“But ye did know, and ye kept it from me.”
Glynis had wanted to save him from the disappointment if it turned out she was wrong. But she had been going to tell him soon.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “But it doesn’t change anything.”
“It doesn’t?” he said, his voice dangerously low. He turned to face her, and his eyes burned through her like a torch to parchment.
“I can’t live with ye now.” Her voice shook, despite herself. “I want to go to my father’s.”
“If you’re that set upon it,” Alex said, his eyes hard as ice, “then I will allow ye to leave after the child is born.”
“After? But that’s months away,” she said. “Ye can’t keep me here.”
“As I said, ye may leave after the child is born, if that is what ye want,” Alex said. “But the child stays here.”
“Ye can’t mean it,” Glynis said, her voice coming out high-pitched. “Ye wouldn’t try to force me to stay by threatening to keep my child.”
“I’m no threatening, and ye can do as ye like,” he said. “But the child will remain here.”
“Ye wouldn’t do that to me,” Glynis said, looking into his face for a bit of softness and finding none. “Nay, ye can’t hate me that much.”
“Ye are the one leaving. I asked ye to stay.” Alex got to his feet. “If ye are separated from our child, it’s by your own choice. I won’t take the blame for that.”
“I won’t let ye keep my child from me,” Glynis said, clenching her fists.
“Under Highland law, it is a father’s right.”
“But most fathers don’t enforce it—at least not when the child is young.” Glynis grabbed his sleeve, but he shook her off. “Alex, ye wouldn’t do this.”
“Since ye believe I would seduce that poor, frightened lass, Ùna,” Alex said, glaring down at her, “than ye know I’m capable of anything.”
CHAPTER 46
The tension was so thick between her and Alex at the table that Glynis could not eat. It had been like this for a week now, and she was feeling the strain—as was the entire household. When she set down her eating knife, she felt Alex’s eyes on her and could not help giving him a sideways glance. There were lines around his eyes, and his expression was grim.
Smiles rarely graced his countenance these days—except when he was playing with Sorcha. Unlike most fathers of daughters, he paid close attention to her. He treated her as the special and unexpected gift that she was to him. If Glynis took her new babe away with her, she would be denying the child a wonderful father. But it was worse to separate a babe from its mother, was it not?
Nothing she did would be right.
Glynis got up from the table without eating a bite and left the hall. She was going down the steps of the keep when Alex caught her arm and spun her around.
“God damn it, Glynis, ye have to eat,” Alex said.
“Ye wouldn’t care if I starved to death, except for the child I carry.”
Alex took a step back, as if her words had dealt him a physical blow. “After all that was between us, how can ye say that to me?”
It was a harsh thing to say, and she would not have if she were not so tired. She found it hard to sleep in their bed alone.
“Ye win, Glynis.” Alex sank onto the steps and held his head in his hands. “I’ve tried to do what I thought was best, but nothing has turned out as I wanted it to.”
Win? She could not feel worse. Oh, God, she hated to see him like this.
“Are ye saying you’ll let me go?” she asked.
“Aye. And take Sorcha with ye,” he said, sounding as though the words were wrenched from him. “I can’t provide her with the family she needs.”
Glynis sat beside him on the step. “Nay, Alex. I cannot do that.”
“You’ve become a mother to her,” Alex said. “Sorcha needs ye more than she needs me.”
“Ye know I love her with all my heart, but I could never ask ye to give her up.”
He turned, and his gaze settled on her like a cold sea mist. “And yet, ye asked me to give up my other child with no hesitation.”
“I didn’t think—”
“Do ye believe I will care less for that child?” he demanded. “That the babe we made together would be any less precious to me than Sorcha?”
Glynis dropped her gaze to her lap and shook her head.
“If ye know that,” Alex said, “then how can ye believe I would risk everything that matters to me for a tumble with some lass I barely know?”
“Ye were never particular before,” Glynis said in a low voice.
“I had nothing to lose before.” Alex stood up. “Go when ye wish. I’ll not stop ye.”
* * *
Sorcha flicked her eyes from her father to her mother and back again. Their sadness weighed down on her chest. She squeezed what was left of her doll. Bessie tried to hide Marie, but Sorcha always found her again.
She knew her parents had been waiting for her to speak. Sometimes when she was alone she could make the words that were always in her head come out of her mouth. But that was before she learned her mother was leaving. She’d heard whispers about it all over the castle.
Sorcha wanted to tell her mother not to leave them. She wanted to ask if it was her fault that she was. But her chest grew tighter and tighter, trapping the words inside.
CHAPTER 47
Glynis was leaving tomorrow.
As Alex had always suspected, he was incapable of keeping a woman happy for long, incapable of being the good husband and father he wanted to be. Blood will out.
But he missed Glynis so much his heart ached with every step. He had tried shouting at her, reasoning with her, and threatening her, and he had come very close to begging her. Now he would make one last attempt.
He wanted her to stay with him because she trusted and respected him. Ah hell, he wanted her to stay because she cared for him. But with her leaving in the morning, Alex was desperate enough that he didn’t care if she stayed with him for the wrong reasons—so long as she stayed.
It was time to play to his strengths. He would get her into bed. And then he would drive Glynis so mad with passion that—against her better judgment and despite the lies she believed about him—she would take him back.
And even if she did not, Alex would have one last night with her.
* * *
Glynis sat by the window stitching because she had finished her packing and had nothing else to do. Although she’d rather be outside, it was better for both her and Alex if she avoided him until she boarded the boat tomorrow. It was one of those fine autumn days when they had a lull between storms and the sun shone as if it was summer. But in her heart, there was no break in the rains.
Alex’s laughter floated through the window, and her needle stopped. Alex was by nature full of good humor—and yet, how long had it been since she’d heard his laugh? She’d missed the sound of it.
Had he sought out another woman because Glynis drained the joy out of him? She was all hard edges and strong opinions. If she were easy and sweet-natured like her sisters, perhaps Alex would not have strayed. Or perhaps she could live with his straying.
But she was the difficult, demanding person she was.
Glynis set aside her stitching and picked up the silver medallion of Saint Michael from the table beside her. She twirled the medallion by its heavy chain and watched it spin, thinking of the day it had caught her eye in one of the shops that her aunt and uncle had dragged her into. When she left Edinburgh in a rush, she had tucked it away in her bag and forgotten it until she came across it while packing today.
She stopped it spinning and rubbed her thumb over it. She had traded one of her rings for the medallion because the image of Saint Michael, the warrior angel, looked so much like Alex.
Alex’s laughter came in through the window again. Drawn by the sound as if it were a string tied to her heart, Glynis set the medallion on the table and went to the window. The sight of Alex in the castle yard below stole her breath away. With graceful, swift movements, he was demonstrating the use of the claymore to a few of the older lads.