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“It must have been a huge blow when she was killed,” she said, in the same calm, unprovocative tone she had used with her uncle.

Gavin’s face darkened. As if just realizing she was there, he turned and looked at her, hatred flashing in his eyes.

“She was never going to be mine,” he said. “And if she werenae going to be mine, then no one else could have her.”

A gasp escaped her lips. This was not mere obsession or possessiveness. This went far beyond.

“What do ye do, Gavin?”

“Ye think that yer uncle could have done this on his own?”

Cold realization washed over her, and her hands flew to her mouth.

“Alisdair was supposed to be with them,” Gavin sneered. “I had other plans for him.”

Isla sucked in a sharp breath. “Gavin, what did ye do?”

“I wasnae going to watch Alisdair take everything from me.”

He looked at her as if that was reason enough. As if his distorted vision of love justified betraying his clan and turning against the people who had trusted him the most.

“Yer uncle wanted a way to destroy the MacLeods, and I kent exactly how he could achieve that.”

“Nay.” Isla shook her head in disbelief. “How could ye do this? Ye said ye loved her.”

“She never cared about me!” he yelled in her face.

Isla braced herself as he stood over her, his body shaking with fury, any semblance of sanity gone.

“I followed her here like I did most times when she retreated. And I offered to be her lover, to be her secret. Cherish her as she deserved, the way he could never have.”

Catherine might have been a ghost in the castle, but Isla had heard enough about her to know that a lady like her would never have agreed to such an arrangement. She hadn’t loved Alisdair, true, but she had respected him immensely.

“She rejected ye,” she said.

Gavin growled low and threw the robe aside. “She said she would stay loyal only to him. That she never felt that way about me, that I was making her uncomfortable. Me!” He banged his fist against his chest. “I loved her with all me heart, and she said I was making her uncomfortable!”

“Gavin…”

“So I contacted yer uncle,” he continued, straightening his back and looking down at her. “Gave him the route, the timing, how many men.”

“Ye betrayed them. Ye betrayed yer Laird, and ye betrayed her!” Her lower lip trembled.

She had seen firsthand the damage his betrayal had wrought on everyone. She had seen with her own eyes how much guilt Alisdair carried, how crippling that single memory had been for the whole clan.

“I suffered while they continued living happily!” Gavin snapped.

Isla shook as she worked faster to get the nail out of the wood. Gavin was clearly losing his tether. She was running out of time.

“I made it happen,” he said proudly. “I took everything from him, just like he took everything from me.”

“She was never yers,” she scoffed. “Ye were petty and cruel with the people who loved ye.”

“No one loves me!”

“Ye think ye deserve love?”

Fury broke through her fear. For eight years, Alisdair had carried pain and grief, along with his duties. And this man had stood by his side and watched him suffer.