“What do you mean?”
Adaira looked away and huffed out a breath. She stared into space for a long time as though replaying memories through her head. Finally, she looked back at Molly. “Do you know how long William and I have known each other? All our lives, that’s how long. And I’ve loved him since I was old enough to recognize what love is.”
She took another swig from her goblet and then rolled it between her hands. “My family hold estates in northern England. William’s family held estates next to ours. In the summer they would visit those estates and we would spend the summer months together. I was a young lady in training, he a young lord, and normally we would have been kept strictly separate. But neither of us had any siblings and our parents were usually too busy to pay us much mind so we were left to our own devices. He taught me to fish. I taught him to dance. He taught me to climb. I taught him to play the fiddle. We swam in the lochs, climbed the trees, chased the local sheep. I loved those summers.”
She fell silent a moment and Molly said not a word, not wanting to interrupt the older woman’s thoughts. “And so it went, every summer right through our childhood. I don’t know when I first realized I was in love with him but as we got older, things progressed as these things will.” She turned to look at Molly, tears shining in her eyes. “I fell pregnant. I was sixteen, he was seventeen, and we were not married. It was a scandal. We brought shame on both our families. When my father found out, I was sent to our remote estates in East Anglia, and he was forbidden to ever see me again. Instead, his father arranged for his marriage to a respectable daughter of Clan Ross—Conall’s mother. And I...” Her voice cracked and she had to swallow a few times before she could continue. “And I lost my child. I’ve never been able to conceive another.”
Molly’s heart broke for her. She squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry, Adaira. I can’t imagine what that must have been like.”
Adaira gave her a wan smile. “Not as bad as what followed. I was sold in marriage to a man old enough to be my grandfather, but I had it better than William did. My husband barely noticed me and I was left to live my own life for the most part. But William’s wife hated him. She had been engaged to someone else and resented the fact that she had been forced instead to marry William. They did not make each other happy. But then, when Conall was born, it was like a piece of William had been given back to him. He doted on that boy, and Conall adored him in return. But as he grew older, William’s tempestuous relationship with Conall’s mother became a wedge between them.
And then my husband died and as a noble of equal rank, William attended his funeral. I had not seen him in ten years and I was as shocked as he was to find that the time hadn’t dulled how we felt about each other. Now that he had inherited the earldom from his father, William could do as he pleased. So he annulled his marriage to Conall’s mother—an arrangement I’m sure she was more than happy with—and we married a few months later.”
She sighed heavily. “If we had known how Conall would react, I think we both would have handled things differently. He never forgave William for making his mother leave, and he never forgave me for being the cause. Their arguments worsened, William became harsher and colder with his son, until William arranged for Conall’s marriage without his consent and their relationship finally broke. That’s when he left and we haven’t seen him until he arrived with you.”
Molly digested all this in silence. It spoke of Adaira’s pain that she was willing to speak about this to a relative stranger, as though she’d been desperate to let it all out.
“I’m so sorry for everything you went through,” Molly said softly. “I had no idea.”
Adaira waved a hand dismissively. “It’s in the past now. But I had to tell you, my dear. You see, I have a feeling that Conall still cares for his father deep down, despite everything that has happened. And I believe he cares for you as well. If anyone can get through to him, it’s you.”
Molly thought about it for a moment. Everything was such a tangled mess. Conall had painted his father as an evil man involved in evil schemes and what they had discovered at the warehouse had only confirmed that. But James and Annie had said that Earl William was a good man and Adaira’s story suggested that everything was not as black and white as Conall believed.
Who was right and who was wrong? Heck,wasthere even a right and a wrong in this? Could there be when everything was so tangled up in old hurts?
Molly didn’t know, but she did know that if Conall sent word to the Order of the Osprey and brought their forces here to attack the Pinnacle, then it would be too late for any chance of reconciliation.
“Conall never told me any of this,” she said to Adaira. “He thinks his father married his mother for political advantage then discarded her when it suited him. He thinks he married you for the same reasons. Why didn’t you tell him the truth?”
Adaira shook her head sadly. “William was too proud to reveal his true feelings and Conall would never have believed me if I had tried. He was always so distant from me, no matter what I did or said. I think he thought if he got to know me, it would somehow be a betrayal of his mother, even though after her second marriage and the birth of Conall’s half-siblings, she showed very little interest in him.”
Molly didn’t know if she could ever truly understand what it felt like to lose a child, or to be forced into a loveless marriage. But she did know that she wanted to help Conall reconcile with Adaira and Earl William, if that was at all possible.
She knew what it was like to be estranged from those you loved, and how hard it was to cross the barriers once they’d gone up. She didn’t want that for Conall.
She stood up from the table and gave Adaira’s hand a gentle squeeze. “Thank you for telling me all this. I’ll do my best to help.”
