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She continued to stare at him, blinking with surprise. Then, suddenly, it was as if a cloud descended on her. Her eyes went dark as a stormy night and her pretty mouth pressed into a flat line. He knew instantly that all of his fears that she was angry with him were justified. It was written all over her.

“Well, ye can just take yerself back to London, Kieran Hage,” she snarled. “I dunna need ye here. I dunna want ye here.”

He braced himself. “Yet I am here just the same,” he said calmly. “I love you, Jemma, with all my heart. I am sorry I could not be here when the babe was born, but it was impossible.”

“Ye weren’t here and the babe died!” she snapped viciously, slapping her hand on the bed. “I dunna want to see ye ever again. I hate ye!”

He slowly began to remove his armor. “Even had I been here I would not have been able to save our child, Jemma,” he said patiently. “The babe was stillborn.”

Tears spilled over onto her white cheeks. “I hate ye, Kieran. Go away and leave me be.”

He could not stand seeing her like this; his heart was absolutely breaking.

“You do not hate me and I will not leave,” he said quietly. “I am your husband and I will not ever leave you.”

She began to sob loudly with grief, pain, and sadness. The last of his armor came off and he stripped off his tunic, revealing magnificently muscled chest and arms. When he sat on the bed, she screamed and bolted from the mattress.

“Get away from me!” she yelled at him. “Dunna ever touch me again. Ye caused me this pain, ye bastard, by planting yer seed in me. ’Tis yer fault, all of this, and I shall hate ye until I die!”

So now he had it. Everything she was afraid of, the reason why she professed her hate for him. She blamed him for the pregnancy and leading her through this tragedy. He was beginning to struggle with his control.

“Jemma,” he said with gentle firmness. “I know you are hurting, sweetheart, but I am hurting, too. That babe meant as much to me as it did to you. But what happened was God’s will and we must accept it. The babe is gone and venting your anger on me will not bring her back.”

Jemma’s dark head snapped to him. He could read the horrible, wrenching pain in the depths of the amber eyes and he was filled with the same naked agony. Her crying lessened, but she turned away from him, softly moaning in anguish. It took every bit of willpower he possessed not to run to her and cradle her in his arms. He so wanted to comfort her, and he needed comforting in return.

“There is no God,” Jemma finally whispered. “God doesna allow babies to die before their mothers have the joy of seeing the color of their eyes, or their first smile, or feel them tug hungrily at their breasts. Nay, Kieran; there is no God; only the devil to cause so much grief.”

His eyes stung with tears then. God, if he could only take her own pain upon him he would have done so in a heartbeat. He could not bear to see her so distraught.

“I love you, Jemma,” he said again, his voice tight. “There will be other children for us, I promise.”

“I dunna want other children. I want my daughter!” she screamed as loud as she could, her hands clenched into hard little fists. Suddenly, she threw herself down on the floor and began clawing at the stone. “I want my bonny lass, Kieran! Why did she die? Why?”

Kieran flew off the bed, snatching her to him whether or not she wanted him to. She was being violent toward herself, bloodying her fingertips on the stone but the moment he touched her, her rigid body went soft and limp against him and she clung to him as if she was drowning.

Her tears came freely, wetting his chest as he cradled her tightly, and his own tears fell silently on her hair.

They stayed together on the floor for an eternity, holding each other in the dark as if nothing else mattered in the whole world but their grief. Jemma cried until there were no tears left, reduced to a shaking, quivering shell in Kieran’s massive arms.

Her anger towards him had been great. She had blamed him for everything and his absence only served to feed her anger. He didn’t care for her or the babe, she was sure, otherwise he would have been with her for the birth. He only cared about his own pleasure, putting his seed in her and unconcerned with the end result. She was terrified that if he touched her again she would bear another dead babe. She would kill herself if that happened. She could suffer no worse pain.

Except if she lost Kieran. Even with her black rage toward him, she loved him more than anything on earth. Lord, he made her feel safe and secure in his enormous arms and when he made love to her, there was nothing sweeter. His gentle nature made her melt, his wisdom constantly amazed her. Oh, yes, she loved him and she knew deep down in her heart that he was not to blame, but somehow it had helped her own grief to focus her pain on something.

He was here now and that was all that mattered. Nothing could ever harm her again so long as he was with her. She had spent three weeks in the black hole of despair and suddenly she felt as if there were a light at the end of it all, beckoning her away from her grief. It was at that moment she began the long, slow road to recovery.

“Let me see yer neck,” she said finally, with a faint, raspy voice.

With everything they had gone through, it was the last request he expected to hear. Obediently, he tilted his head and revealed the thick scar that ran along the top of his left shoulder and onto his neck. It was long and purple. Jemma ran a finger along it, inspecting it closely.

“So this nearly killed ye?” she whispered, hiccupping.

“Aye,” he gazed at her lovely, pale face.

“What happened to the man who did this to ye?”

He raised his eyebrow faintly. “William tore him apart with his bare hands.”

Her eyes widened and she stopped fingering the scar. “He did?”