A Forbidden Night with a Scot (Sins in a Kilt #1)

Chapter 21

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

A cross from Samuel, Nerian sat with an amused smile on his lips, swirling a cup of wine in his hands, looking right at home in his arm chair in front of Samuel’s desk, where he spent much of his time. It was a smile Samuel didn’t like seeing at all—in fact, it infuriated him, and that seemed to amuse Nerian even more.

“So, ye bedded her,” Nerian said with a small shrug. “An’ ye have fallen in love. What is so terrible about either o’ these things?”

Samuel shook his head, unable to understand how his friend couldn’t see the severity of the situation. “What about Gavin, Nerian?” he reminded him. “What happens when Gavin finds out? He will find out if I wish tae stop him from givin’ her hand tae MacTavish.”

Nerian shrugged a shoulder. “Perhaps he will be unbothered by it.”

“I sincerely doubt that.”

Samuel had been struggling with this thought all day. Sooner or later, Gavin would recover and it would be time for Samuel to tell him the truth. There was no avoiding it; it was the only way to avoid Alicia’s marriage to Laird MacTavish, and it was also the right thing to do. Neither Alicia nor Gavin deserved to be forced to deal with Samuel’s lies.

And yet the odds were stacked against him. What were the chances Gavin would be unbothered by it as Nerian said? What were the chances he would not only allow this relationship between Samuel and his daughter, but also support it? If their roles were reversed, Samuel knew for certain that he would be apprehensive, at least, if not outright murderous.

“Ye cannae ken if ye dinnae tell him,” Nerian said. “An’ the sooner ye tell him, the better. I doubt he will be as gracious if he finds out ye have been lyin’ tae him fer long.”

“I dinnae wish tae put any undue strain on him,” said Samuel. “He is still weak an’ he has a long recovery ahead o’ him.”

The stress of the revelation would undoubtedly lengthen Gavin’s recovery time, Samuel thought. It was better to wait for his wounds to heal more before he revealed the truth to him, but he couldn’t help but feel that by then, perhaps it would be too late.

Neither the king nor Laird MacTavish had been in contact since their last letter, but they were surely becoming impatient. Though word of Gavin’s injuries had been sent to them both, the more the wedding was delayed, the more displeased they would be. The last thing Samuel wanted was to wait so long to tell Gavin the truth that another order came, this time more pressing than the last.

“He is feelin’ better, though,” said Nerian. “The healer allowed him tae move tae his private chambers, so he can only be recoverin’ well. He doesnae need her constant supervision anymore.”

That much was true, Samuel knew. He had been informed by one of the servants that Gavin had been transferred to private chambers after getting the all clear from the healer, and he had been glad to hear his friend was doing better. Still, he would rather wait—party because he was so afraid of his reaction.

With Gavin’s disapproval came the end of their friendship. If he was opposed to his relationship with Alicia, then he would lose them both.

“I will speak with him,” Samuel promised. “When the time is right.”

The right time never came. Samuel was so busy with clan matters and the possibility of another attack that he hardly had time for anything else besides meetings with his council and personally overseeing the training of his men. He wanted everyone to be prepared in case Colm MacLaine decided to attack the castle itself, which sounded more and more likely with every passing day.

There were rumors of more of MacLaine’s men nearing the borders. Spies, soldiers, messengers, all of them there to scout and report back on what they had found. Some of them had been caught by Samuel’s men, but they were uncooperative, refusing to give up any of MacLaine’s secrets, regardless of how persuasive Samuel’s men could be. No torture seemed to work on them. They would rather die than give Samuel information—at least any information useful to him.

The days passed one after the other, leaving Samuel disoriented and unmoored from time. Every day seemed the same to him, an endless cycle of the same strategies, the same meetings, the same people. Each day, he tried to talk to Gavin and each day, he failed. Each day, he tried to see Alicia, and he could hardly even do that outside of dinners and a few stolen moments between their duties—he with his council and she with her father, taking care of him as he recovered along with Katherine.

Samuel had found himself near Gavin’s door several times in those five days since they had arrived at the castle, and none of those times seemed like the right moment to speak with him—or at least that was what he told himself. The truth was much simpler than that: he simply feared his reaction and was trying to delay being at the receiving end of his wrath, no matter how many excuses he told Nerian about his reluctance to talk to him. The thought that Gavin would see him as a monster from the moment he found out the truth had etched itself in Samuel’s mind and soon, no other option remained. It was the only result he could imagine, the only way the conversation about Alicia could end.

It wasn’t all just fear, though. Deep down, he still held onto the guilt, that terrible thought that he was a monster for loving Alicia. No matter how many times anyone reassured him his love for her could only be right, there was a part of him that rejected that idea entirely, a part which insisted he was doing the wrong thing, feeling the wrong thing, and would corrupt Alicia in the end.

