Page 58 of Auctioned to the Cruel Highlander
Ciaran exhaled. “I needed a walk.”
“A walk.”
“Aye. To the market.”
“The market.”
“What is that?”
She folded her arms over her chest, the determination on her face growing further. “What is what?”
“Repeating me words like I am a child.”
“Ye needed a walk to the market. Ye must forgive me if I find that a bit hard to believe.”
“Ye are going to find a lot of things quite hard to believe since ye are now me wife, lass.”
“Aye, I am beginning to see that.”
He should have said something measured and practical then, something about duties, about the village, about the usual burdens of the castle. Instead, he found himself acutely aware of the map behind his back and how close she stood.
“So, ye arenae hiding from me? Look me in the eyes and tell me honestly.”
He stared at her eyes, at the blue flecks surrounding her irises.
“I kent it,” she scoffed.
He could hear the mild hurt in her voice, even though it was clear she made an effort not to show it.
“If this continues,” she warned, “I think I shall visit me father by the end of the week.”
The words landed cleanly. Of course, she had decided that absence might be better than this half-marriage of approach and retreat.
Something inside him tightened so quickly that he almost let it show. For one reckless second, he wanted to stop her there. To tell her that she had no notion what effect the very thought had on him. To put the map in her hands and say,See, I did think of ye. I did listen. I do carry ye when I never meant to.
Instead, he did what he had always done when the truth came too near the surface—he hid it. He turned just enough that the map disappeared entirely from her sight.
Ava’s gaze sharpened, though whether she had noticed the movement or only the pause around it, he could not tell.
“Well?” she prompted.
Ciaran forced words into his mouth in a bid to show he was unaffected by her decision. “Do as ye think best.”
The answer was poor even to his own ears.
Ava held his gaze for a beat longer. She did not plead or try to argue with him. If anything, her expression cooled a little, as though she had expected disappointment and was annoyed to have been proven right.
“Very well,” she said.
That should have ended it. It did not.
The silence that followed carried too much: her calm decision, the hidden map, the fact that neither of them had said the true thing.
Ciaran knew if he stayed there one moment longer, he would either harden further or break in some direction he did not trust.So he did the safest thing—he stepped back. “I have business to attend to.”
Ava nodded and stepped aside to let him pass.
Ciaran headed to his chambers first and sat on the bed for a few hours.
