He was a man torn, sworn by law and his marriage oath that he would stay by Edana’s side, but promised by soul and heart to a lass who was waiting for him at his brother’s home.
He’d yet to seek out Blaire, afraid that each moment spent together would only make the moments apart more difficult. And now with the news of his unborn child, he was afraid it would be impossible for him to go to Blaire without being crushed by the weight of his guilt.
If it were only Edana, his love for Blaire might have been enough to push away his feelings of guilt. But now with a child on the way, he knew he could not.
Arran would not allow himself to be the sort of man to teach his children that such behavior was acceptable. It was bad enough the way he’d treated women before, using them for his enjoyment and then discarding them before the heat from them had left his bed.
Blaire had changed him. He now could see the value of owning a woman’s heart, the strength, responsibility, and the pure happy misery that came with possessing such a gift. He would teach his sons to view women the same way, but he would be unable to do so if he continued to dishonor their mother through his relationship with Blaire.
It didn’t matter that he did not love his wife. His conscience didn’t care. It would be the hardest thing he would ever have to do, to give up his heart so quickly after having it returned to him. But his child would need a parent who lived a life of honor, more so than most if the child’s mother was to be Edana Kinnaird.
He would tell Blaire face-to-face. ’Twas the least he could do. His heart demanded that he see her one last time, to hold her and give her whatever explanation and apology he could offer. He knew nothing would be enough to heal the hurt he would cause her with his farewell. It had been she, after all, who’d tried to speak reason, saying that they could not meet again after their last night together.
He’d been a heedless fool. Unable to see the cards that fate would deal him, he’d promised Blaire he would come to her to claim her as his own as often as he could. Now he would have to break her heart all over again.
His heart heavy and his spirit broken, he sat down at his desk to pen a letter to her. He would tell her nothing of why he needed to see her, only that she meet him at the small cottage not far from Conall Castle in one week’s time. She would come, her smile illuminating the four walls in which he would meet her. That smile he would soon snuff out, the smile he was afraid once gone would send him plummeting into the darkness he’d once known so well.
*
Conall Castle
Several weeks had passed with no news from Arran. I found meself growing more certain that news would never come. I’d suspected as much when we’d said our goodbyes, but I hadn’t realized how miserable waiting for him would be.
Despite Arran’s promise that we would see each other again, I knew what kind of men the Conall lads were. I knew the kind of man their father had been. It would no set well with Arran to have a mistress, regardless of the quality of his marriage.
Quality mattered not, in this time anyway, as most marriages had little to do with the love of the people getting married. ’Twas one’s ability to dissolve oneself of a marriage that was one of the things I’d found most fascinating about me time spent in the twenty-first century. If only Arran had married Edana there.
But he had not, and such a wish could never be. So as I continued to tear the handful of herbs Mary had given me, tossing them into the stew as she stirred, I talked to ease me mind of thoughts of loneliness.
“What do ye think of Adelle and me father? Do ye think that if they spent more time together, they could get on well?” I already knew the answer, but I also knew the reaction such a question would garner from Mary, so I let it slip out innocently, trying no to grin as I waited for her overzealous response.
Instead of Mary, Adelle’s voice answered from the doorway. “Oh gosh no, sweetheart. Your dad is a nice enough fellow, but truth be told, he looks so much like my ex-husband, it’s hard for me to spend more than a few minutes in the same room with him.”
I smiled and winked back at Adelle as I nudged my head toward Mary. “Aye, I know. I only wanted to hear Mary ramble on about how ye are no deserving of me father. If I dinna know better, I would say that Mary has taken a fancy to him herself.”