Page 55 of Outlaw Ever After

Alex ripped out his quill again, stalking to the dressing table once more, and dipped it into the inkwell. “Starting on the morrow after the first event, ye will show me each renovation.” Then he sculped his signature in a twirl onto the contract.

Alexander Stewart, Esq.

Battered hands crafting elegance. Binding him.

The ink still wet, Alex held it out to his adversary. “I’ll give yer sister three days to be married. Then ’twill be me escorting ye to Edinburgh for you to pay this outstanding debt.”

Chapter Seventeen

Peigi left her chamber, having composed herself, when Seamus called.

“Peigi, wait.”

She turned to see him coming off the stairs from above, parchment in hand. She hastened the other way and descended the stairs toward the great hall. The embarrassment he’d forced upon her in front of Alex, still fresh, savaged through her. Wasn’t this tournament embarrassment enough?

The celebration grew boisterous on her ears. “Ye can beat him!” taunted some of the contestants who were arm wrestling.

Beat. Beatings… Anger rippled through her anew—at Alex’s arrival today, making her confront him when she’d finally put him behind her. At making her atrophied heart feel pain again. At the beating Alex had suffered. That, and his back had been a mess of olden welts. Distorted scars that had once flayed him open until he’d been raw, scar tissue stretched by time. She’d known him to be a warrior. But those hadn’t been the irregular cuts of battle.

“Sister, slow down.” Her brother chased her.

She bunched up her skirts and pattered faster.

“Sister .” His voice grew insistent, though she didn’t stop, until he took her arm. “Wait—”

She spun around to face him. The dog, having trotted ahead of her, rumbled, but Peigi mastered herself quickly and quieted the beast with a gentle hand. Sweet pup, becoming her protector, making her think of Mildred so long ago.

He threw his hand up in surrender. “I’m sorry for shouting. I was nay angry at ye. I saw him holding ye and—”

“Ye nay trust me. After this summer.”

He rubbed his jaw at her double edged question. Then pulled her to him. This time, she let him. His normally stoic hands trembled with…frustration? Anger? “I trust ye. I just nay ken why ye did it.”

“And yet, ye’d nay honor me by standing down when I ask ye.”

“It’s just… It was my duty to protect ye, and I failed. I let a wolf steal into my sister’s heart and reave her innocence and I worry, for ye’ve been so quiet since that day.”

Innocence…

She sank into Seamus’s brotherly hold. He didn’t offer these hugs often anymore.

“Ye’ve been so ill, and that day when ye cried, Christ, I’ve rarely seen ye so pained and been unable to make it better, and now this man shows up and draws yer tears in front of the whole hall and— Hell , I want to sink my dirk into his obnoxious smirk—”

“He nay stole what I gave him, Seamus.” Alex had been right. They’d both chosen it.

Seamus pulled back at her unexpected words. “Peigi.” When her use of the word “He” sank in, his eyes hollowed. Was he listening? He always heard her but rarely listened. “He is the man.”

She said nothing. Chewed her lip.

“And ye still love him.”

Helplessness descended. She shook her head. “I nay ken how I feel. Confused?” At the least, relieved to not have to lie to him about Alex’s identity. God knew her other secrets had eaten away at her heart over the years, like a mouse nibbling through the corncrib.

His eyes searched hers as disgust contorted his brow. “He abandoned ye.”

“I ken. He said he came for me, left a missive for me, begging me to wait, but…”

“And ye believe him?” Seamus scoffed with disgust.