Page 31 of Hold Fast

“I am afraid she is a fair bit taller than you are, Cat,” Ewan said. “I thought perhaps we could—”

He stopped. It didn’t seem fair to ask his sister to part with one of their mother’s gowns, the only things she had left. Cat had never worn them as she would have had to alter the length significantly, something she insisted she could not stomach doing. They remained neatly packed in a trunk beneath the window, safe and stowed.

But perhaps Cat couldfindher a gown. Perhaps there was an extra lying around the keep somewhere.

“Mother was tall,” Cat ventured. “I have all of her gowns in the trunk.”

“I cannae ask you to give up such a precious item. Surely there is another gown to be had.”

But Cat made thatpfftsound that she often made when she thought one of her brothers was being especially ridiculous. A hard, suffocating lump rose in his throat. He had not looked at his mother’s gowns since they’d been packed away after her death.

He looked down at his own clothes, at the white lawn of his shirt and the blue and green of his plaid, both drenched in Connor’s blood, and his stomach turned as he remembered entering the laird’s chamber after the twins had been born. He’d found his beautiful, gentle mother’s sheets and shift soaked red with blood, the bright stains contrasting with the blue-and-green plaid wrapped around his tiny new siblings. She had not survived the night.

“Ewan? Ewan, where have you gone?” Cat asked with a loud clap of her hands.

He startled and shook himself, returning to the present. Cat was rummaging through the chest under the window, handing parcels to Joan, who arranged them neatly on the bed.

“Ewan, I have been asking you questions this whole time. What color is her hair? Her eyes? And what did you say her name is?”

“Una,” he said, feeling how his tongue cupped to cradle the first syllable.

“Una. A beautiful name. And her hair color? Och, pfft. You likely didnae even notice.”

Today had been impossible. Yesterday even more so. Overwhelming. Devastating. Exhausting. Seeing Connor so very ill, so very bloody, in the same bed in the same chamber where their mother had died bringing him into the world had been too much. He hadn’t made the connection until just now, until seeing his mother’s gowns removed from the trunk. His throat felt tight, as if it might close, and he sucked in a raspy breath.

It was all too much. And yet, through the haze of panic, Ewan could still picture in vivid detail what Una looked like.

“Her hair is dark,” he said hoarsely. “Black, like a raven. Her eyes are a verra light blue. Like—”

He’d been about to saylike a clear winter sky.

His sister grinned.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing at all, brother,” Cat said with a smirk. “I believe I’ve found just the thing.”

She pulled a bundle from the trunk, letting the gown unfurl as she pinched the shoulders between her fingers. The dress was made of a fine wool, dyed the color of bluebells. He remembered his mother wearing it often, one of her favorites, and his mouth went dry as he imagined Una’s glossy black hair cascading down in sharp contrast to the soft color.

“Well?” Cat asked, interrupting the daydream. “Will it serve?”

Una had insisted the gown be a dark color. Something that wouldn’t stain or be easily ruined. “I’ll work in my shift before I ruin a fine gown with my work,” she had declared. This gown would show every speck, every drop, every smudge.

But he wanted to see her in it anyway, wanted to see if it made her eyes look even more blue like he suspected it would. He wanted to give her something fine, something that she could wear to feel pretty, not just serviceable.

“Aye,” he said, swallowing thickly against the tightness in his throat. “’Twill more than serve. Will you take it to her?”

Cat draped the gown over her arm, placing her other hand on her hip. “Leave Una to me. I’ll make sure she feels welcome. You have more important things to attend to.”

He did. Hundreds of them. And yet none of them seemedmoreimportant than making Una feel safe and welcome. There was much to do. Eventually, once Connor recovered, as he could not bring himself to imagine any other outcome, Una would need a home. She could not stay in the keep indefinitely or she would become the subject of gossip. He could find her a cottage, something close to the wall and the keep. He pictured her cooking her supper alone, sitting alone by her hearth at night, climbing into her bed alone. The thought rankled him.

But that would not be the case. Una was young and beautiful. No doubt someone would ask for his permission to seek her hand before the end of the week. And he would have to grant them permission to court her because denying that permission would indicate that he’d set his own cap at her. And he hadn’t. He wouldn’t. Hecouldn’t.

And yet that rankled him, too. He did not want a wife. He did not want to love yet another person who could be taken from him. But the thought of another man building a home with her made him want to put his fist through the wall.

He tried to regulate his breathing as he ran down the wheeled staircase. He tried to calm his mind as he stomped out of the keep into the blinding, frigid air.

But he could not stop thinking about Una wrapping her long arms willingly around the neck of a faceless man. Of that man stroking her hair, rubbing the slick strands between his fingers.