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Benneit strode into his study.
‘I’m not marrying Tessa McCrieff. I went there to beg her to release me. Blast you, you should not have let Jo leave. Have Lochlear saddled right away. I’ll ride across the glen.’
The letter lay in the middle of his desk and he opened it, furious, scared, but still stubbornly elated. His heart was soaring like a hot air balloon—she would not have run if she did not care. In an hour, less if he was lucky and the glen not sodden from rain, he would reach her and tell her precisely what he thought about her running away. But first he would make it abundantly clear to her she was staying. No, first he would beg her to tell him he was not wrong in his belief that she cared as much as he did. He needed to see her when he spoke the words. See the truth in her eyes, whether it took him to heaven or hell.
He unfolded the letter and read.
Dear Benneit,
Beth told me where you have gone, so it is time for me to leave.
I should end my letter here and thank you for everything—tell you to take good care of Jamie, though I know you will. And say Godspeed and congratulate you.
But I cannot say that and I cannot stay. Not one moment longer. I know this is the right path for you, but if I were wealthy and beautiful, or even merely pretty, I would fight for you and tell Tessa McCrieff she cannot have you.
Yet I can offer you and Jamie nothing but what I am. No, even that you have taken from me. You have stripped me of my armour against the world and now instead of thinking I speak, and instead of wanting I am beginning to make demands, and this is dangerous.
If I stay a moment longer I might begin to beg when I have never, ever begged for anything in my life.
You will feel guilty, I know, even hurt, and perhaps responsible, and you will consider coming after me. But if you dare... If you dare I will blacken your eye, Benneit Lochmore.
You have your pride and I have mine. I am writing this to you because I must, and because even though we cannot be friends you are my finest friend. I will take this loss and make even more of myself now because of you—not less because of this pain I am taking with me.
Jamie is upset and hurt, but Tessa McCrieff is a good person and will be a good mother and I believe he will become attached to her. You are and will be an excellent father. The very best. Please don’t ever doubt that. This is one of the things at the very top of my List of Things I Know to be Absolutely True.
Goodbye, Benneit. It will only ever be you, mo chridhe.
‘Papa?’ Jamie stood in the doorway. His cheeks were marked with streaks of drying tears and strangely Benneit noticed he was wearing shoes. Flops’s muzzle was pressed against his hand, gently licking.
‘I tried to make her stay, Papa. She said she couldn’t. I don’t understand why.’
Benneit covered his eyes for a moment, then strode towards Jamie, swinging him into his arms.
‘It is my fault, Jamie. But I will make good. I need to leave now and fetch her back. Don’t you worry. I’m bringing her back to stay, Jamie.’
‘To stay? For ever? She won’t leave?’
‘Not if I can help it. I must go now and hopefully we will be back by nightfall. You will be laird while I’m gone and make certain all is well and ready for our return. Understand, Lord Glenarris?’
Chapter Thirty-Two
It was perverse. It had been a beautiful sunny day for his ride out to face his doom at McCrieffs’ and now that he was trying to capture his small corner of bliss, the world was leaking—the sky, the ground, the heather, his greatcoat, even his boots.
Poor Lochlear sensed his urgency and made good time across the glen even in the rain, his hooves sending up clumps of mud and heather. Despite the miles falling behind them, a superstitious fear clung to Benneit that he would never reach her, that she would disappear into a fold in the air, leaving only the memory she had imprinted on his heart and mind and body. Spirited away after the Summer’s Solstice like her magical mice.
But as he neared the Standing Stones he spotted the carriage and spurred Lochlear on. Dougal heard his shout and pulled on the reins, and the carriage drew to a halt on the side of the road where a track led off towards the stones.
‘Your Grace! Is aught wrong?’ Dougal asked.
