Margaret Mallory - The Guardian

The young woman was nothing like the scrawny thirteen-year-old he remembered. Instead of gawky limbs and pointed elbows, she had graceful lines and rounded curves that made his throat go dry.

And yet… that was Sìleas’s upturned nose. And he supposed that glorious mass of curling red hair could be hers, if it were brushed and combed—a state he’d never seen it in before.

“Welcome home,” the young woman said to Alex in the kind of throaty voice a man wanted to hear in the dark.

Sìleas never had one of those high-pitched little girl voices… but this beauty could not truly be her.

“Ye two must be hungry after your travels. Come, Sìleas, let us get these men fed,” his mother said, taking the lass by the arm. His mother gave him a wide-eyed look over her shoulder, the kind she used to give him when he was a lad and had committed some grievous error in front of company.

When he started to follow the two women to the table, Alex hauled him back. “Are ye an idiot?” Alex hissed in his face. “Ye didn’t even greet Sìleas. What’s the matter with ye?”

“Are ye sure that’s Sìleas?” Ian said, leaning to the side so he could see past Alex to the red-haired lass.

“Of course it is, ye fool,” Alex said. “Did ye no hear your mam just say her name?”

Ian had to tear his gaze away from her when Niall and the other man joined them. Now that he took a good look at the man, he saw it was their neighbor, Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald.

“Ian, Alex,” Gòrdan said, giving them each a curt nod.

Ian met the man’s stubborn hazel eyes. “Gòrdan.”

“You’ve been gone a long time,” Gòrdan said, sounding as though Ian could not be gone long enough to make him happy. “A good deal has changed here in your absence.”

“Has it now?” Ian said, knowing a challenge when he heard one. “Well, ye can expect it all to change again, now that I’m back.”

Gòrdan scowled at him before turning on his heel to join the women, who were busy setting food on the table on the other side of the room.

“Thank ye kindly for supper,” Gòrdan said to them.

“Ye are always welcome to join us. ’Tis small thanks for all you’ve done for us,” his mother said, beaming at Gòrdan. “ ’Twas kind of ye to take Sìleas out for a stroll today.”

What in the name of all the saints was his mother doing, thanking that conniving Gòrdan?

“If ye need me for… for anything at all,” Gòrdan said to Sìleas in a low voice, “ye know where to find me.” Gòrdan touched her arm as he spoke to her, and an unaccountable surge of anger rose in Ian’s chest, choking him.

If Sìleas answered, Ian didn’t hear it over the blood pounding in his ears. Just what was going on between Sìleas and Gòrdan Graumach MacDonald? He was about to help Gòrdan out the door, when the man showed the good sense to leave.

“Ye won’t have far to look to find a man to replace ye,” Alex said in Ian’s ear. “That is what ye wanted, no?”

“That doesn’t mean I’ll let Gòrdan make a cuckold of me,” Ian ground out through his teeth.

Ian didn’t know whether to regret drinking so much whiskey—or to wish he had drunk a good deal more. After traveling half the world, he felt disoriented in his own home. Everyone had changed—his brother, his mother. And most of all, Sìleas. He still could not quite believe it was her.

“Where’s da?” he asked his mother.

“Come have some supper,” his mother said, and disappeared into the kitchen. She returned a moment later with a steaming bowl. “I’ve got your favorite fish stew.”

Ian’s stomach rumbled as the savory smell reached him. He was near starved.

“Where’s da?” he asked again, as he sat down at the table.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the back of Sìleas’s skirt disappearing up the stairs.

He stopped with his spoon halfway to his mouth as it occurred to him he had the right to follow her up and take her to bed. Tonight. Right now. Before supper, if he wanted. And again, after. The part of him between his legs was giving him an emphatic Aye!

His reaction startled him. For five long years, he had planned to end the marriage as soon as he returned. He’d harbored not a single doubt. The only question had been how to do it with the least embarrassment to Sìleas—and the least difficulty for him.

But he made that plan before she turned into this enchanting lass with a voice that was like velvet sliding over his skin—and curves that would have him dreaming of her naked as soon as he closed his eyes.

Aye, he most definitely wanted to take Sìleas to bed. Any man would. The question, however, was whether he wanted her to be the last woman he ever took to his bed. He wasn’t prepared to decide that tonight. Hell, he didn’t even know Sìleas anymore. Was the woman anything like the wild-haired bairn who used to follow him about and always need rescuing?

Ian knew he should say something to her. But what? He couldn’t tell her he was ready to be her husband and bind his life to hers forever. Though he had no idea what he would say, he got up from his chair, stomach rumbling, to follow her upstairs.

Before he had taken two steps, he was stopped by a loud crash in the next room. He turned in time to catch his mother and brother exchanging glances.

At the sound of a second crash, Niall jumped to his feet. “I’ll get him.”

Sìleas ignored the crash of pottery and the bellowing that followed as she ran up the stairs. This once, they would have to manage without her. She slammed the bedchamber door, leaned against it, and gulped in deep breaths. Damn him! She had wept for Ian MacDonald too many times over the last five years, and she was not going to do it again.

Her head pounded, her chest hurt, and she could not get enough air.

The foolish plans she’d held on to since she was a wee girl were shattering like the crockery Ian’s father was hurling against the wall downstairs. She had lied to herself. Lied, when she told herself she had put her childish dreams away. Lied, when she said she’d ceased expecting Ian to want to share a life with her when he finally returned.

If she had given up her dreams, her heart would not be breaking from the loss of them now.

When Ian embraced his mother first, she understood. That was only right. And she hardly resented it at all when he greeted Niall next, for Niall had missed Ian almost as much as she had. But then, it was her turn. She fixed her gaze on the floor and held her breath, waiting. He was the one who left; he should come to her. In any case, her feet would not move.

Then the room went silent, and she felt his gaze on her. Slowly, she lifted her head and looked into the bluest eyes in the Highlands. Her fingers were ice, her palms sweaty, and her bodice felt too tight. For five years, she had waited for this moment.

She had imagined it a thousand times. Ian would give her a wide smile that warmed his eyes and pull her into his arms. He would tell her how much he missed her and how glad he was to be home. Then, in front of God and his family, he would call her wife and give her a kiss—her first real kiss.

In her more realistic moments, she thought it might be awkward between them at first, but that Ian would attempt to make it right and seek her forgiveness. Never did she imagine he would not speak to her.

Not a single word.

With her heart in her throat, she implored him with her eyes to do as he ought. Instead, he stared at her as if she had grown a tail and fins. If he didn’t want to claim her, he could have had the courtesy to greet her as the old friend she was, then told her in private he did not wish to be her husband. His public dismissal was both insulting and heartless.