“Then I proved poor at being the man she thought I was.”
Connor did not look at him. He did not want the honesty. It asked him to remember that Lachlan had not always been like this. It asked him to consider whether Violet looked at him with some belief he had no right to receive.
“Jane believed men could be better than they were,” Lachlan continued. “It was a dangerous kindness.”
“Kindness didnae save her.”
“Nay.” Lachlan swallowed. “Nor did I.”
That should have ended their conversation. Connor should have sent him away, ordered a guard to watch him, and returned to work. Yet Lachlan kept walking beside him like a ghost Connor had allowed past the gate.
“She looks at ye,” Lachlan noted.
“Most people look at me when I stand in a room.”
“Nay. It would be worrying if most people look at ye the way she does.”
Connor’s eyes narrowed.
“And daenae get me started on the way ye look at her. I’m saying this as someone who has only been here for two days,” Lachlan said.
Silence settled between them again.
Connor should have let it punish him. Instead, Violet’s name hung between them, and Lachlan’s damned eyes stayed too clear.
“We agreed to lead separate lives, with only an hour a day together for the bairn’s sake,” he grunted.
Lachlan studied him. “In the same castle?”
“Aye.”
“With the same bairn?”
Connor’s jaw tightened. “Leave it.”
“Sounds like a lie both of ye are trying to survive.”
The words struck too hard.
Connor thought of Violet in the study, trembling, and of her mouth finding his after every proper answer failed. He could order watch rotations, christening preparations, locked gates, letters answered, guards assigned, and servants warned.
What he could not order was Violet’s silence into an answer that satisfied him.
“Let the matter rest,” he said.
Lachlan lifted both hands. “As ye wish.”
“That would be new.”
Lachlan’s smile flickered. “Aye, I suppose it would.”
He stepped back with a readiness that felt too easy, then turned toward the breakfast hall.
Connor watched him go and caught the shift in his shoulders before he reached the door, the slight looseness that meant the charm had cost him.
Alex came from the opposite corridor, as if he had been summoned by suspicion alone.
“I still daenae completely trust him,” Connor said before Alex could speak. “I ken he is me brother, but he might still be a risk. Wouldnae be too bad to just keep an eye on him.”