A knock on the door of his study pulled Samuel out of his thoughts, and he called for his visitor to enter, expecting it to be a member of his council or one of his soldiers. Instead, Katherine entered the room, her small, elfin face now seemingly permanently twisted into a mask of worry, ever since the attack on her father. Still, as she sat down across from him, she smiled, and the smile was warm and reassuring.

“Katherine,” Samuel said, standing to greet her. It was a surprise to see her there, since she was now spending so much time caring for Gavin. “Is there somethin’ I can dae fer ye?”

“Fer me? Nay,” said Katherine, shaking her head. “But fer ye? Perhaps.”

Cryptic as her words were, Samuel could only frown at them. Before he could ask what she meant, Katherine added, “I ken about ye an’ Alicia. She has told me everythin’.”

This was hardly a surprise. Samuel already knew the sisters shared everything with each other, and he hadn’t expected Alicia to keep it a secret from Katherine. He also hadn’t expected, though, to have Katherine in his study, talking so openly about this. Had Alicia sent her, he wondered? Or had she come on her own?

Was this a warning?

“I though she might have shared it with ye, aye,” said Samuel, for lack of anything better to say.

“She also told me that ye feel guilty about it,” Katherine said. The candid, unflinching way in which she spoke about this surprised Samuel, as Katherine was always the quiet one, the one who seemed meeker, softer. Now, having her before him and listening to her speak plainly about this matter made Samuel realize that she, too, had grown into a woman. “An’ that ye fear faither will be angry.”

“How can I nae?”

There was no point in denying anything Katherine had said. He had been the one to say it all in the first place, after all, confiding in Alicia. Everything Alicia knew, Katherine knew as well, and so there was no point in trying to keep any of his guilt or fear hidden.

For a few moments, Katherine was silent, chewing on the inside of her bottom lip. When she spoke, her words were slow and measured, making her sound mature beyond her years.

“It will certainly be an adjustment fer Faither,” she said. “But what he truly wants is tae see Alicia happy. When Emmeline was taken away from us, he was devastated, an’ he never wanted another o’ his daughters tae suffer the same fate. I’m sure he would rather Alicia wed a man who loves her and whom she loves rather than a man she doesnae even ken. All Faither wants is tae see her happy an’ ye make her happy.”

Those were all nice words, Samuel thought, but the core of the matter was the fact that no one but Gavin himself could tell him how Gavin would feel about this relationship. Everyone around him was well-meaning. Everyone saw Gavin as the good man he was, the man who wanted the best for his daughters. But precisely because Samuel knew Gavin wanted the best for his daughters, he wouldn’t want one of them to marry one of his oldest friends.

“Sometimes makin’ someone happy isnae the only thing that matters,” Samuel said. “Sometimes there is also the matter o’ what is right, what is decent. Can I claim to be decent?”

Katherine seemed to truly consider his question for a moment, her brows stitching together in a frown. “I think ye can, aye,” she said.

The simplicity of her answer struck Samuel, chest constricting at the knowledge that she was so confident he was a decent man. Katherine was just as protective of her sister as Alicia was of her. Had she thought Samuel was a monster, like he feared, then she would have made her feelings known.

“All ye have done so far is make me sister happy,” Katherine said with a small shrug. “She is thrilled when she is around ye. We all enjoy seein’ her like this, especially after all the pain the separation from Emmeline caused her. Had ye hurt her, either on purpose or by accident, then I wouldnae be here now. Ye’re nae the corruptin’ influence ye think ye are, Samuel. Ye’re simply a man. Ye’re a man who loves me sister an’ I ken ye will dae everythin’ in yer power tae keep her content. So why dae ye insist on punishin’ yerself?”

Samuel didn’t have a satisfying answer to that. The more he thought about it, the more he realized he couldn’t give one, not even to himself, and so he remained quiet, gaze dropping to his lap. It seemed easier, he supposed, punishing himself for what he believed was a great transgression, rather than confronting Gavin and telling him the truth.

Any sign of hatred from his friend would shatter him. They had known each other for so long, they had fought together and gone through tragedy together. The last thing Samuel wanted was to become the source of another tragedy for Gavin, one that would be more personal than anything he had experienced before.

When he said nothing in response, Katherine smiled once again and rose from the chair, heading to the door. Before she left, she looked at Samuel over her shoulder and said, “I will be with Faither tonight. Alicia is alone in her chambers. I think she would be very happy if ye visited her.”

Then, Katherine was gone, closing the door softly behind her and Samuel was left to wonder when the two girls had grown up so much. Katherine’s words slowly took root inside him, forcing him to reconsider his situation. If Alicia’s own sister, the very girl who would do anything to protect her from harm, assured him that he was not a monster for loving her, then perhaps she was right. Perhaps Samuel didn’t have to worry so much about corrupting her and pulling her into sin with him.

And perhaps, if he was lucky, then Gavin would see it the same way.