Page 24 of Highlander’s Captive Bride (Troubles of Highland Lasses #4)

24

I t turned out, a few days later, that she was right. With four healers now sharing the duties of the healing room and the number of patients regularly decreasing, Daisy was now able to sleep a little later in the mornings than before. On the fourth morning after the attack, she awoke in her bed and then got up to draw the curtains, to let the summer sunshine in.

She looked out her window over the courtyard and beyond the gatehouse, her eyes seeking the loch, the moors, and the mountains in the distance. However, on this occasion, her gaze was arrested by the unexpected sight of a small party of armed men on horseback drawing up the stone pavement immediately before the castle gates. In their midst was a carriage drawn by four horses.

While she was peering at the unexpected sight, pressing her nose against the glass, a tall, dark-haired man broke away from the group slightly. She frowned, for there was something strangely familiar about him, but she could not quite see well enough to make his features out. A beam of sunshine suddenly hit him, illuminating the tartan of his plaid.

Daisy’s heart leaped in her chest with a painful thump.

“Dominic?” she murmured in disbelief.

She closed her eyes and shook her head, thinking her eyes were deceiving her. But when she opened them and looked again, she could see it was, indeed, her brother.

But how is he here? How did he know to come and get me?

Seized by an insatiable need to know, she hastily dressed and pulled a brush haphazardly through her hair. Then, she left her room at a trot and hurried downstairs, making straight for Bellamy’s study.

She knocked, praying he was there. When he answered, she rushed inside, to see him sitting alone at his desk, a pile of parchments in front of him and a quill in his hand. The smell of wax was in the air.

Without ceremony, she went right up to his desk and leaned her hands upon it.

“Me braither is outside the gates,” she announced, shooting him a questioning look.

“Is he?” he asked, throwing down his quill and sitting back in his chair, regarding her levelly as he rested his chin on his hands.

“Aye, he is. With a party of men and a carriage. But how is it that he’s here?”

“Because I wrote to him and asked him to come and fetch ye home,” Bellamy told her calmly.

“What? When?!” she demanded, taken aback. “Ye said naething to me about it.”

Daisy thought he might get up and come round to her side of the desk then, but he stayed put, with the expanse of the huge desk stretching out between them.

“I found yer letter in me chambers on Beltane night before the attack started.”

He suddenly rummaged in his shirt pocket and produced the very note she had left for him. Daisy stared at it in surprise. She had forgotten all about it amid the flurry of events. Guilt stabbed at her, and she felt her cheeks flush.

“I saw how ye planned to leave without saying goodbye to me or Elodie. I realized that ye’d done everything I asked of ye, and more, and I thought that if ye wanted to leave so badly, I should let yer braither ken where ye were and tell him of our situation so he could come and fetch ye home.”

He laid her note down on the desk. “I’m just holding up me part of the deal, like ye said before,” he said.

He seemed so distant, with no warmth in his expression, that her heart felt as if it was breaking in two.

But is this nae what ye wanted all along? Now, ye can leave without having to steal away in the night…

Now, she was not sure it was what she wanted at all.

“Is that all it was between us, then? A deal?” Daisy asked, struggling to keep her heartbreak in check.

Before Bellamy could answer, the door burst open, startling them both. Daisy looked around and saw Elodie running towards her. The child threw herself at her and hugged her waist tightly.

When Daisy looked down at Elodie’s face, she saw she was crying.

“Dinnae go, Daisy, please! I dinnae want ye to go. Stay, please!” Elodie pleaded through the sobs that were wracking her small body.

Daisy’s heart ached even more at seeing the child’s distress.

Close to tears herself, Daisy reached down and held Elodie, stroking her hair. “I—” she began, with no idea what she was about to say.

“Daisy has to leave, lass. She has stayed too long already, and her family wants her back. I’m sorry, but ye must say goodbye,” Bellamy said, his voice softer as he addressed his daughter but with an edge of hardness that stood out to Daisy.

Confused, her emotions in turmoil, Daisy crouched down and hugged Elodie with all her might. “I’m sorry, hinny, but yer faither’s right. Me family needs me now. I dinnae want to leave ye, but I must go,” she whispered, feeling tears gathering in her eyes.

“Nay! Stay with us. Yer family can come and visit ye here. Ye dinnae have to go,” Elodie cried, clearly as heartbroken as Daisy felt.

“I cannae, me darling,” Daisy managed to say. “Me braither is already waiting for me outside. I have to go.”

Elodie cried even harder while Daisy held her. Daisy looked at Bellamy over the child’s shoulder, but his expression was hard. It was the final nail in her heart.

“I must go and get ready,” she told Elodie, brushing her tears away gently with her hand as she gazed up at her imploringly. Leaving the child felt like the hardest thing she had ever done. “Will ye come and say goodbye to me at the gate?”

After some moments, still clinging to Daisy’s waist, Elodie nodded. “But will ye come to see me sometimes?” she asked, sniveling into Daisy’s skirt.

Daisy did not know how to answer. She looked again at Bellamy, praying he would say yes. Or anything at all. But he said nothing, his face stony.

“I-I’ll try,” she said finally, hoping to mollify the child. “Now, I must go and bid everyone goodbye. Let’s go up and see Poppy, shall we?”

