’t know about, Lachlan? Something you should have told me? I know you’re drowning in a cauldron of hate, but to pass me off to Domnall? What about what he wants? What about what I want?”

For a moment, Lachlan visibly held his breath, his head shaking. He slowly got to his feet. “I’m protecting you, Evalyn.”

“Protecting me? You think you can just swap out one husband for another?” Her right hand lifted and slammed onto the desk.

His look dipped down to her hand, then slowly traveled up her body until he met her eyes. “Well, yes. I guess I did think I could do that.” His voice was painfully even, devoid of any emotion. “I thought I was ensuring you were to be protected under any circumstance. I thought—”

“I don’t want another husband, Lachlan.” Her voice screeching, she cut him off. “I want you. I want you not doing something so entirely idiotic in the name of protecting me that I lose you. I want you.”

His head snapped back, the vehemence in her words a blow. “How did you even find out about this, Evalyn?”

“Lady Inverton. I met her in a corridor on the way to our room.”

His right brow arched. “You met Karta? I haven’t even met with her and her father yet.”

“Apparently, your grandfather has already taken care of that trifling detail.”

Lachlan’s fist clunked onto the desk, loose papers crunching under the force. “Damn him.”

“Damn him?” Her eyes pinned him. “How about damn you, Lachlan? Did it ever occur to you to ask Domnall what he wants for himself? Did you know Lady Inverton wants him—apparently she has for some time?”

“No, I didn’t know that.” He shook his head. “But that’s of no consequence now. Let me do this, leave things with Domnall as they are.”

“No.”

He drew in a deep breath and rounded the desk, setting himself next to her left side. Close, but their bodies not touching.

Space she imagined he was giving her for her anger.

It didn’t matter. He overwhelmed her whether he was ten feet or ten inches away.

His fingers twitched as though he wanted to grab her, shake her to see his reason. “Let this be, Eva. I need this assurance for you in my mind.”

She sucked in a deep breath, her lips drawing inward for several heartbeats. How to make him understand when she didn’t truly understand her own anger setting her nerves on fire?

Clarity hit her with the fifth heartbeat—why this action of his shook her to her core.

“No. I’ll not let it be.” Her hands pushed off the desk and she turned to face him. “I’m so damn tired of being afraid, Lachlan. And if I let you do this—let you shuffle me off to Domnall—then I’m not in this with you—in our marriage. It makes me still afraid—afraid of the thousand possibilities that could happen—the ways you could leave me alone. It makes me build more moats around my heart for fear of the unknown.”

Her right knuckles rapped onto the desk. “And I am done with it. Done with the constant fear. I am in this with you, Lachlan. For good or for bad. Not until tragedy happens. Not until I need to escape again. I’m in it with you. You alone.”

For a moment, his eyes narrowed, his breath seething.

In the next instant, he rammed into her, his arms wrapping her, his mouth ravenous on her lips.

Instant, like it always was, how quickly he overtook her. How quickly she melted into the boulder of his body, needing her limbs entwined with his. The heat of him pounding deep within her. The whole of it terrifying in how much he made her want him—made her need him.

But no.

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