Now, as her curious gaze traveled across his scarred features, he remained still and silent, letting her drink her fill. There wasa prideful tilt to his lips that said he knew he was monstrous, beastly. And he did not care.
Despite her apprehension about his return, Olivia found herself secretly admiring him for it. He chose to invoke fear not pity, suggesting he was as strong inside as he was outside.
Aye, his looks are intimidatin’, but he’s nae a monster. He won those scars in battle, through bravery. He must be a great warrior. Perhaps it serves him well if his scars make folks afraid of him. But I’m nae afraid.
The scars were an indelible part of him, a history of violence both meted out and endured inscribed on his skin for all to read. But the marks on a man’s skin did not define him, she knew. It was what was inside that truly counted.
Hardly aware of what she was doing, she reached up and touched his cheek gently with her fingertips, feeling the ridges of the scars beneath them.
“Ye really are here,” she murmured, suddenly full of wonder.
He let out a long exhale. “Aye, I’m really here.”
She dropped her hand, feeling an odd tenderness towards him. “Ye look tired. Have ye had to travel far to get home?” she asked solicitously.
She could tell at once by the almost imperceptible tic in his jaw that he was taken aback by her reaction. Or rather, the lack of it.
Is he annoyed that I’m nae scared?
“Aye, a few days’ ride,” he answered in a grudging tone.
“Ye must be hungry as well.”
He gave her an impatient look. “Aye, I’m hungry all right. For me bed. I came here to sleep, and I found ye here, remember?”
Olivia ignored the observation, for it was now beginning to sink in that she had been wrong, very wrong to doubt his return. Unbelievable as it seemed, her husband was very much alive, and he had come back to her, to claim her as his wife! Just as Greta had said he would all along.
I shouldnae have doubted him.But how do ye keep believin’ in someone who’s a stranger to ye?
Perhaps it was in pursuit of answers to that silent question that brought her long-suppressed curiosity to the fore. Before she knew what she was doing, she began firing questions at him.
“Where have ye been? Why did ye nae answer me letters? Did ye win the war? Will ye have to go away again?”
“Ach, will ye stop with yer questions?” he burst out irritably. “I dinnae have time to answer them all now.”
Her frustration at his attitude boiled over into anger. “Why nae? Have ye got somethin’ better to do than talk to yer wife?” she snapped back. “If ye have, then why do ye nae get off me? I can hardly breathe!”
Seething, she began wriggling violently beneath him, determined to break free.
In response, without any visible effort, he somehow managed to increase the pressure pinning her down. When she opened her mouth to protest, she looked into his dark eyes, so close to hers, and instantly shut it, ceasing to move as cold apprehension flooded her body once more.
Who is this stranger who has me in his grasp?
She could hear her heart beating loudly in her ears as he continued staring down at her wordlessly.
I have nay idea what he’s capable of if I dinnae do exactly what he wants.
And what that might be, she did not even dare to imagine.
The air around them seemed to crackle with almost suffocating tension as she lay trapped there, afraid of what he might do next.To her intense relief, after a few more moments of silence, he finally spoke.
“I’m tired, and I need to sleep. Ye should leave me in peace and go to yer chambers.”
That took her aback.
“But-But I’ve never slept there,” she said nervously. “I’m used to this chamber, and all me things are here.”
But he merely shrugged. “Ye’re welcome to sleep here if ye want, but only if ye agree nae to ask me any more questions.”
