He kissed her gently, and she tensed in his arms. She was no fool, and he knew she sensed the change in him before he uttered a word.
“Nope. You’re not doing this again. I’m not letting you beat yourself up over something like sex. You’re allowed to have it. People have it all the time, and me and you,” she paused and pointed her finger to each of them. “are having it tonight. So get that terrible look off your face and strap in because this is totally about to go down.”
He wrapped his arms around her and laughed into her hair. She said the strangest things, and he loved all of them. Lifting her hair, he gently kissed her neck as he reached for a covering to drape over her. She frowned at him, clearly annoyed as he did so.
“I’m sorry, lass, but I canna do so tonight.”
Her face changed and he watched as she pulled the blanket more tightly around her, realizing she didn’t understand him.
“Why?”
She thought that he didn’t want her.
He pulled her into his arms and kissed her until she melted against him once more. Crawling onto the bed with her, he motioned for her to follow him. Once they lay next to one another, he reached up to cradle her face in his hands. “There is no anything that I want more than to live inside ye this night.”
“Then, do it.”
He smiled but shook his head as he continued. “I canna, lass. Ye deserve more than what I can give ye this moment. ’Tis been far too long since I have been with a woman. If I lay with ye now, ’twould be more about satisfying that need than what it should. I care about ye too much to do that.”
She rolled her eyes at him and he snuggled closer. “There is also something that I must tell ye. For once ye know it, ye may feel differently than ye do now. I willna lay claim of ye until ye know what it is.”
“Fine. What is it?”
She spoke short, and he couldn’t deny that it pleased him to know how disappointed she seemed not to have him.
“’Tis about me wife that died. Osla dinna pass the way I said.”
Her face softened as she reached out to grab his hand. He couldn’t help but feel that perhaps she suspected his lie.
“We were happy for a while. I was at least. I loved her verra much, but something wasna right inside her after we married. She dinna smile or talk often. She wouldna hardly leave the bed and spoke often of her hatred for living.”
He paused to gauge her reaction, but she gave nothing of her thoughts away. Her gaze remained sure and steady, and he did his best to continue.
“I went away for a short time and left Eoghanan to watch over her. She was in the darkest place I’d ever seen her. I worried every moment while away. I returned to find her dead. She’d hung herself out one of the windows. I blamed Eoghanan for too long, but he isna the one who deserves the blame for what happened to her.”
Baodan swallowed the lump that built in his throat at the mention of Osla and closed his eyes to distance himself from the moment. Mitsy’s hand moved to his face, and he opened his eyes to see her staring at him in astonishment.
“And you think the person who is to blame is really you?”
He nodded, the shame rising within him once again. “Aye, I wasna able to save her. I couldna be enough for her, and the knowledge of that drove her to end her life.”
Mitsy surprised him by leaning forward to kiss him. She held her lips there, unmoving, and he sighed as some of the tension within him fled.
“I don’t know what it is with you that makes you punish yourself so completely. You’re right to say that Eoghanan is not to blame, but neither are you.”
“How can ye say that, lass? ’Twas me job to protect her, and I failed. I dinna make her happy, and she couldna bear it.”
Mitsy shook her head at him, “It was not your job to make her happy. That is something one must do on her own, and you are not to blame for the sickness in her mind. It is horrible when someone has such sadness inside them, but you are not the cause of her pain.”
He said nothing. Perhaps she spoke true. He did nothing but treat Osla with respect and love. Why, when Mitsy suggested something to him, it made perfect sense, but he could not reach the same conclusions on his own?
“Is that why you hesitated? You were afraid that I would blame you as well and wouldn’t want you? That I’d worry that you wouldn’t be enough for me?”
He could scarcely look at her as he answered. He feared nothing more. He’d not cared for anyone in the way he cared for Mitsy. He couldn’t bear the thought of her leaving when things had only just begun between them. “Aye.”