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She looked down at her plate, scanning her memory. “Rosalinda—that was the mare’s name. She was a beautiful beast. The prettiest speckling. I was stroking her neck and you moved to stand next to me and you asked me what I thought of her.”
She paused and the softest smile came to her face. “And I was dumbstruck.”
“You were?” He set down his wine glass. “Because of my size?”
She looked at him. For all his certainty of self and purpose, Domnall had always had one insecurity—his size. His height and strength and how it would scare people. Intimidate them. It was obviously still top in his mind.
“No.” Her head shook. “I was dumbstruck because you asked me the question. Do you know that aside from my grandmother, you were the first person in my life to ask me what I actually thought of something?” Her hand flipped into the air. “Beyond which clothes I should wear or how to style my hair, of course.”
“Ye were dumbstruck?” He chuckled. “I was dumbstruck. I was lucky I got any words out at all. I do recall I just wanted to hear your voice. Ye could have talked about butterflies for all I cared. I just needed to hear your voice in that moment. Change the enigma of ye into a real person. And then the oddest thing happened.”
Her eyebrows quirked. “What?”
“Ye were intelligent. Ye went down a list of the multitudes of considerations for the breeding of each of the mares I had shown your father and the marquess—and not only the attributes that had been discussed, but how those attributes played with the factors I hadn’t considered—the horses’ reactions when approached by a male. Their pride. Their personalities. Not just the length of their stride or the breadth of their thighs.”
Without taking a bite of grouse, he set his fork down and picked up his glass again, tilting it to her before taking a sip. “And you were right on every accord. Ye designed some of the best matches ever made from the Vinehill stables that day.”
“Do not short yourself, Dom. You always do that.” She pointed at him with the tines of her fork. “We designed the matches. The both of us. I talked, but you not only asked me questions—you actually listened to my answers. Countered my points. And we were both better for it.”
She exhaled a breath, her hand gripping her fork dropping to the table as her look went to her plate. Her voice faltered. “We always were.” Her gaze lifted to him. “How did we lose that?”
A flash of anger flickered across his face. Come and gone so quickly she wasn’t even sure she saw it. Domnall had always been able to do that. Hide each and every emotion he had from her.
Except for how he had once wanted her. That he hadn’t been able to hide.
He wanted her. His body, the heat in his dark blue eyes whenever they had been alone in a corridor or in the stables.
But she hadn’t been enough for him.
The humiliation of that fact still burned a hole in her gut. Unforgotten. She wasn’t enough. She’d never been what her father wanted her to be. Domnall was just the next in line.
She stared at her half-eaten food, not able to lift her fork to it. Her appetite had vanished.
Domnall cleared his throat, his voice rough. “You’re beautiful, Karta—beyond compare. And then I learned ye were smart. That ye took in all that was around you, but ye were never allowed to speak. From the very first, I knew I never had a chance with you. Even though I lied to myself for years on the matter. Ye were destined to marry Jacob. He was heir to Vinehill. After he died, there was one minute where I had hope, but then the marquess deemed you were to marry Lachlan.”
He shook his head. “One brother to another. And I always knew, deep down, you were made for grand estates and diamonds and London and balls and silk dresses. And I couldn’t give ye any of that.”
Her fork slammed down onto her plate, her ire spiking. She wasn’t about to let him hide behind that excuse. Not now. Not after all these years. “And that is exactly why you were my match. You didn’t care about any of those things. You couldn’t give me all of that—only you. Only yourself. That was all you could give me and all I ever wanted. The biggest, strongest man in Scotland. A man who saw beneath what my father created in me—the gilded lady that he demanded me to be. You saw everything beneath that. But then I wasn’t enough for you.”
“What in the devil’s name do you mean, Karta?” He set his goblet down on the table, his own voice rising against hers. “Ye said that last night—I broke your heart. When? When could I have possibly done that?”
Her lip curled, her head shaking, and she shoved back in her chair, jumping to her feet as she leaned over the table to him. Even standing she barely had an inch on his height. “Don’t even try that. You didn’t come, Dom. I waited and you didn’t come.”
“Come to what?”
“The blasted midsummer ball.” Her palm slammed onto the table. “You told me you were coming, but you didn’t. So that was it. That was the end of our time.”
His brow furrowed. “What? What madness are ye speaking? You left me because of a damned ball?”
“Not because of a damned ball.” She shoved off from the table, her hand flying in the air. “There was no more time. I made a deal with my father—I risked everything—everything on you. If you came for me by the midsummer ball, he would consider you. Consider letting me marry you. You don’t know what it took to convince him of that. But the only way he agreed to it was if you didn’t come by the ball…if you didn’t, I was to marry the viscount. You had months, Dom. Months. And you swore you were coming. You swore it again and again. But you didn’t show, Dom.”
Her fingers curled into a fist and she knocked it onto the table, the sound a dull thud. “You didn’t show. So I stood by my word. I left the next morning for the Leviton estate.”
He pushed back his own chair, standing, towering over her. “I showed up the next day after that ball, Karta. The next day. I bloody well told ye I was coming for you, and I did.”
Her arms clasped over her chest, her look flinging daggers up at him. “Yes, well, you were obviously delayed.”
“You’re telling me I was hours late? I missed ye by a few blasted hours?”
