His Bonnie Bride by Hannah Howell (the beginning after the end read novel .TXT) 📕

"Puir wee Storm," he murmured, wondering why he felt such a strong desire to protect her from such ugliness. " 'Tis possible, lass. There be those who do feel so when giving or seeing pain."

"Sweet heaven," Storm buried her face in his chest, feeling slightly ill, for now she doubted he would be able to tell her that the rest did not happen. "Then what I saw as I lay nearly unconscious could have been real," she said in a small voice. "Lady Mary and Sir Hugh might well have made frenzied love. Right there. Right at my side upon the bed where I lay bleeding and wracked with pain."

"Aye, the bastards," Tavis affirmed vehemently. "I wish I could tell ye nay, but 'tis a dark side that exists. Be thankful the animals took each other and left ye alone. Now rest, Storm. Ye'll get better quicker, and I cannae take too many nights o' holding ye without loving ye."

"Nor can I," she said softly and honestly as she closed her eyes.

It was not long before he knew she was asleep, and he wished he could do so as easily. Methodically, he catalogued each emotion that had assailed him in the past eight and forty hours and neatly explained away each one. The reason that kept trying to present itself was ruthlessly ignored for, not only did he not want it but, considering who they were, it was an impossibility.

Chapter Fourteen

"Lass, it might help to talk about what is making ye so dowie. Have your wounds healed weel? Are they bothering ye still?" asked Maggie, studying Storm's woeful face with honest concern.

"Nay, my wounds cause me nary a twinge, Maggie. They left few lasting marks either."

Another sigh escaped Storm as she watched Maggie knead her bread dough. It was cozy in the small kitchen, and the children had been bedded down or sent off, depending upon their ages, yet Storm was not able to find the lift for her spirits she had hoped for with a visit to the cheerful Maggie. A stranger to melancholy, she was finding it hard, a distasteful emotion to experience.

"Do ye miss your father and kin, lass?"

"Aye. I worry for them as well. 'Twould please me more than I can say to have some word of them, word that they are safe and sound at Hagaleah and Lady Mary's heinous plots have failed."

" 'Tis hard tae worry and nay ken I ken that weel enough, but 'tis nay all that troubles ye, is it?"

Storm shook her head. She had no worry that Maggie would reveal any confidence made to her. Deciding it might help to relate her many worries and pains to another woman, Storm lifted her eyes from the workworn surface of the table and gave Maggie a weak, slightly crooked smile. She simply could not keep it all to herself any longer.

"Nay, 'tis not. I have done a very foolish thing. I have fallen quite hopelessly in love with Tavis."

"I feared as much, lass." Maggie shook her head. "Saw it when the MacDubhs were here."

"Oh, it was well entrenched by then, though I tried to shake free of it." She shrugged.

"But 'tis nay easy when the man is there each night tae hold ye and delight ye."

"Oh, Maggie, I want my father to come home, to be safe and alive, but a part of me hates the very thought of it. When he returns I must leave Tavis." She felt suddenly choked with tears and stared down at the table again, hoping to fight them. "I think 'twill kill me."

"Now, lassie, 'tis nay a certainty that ye willnae stay here," Maggie soothed, but knew she lied.

So did Storm. "Deceiving myself as to how this will end is one thing I have not done. 'Tis bad enough that I am English, but far worse is the fact that I am an Eldon. Mayhaps if my father had other daughters, he'd care little how I ended up, but I am his only girl child. I am his firstborn. He brought me into the world with his own two hands, slapped the breath of life into me. 'Tis a bond that few fathers have with their children. I look much as my mother did, and she was the first and mayhaps the greatest love of his life. I do not think he really recovered from her loss until he found Elaine, his mistress. Nay, my father will not leave me here to keep Tavis MacLagan's sheets warm."

"What ... what if ye were tae wed Tavis?" Maggie asked, her doubt evident in her voice.

"There has ne'er been the option of marriage. For all his pretty words, Tavis has ne'er spoken of love or a future for us. If he mentions the future at all, it is to speak of when I will return to Hagaleah. Then, too, e'en if he did, would it be allowed? My father is an understanding man, but allowing his only daughter to be wed to a MacLagan could well be more than he can tolerate."

"Then, lass, all ye can do is take all ye can while 'tis there for the having."

" 'Tis what I tell myself, what I try so hard to do. Yet oftimes at night I lie awake watching him, and I hurt so knowing that 'tis but for a while. I cannot speak of my feelings for 'tis unsure I am that he feels any such thing for me, and all I have left to me is my pride. I find myself hoping that he will come to love me and work out a way for us to stay together, but there is nary a sign of that. All I can see ahead for me is such emptiness and pain. He has become such a part of me, of such importance to my life and happiness, that I just cannot bear to think of being without him. It frightens me. I am not so foolish