Page 57 of Promised to the Forbidden Laird

“Ye asked.”

It should not have been enough to move her, but it was. Donaldina instinctively reached for him, her fingers tightening around his hand without a second thought. Roy went still. So did she.

His hand was larger than hers, rough with calluses and colder than she expected. For one uncertain instant, she thought he might withdraw. He looked down at their joined hands. Her courage nearly failed.

She had touched him before to bind his wound, to correct the hold of a honey frame, to steady herself when he caught her. Each touch possessed an explanation.

This one had none.

“I am sorry,” she whispered, uncertain whether she meant for the men he lost, the sleep taken from him, or every night he had stood alone with both.

Roy did not answer. He turned his hand slowly beneath hers until their palms met. Then his fingers closed around her own. The movement was slight, but it affected her more deeply than any declaration might have done.

They stood beside Lachlan’s cairn beneath the scattered stars, hand in hand, while the sea broke endlessly below. Roy did not speak again. Neither did she.

For once, silence did not feel like absence. It felt like something shared.

Roy found the carpenter shortly after sunrise. The shed stood against the inner wall, warm with the scent of fresh-cut wood, resin and damp shavings. Pale morning light entered through the open door, falling across unfinished stools, broken shutters and lengths of timber stacked against the stone.

Ewan MacNicol looked up from the table where he was fitting a new handle to an axe.

“Me laird.”

Roy disliked the title in Dun Ard. It sounded too much like a claim.

He placed one hand upon a plank of seasoned oak. “Ye built the hives in the western garden?”

“Some of them. Lady Donaldina built the oldest with her brother.”

Roy noticed the difference. The first two bore rough joints and uneven measurements, preserved more from affection than sound construction. One leaned slightly toward the sea. Another had split along the lower edge where rain entered.

The storm had damaged both, but Donaldina had said nothing of it. She had stood among the bees as though the broken wood did not trouble her, but Roy remembered the care with which her fingers passed over the cracked frame.

“I want another built,” he told the man.

Ewan set down the axe handle. “The same size?”

“Larger by half a hand. Raise it from the ground so damp cannae settle beneath it. Use oak for the base and pine above. The roof should slope farther over the sides.”

The carpenter’s brows rose. Roy ignored him.

“Fit the corners with proper joints. Nae iron near the comb. It will rust in the salt air.”

“Aye.”

“And make the entrance narrower. The wind strikes hardest from the west.”

Ewan looked toward the open door, where that same wind moved dust and shavings across the threshold.

“Ye have given this considerable thought.”

“I have eyes.”

The man’s mouth twitched.

Roy selected another plank and tested its weight. The wood was dry and sound.

“She shouldnae lose the hive tae another storm,” he said, but he was not certain if he were speaking to Ewan or merely thinking aloud.