Page 21 of Her Forbidden Highlander Husband

“She’s gone back to the Stewarts?”

Liam threw his hands up in frustration. “I don’t ken where she went. I doubt she’d go back to her father.”

“Did she take a horse?”

Liam glanced toward the stable. He hadn’t thought of that. “I didna ask.”

“Let’s find out.”

Together they spoke to the groom and learned Evelyn hadn’t taken a horse.

“Then she’d be on foot with a little one, which means she couldn’t have gone far. We can inquire in the village,” Lach said, looking proud of himself.

“To what end? She clearly doesna want to be my wife. She wanted only my name and a home where she could be with Gwennie.”

“Not everything we wish is easy. And most things are sweeter for the effort put in to get them.”

“And some things will never be ours, and it’s better to stop throwing yourself against a wall with no hope of breaking through. You’ll only injure yourself.” With that, he stormed off to the village.

He’d promised never to force Evelyn to do anything, and he’d hold by his word. But he would find her and have his say.

He needed to ask only two people in the village to find the cottage where Evelyn was staying. It looked to be the smallest one in the village. He knocked twice and before anyone would have had time to answer he knocked again.

She opened the door and stepped back so he could come inside. Immediately Gwennie ran to him. “Bunny. Bunny!”

Without hesitation, he reached into his sporran and pulled out the rabbit he’d made for her. He kneeled down and placed it in her free hand, the other one clutching her favorite.

“Bunny broke,” she said pointing to a clump of wood on the floor. The other carved rabbits were gathered around it. “Mama bunny.”

Somehow knowing Evelyn had attempted to take this one thing he had with Gwennie made him even angrier at the woman.

“Can you stay here with the bunnies while your mama and I step outside to talk? We’ll be right outside the door if you need us.”

The lass nodded and skipped off to play alone.

When Liam stood, he realized how much he towered over his wife. Or perhaps it was that she seemed to be huddled in on herself instead of standing tall like she usually did. “Outside,” he ordered and was surprised when she simply followed him through the door.

“I don’t understand,” he started. “I asked you before we arrived if you wished to remain my wife and ye said you would. I gave you the choice and you chose me only to run off the first chance you got. My clan celebrated us just two nights ago and now I’m the gossip of the castle with how my wife left me. There’s talk that I beat you and the lass. Me! I’d never hurt a soul unless forced to protect my clan, but they think…” He walked in a small circle to release his pent-up anger. “And I could deal with that. What I can’t fathom is what I did to make you leave, and without the respect of conversation first.”

The anger he’d been carrying for the last day deflated like the loss of winds in a sail. He was hurt and embarrassed, but mostly he missed her and Gwennie. It hadn’t been an easy relationship, but they had been his, and now…

…

“I’m sorry.” Even hearing the words, Evelyn knew they weren’t enough. She’d done a dishonorable thing by sneaking away without talking to Liam first. She understood his anger—short-lived that it was. “I thought I could do it, but I can’t.”

“You can’t do what?”

“Lie with you. As your wife.”

His eyes went wide. “I told you I’d never force myself on ye if you were unwilling, Ev. Why would you doubt my word?”

She hadn’t doubted his word. She knew he wouldn’t act if she was unwilling, and that was her fear. That she’d be willing. The feelings he’d aroused scared her.

So far, she’d tricked him into marrying her to escape her father. Hidden the fact she had a child until he was well and thoroughly trapped and left him without a reason and through it all he remained peaceful. If she’d been testing him, he would have surely proven he’d not harm her or her daughter. He was all kindness and devotion, things any woman would want in a husband. Things any woman—herself included—could grow to love in a man. But loving and wanting Liam hadn’t been part of her plan. She’d left rather than give in to the possibility of those things. How could she explain?

“I know you wouldn’t push me into anything, but that wouldna mean you wouldn’t desire those things.”

He tilted his head. “Of course, I desire ye, Ev. I have thought of little else than lying with you since I met you. But I’m not an animal who canna control his urges.”