Page 17 of A Match Made in Heather

She realized then why the cottage seemed so familiar, why she’d been struck by the feeling of stepping into another life as soon as she entered—

“We would have lived in a cottage just like this,” she whispered, barely a sound passing her lips, “if we’d married.” Her belly tightened at the glimpse of the life they might have shared, spreading out before her. Once she’d wanted nothing more than to be his wife, keep his home, have his children . . . “We would have been happy here.”

“You would have been miserable,” he corrected gently.

She whispered, “Not with you.”

“Especiallywith me.” He shook his head at the futility of what she was suggesting. “Can you honestly tell me that you would have been happy living in a place like this, two rooms so poorly furnished that we would have been lucky to have a table to eat from, let alone any food on the plates? No pretty dresses or beeswax candles, no books, certainly no tea or sugar, no velvet or ribbons.” He reached out and tugged at the shoulder of her riding habit, adding, “No Rowland tartan for you or our bairn. Your father would have made certain of it.”

“I would still have been a Rowland by birth.” Resentment began to pulse inside her. “Entitled to wear the tartan.”

“You would have become a McGuiness. You would have been nothing.” His jaw tightened. “Just as I was.”

“Don’t say that! I loved you, more than—” The words choked in her throat. When they came, they were little more than a breath. “More than I’ve loved anyone else in my life.”

He froze, stunned at her unexpected confession.

“Not going with you that night was the most difficult choice I’ve ever had to make.” Her voice shook from the emotion of her admission. “I loved you, Garrick, but I loved my family, too. They needed me to be here with them, to face together all the terrible things that were about to happen to us.”

“A gambling debt?” he bit out. He shook his head, disdain darkening his features. “Terrible for Samuel, surely, but nothing you had to take on yourself.”

She hesitated, wanting nothing more than to tell him everything, to spill her heart and all the dreadful events of that summer—

But she couldn’t. Even now, the pain was still raw, still too difficult to share.

“I wanted to go with you that night,” she answered instead. “I wanted to be your wife and share a home with you, just like this one.” She glanced around her, unprepared for the rush of sadness that swept over her when her eyes landed on the empty cradle in the corner. “And fill it with our own children. There would have been love and happiness . . .” Her voice trailed off, and she drew in a deep breath, pressing her hand against her chest to fight back the memories of the past. The ghosts of a life that would never be. “I had to choose, and I chose my family. But not one day went by that I didn’t regret having to make that decision, not one night when I didn’t wonder what our life would have been like.”

Her gaze met his, and as she stared into his eyes, the rest of the world fell away around them. Just as it did ten years ago whenever his attention was on her, when it seemed only the two of them existed.

“I made the right decision, Garrick, IknowI did,” she breathed out in a trembling whisper. “If I had to relive that night, even knowing now what would happen—” Her eyes began to sting as tears blurred his handsome face. She whispered softly, “I would make the same choice.”

He shook his head. “Arabel—”

“But that doesn’t mean I didn’t love you. That I didn’t want a life with you.” All the emotions roiled inside her so fiercely that she had to press a fist against her chest to keep breathing. The pain was unbearable, but the only way to end her misery was to sear the wound completely, to stir up the desolation and grief until no more pain was left. To answer the question that had been haunting her for ten years . . . “Why did you leave, Garrick? You left Kincardine when I . . .”When I needed you most.

“I didn’t have a choice,” he finished with a cutting iciness.

She flinched at the accusation, and old wounds bled anew. “Neither did I,” she admitted. “I’d thought . . .”

“You thought what?” he pressed.

Somehow she found the resolve inside her to not look away. “That you loved me enough to understand,” she whispered as the memories of that night spiraled through her, all the pain and panic, the desperation . . . “That you loved me enough to wait.”

They stared at each other silently. In that heartbeat’s pause, she was certain that time had been ripped apart, that ten years hadn’t passed. That they were standing once more at the verge of a new future together—

But that was only a fantasy. The life she’d wanted with him could never be hers now.

A decade of confusion and desolation surged to the surface, dredging up memories of how broken she’d felt, how many nights she’d cried herself to sleep, how many prayers she’d offered in which she’d begged God to let him return for her. She squeezed her hands into helpless fists at her sides as she fought to see in him any traces of the man she once knew and loved, but finding none. Staring at him now, surrounded by ghosts of the life they could have had, she knew she never would.

With a frustrated cry, she shoved against his chest to push past him for the door.

But he grabbed her around the waist and yanked her against him. With every struggling shove and twist she made, his arm tightened around her and kept her pressed against him. He shifted her back across the table until her feet could barely find purchase against the dirt floor. His face was dark with anger and something else she couldn’t fathom, but it made her heart pound and her blood turn hot.

“Be still,” he commanded, his voice hitching with a hint of brogue.

Arching herself away from him, Arabel went quiet, with only the soft pants of her breath breaking the silence.

“You once asked me why I took your innocence,” he murmured, his eyes staring darkly into hers.