So, with a last glance at Bellamy but without another word being exchanged between them, Daisy took Elodie’s hand and led her out of the room.

A while later, having bid farewell to Jamie and then Poppy, to whose caring hands she delivered the miserable child, she visited her new friends in the healing room and said goodbye to Drew, Daphne, and Maria, apologizing to the young healer for leaving before she could teach her what she wanted to learn. She gave them her address in case they needed her in the future, and they all embraced her and wished her well.

Then, Daisy retreated to her room for a good cry. Leaving in secret had felt bad enough, but this! This coldness from Bellamy was almost unbearably painful. She vividly recalled their passionate encounters, knowing she would never feel for another man what she felt for him.

In despair, she tried to understand her feelings of heartbreak, but questions she could not answer only crowded her mind.

Does he nae know or care how terrified I was to lose him during the attack? Nor how filled with joy I was to see him safe?

With a deep sense of sorrow, she told herself she had to accept that he did not. To him, everything that had passed between them had just been either a mistake or part of the deal. She forced herself to harden her heart and compose herself.

However, when she was finally ready and had arranged for her bag and medicine box to be deposited by the gates for her to collect on her way out, she went to fetch Elodie. She had promised the child they would walk down to the castle gates together for a final goodbye. But to her consternation, Elodie insisted on going to Bellamy’s study first and making him come with them.

Daisy was somewhat surprised when he agreed without any argument, but it was a long and awkward walk to the guardhouse, the silence hanging heavily between them. With every step, Daisy felt herself getting more and more overwhelmed.

When they arrived, she could see Dominic waiting for her. When he saw her, he dismounted and stood waiting.

Daisy picked up her things and ran to him, throwing down her bag and box on the ground before his arms wrapped around her and the tears burst from her eyes. He drew her in a big, warm hug and rocked her comfortingly as she wetted his plaid with her tears. He stroked her hair.

“Are ye all right, Sister?!” Dominic asked gently. “Ye havenae been harmed, have ye?”

Daisy drew back a little to look at his dear face. She saw him looking suspiciously over her shoulder at Bellamy, but he did not try to approach him or speak to him.

“Nay, ’tis just so wonderful to see ye. I’ve missed ye so much!”

“I’ve missed ye, too. Are ye ready to go home?”

“Aye, I suppose so,” she said.

“Ye dinnae sound too sure,” Dominic observed with his usual dry manner.

“I do want to go home,” she told him, feeling as if her heart was being torn in two. She bit her lip as Dominic went over and opened the carriage door for her and stood holding it.

“Come on, then,” he said.

Daisy hesitated, looking back at Bellamy, who was now standing alone by the gate. Beyond him, she could see one of the guards carrying Elodie back to the keep.

“Wait a minute, please,” she told Dominic, feeling compelled to go back and say goodbye to Bellamy.

When she reached him, she searched his face, looking for any sign that he cared she was leaving. To her shock, his handsome features were marked by deep sorrow as he stepped closer to her. When they stood mere inches apart, he suddenly lifted his hand and caressed her cheek, gazing at her. Pain stabbed her poor heart like a spear, and she could not stop crying, staring into his beautiful gray eyes.

“Oi, stop touching me sister like that!” came an annoyed shout from Dominic.

But Bellamy ignored him. His gaze was fixed on Daisy, making her feel as if she was the only thing in the world.

“Goodbye, Bellamy,” Daisy said through her tears.

“Goodbye, Daisy, and thank ye again for everything,” Bellamy murmured, his voice deep and hoarse.

There was something very raw and passionate in his eyes and voice as he spoke the words.

“Daisy. Are ye coming?” Dominic called.

With a huge force of will, Daisy forced herself to turn away from Bellamy for the last time and went over to her brother. She had her foot on the carriage step when she suddenly remembered something important.

“How is Violet?” she asked, anxious for news about her sister-in-law.

“Och, she’s fine and bonny now. She healed herself,” Dominic told her, his lips curling into a smile.

“Oh,” Daisy said, freezing.

She was suddenly filled with elation at the wonderful news. The guilt and anxiety that had dogged her for such a long time at last fell away, leaving her feeling light as air.

She turned her head and looked back at Bellamy again, her mind suddenly racing. The tall, handsome warrior was watching them, his expression taut with barely concealed grief.

Picking up her skirts, Daisy turned on her heel, a huge smile breaking out on her lips as she ran towards him. With a look of stunned surprise that soon turned to a wide grin, Bellamy opened his arms and caught her as she flung herself at him.

“Violet is better,” she breathed in excitement, hugging his neck tightly. “I can stay! I can stay with ye, Bellamy. Bellamy?”

“Aye, lass,” Bellamy mumbled into her hair, and she could feel him smiling.

“I love ye.”

She felt the deep, rumbling laugh that began in his chest and traveled upwards to burst from his lips, rich, melodious, and filled with happiness. Her joyful heart overflowed as he whirled her around in his arms.

“I’m glad ye said that… because I have to tell ye, I love ye, too!”

Unable to keep apart any longer, their lips met in a kiss of pure euphoria.

Neither of them heard the low curse that Dominic let out just then, just before he sighed and told his men to stand down.

* * *

Bellamy felt rather swept away by the rapidity of events, while at the same time knowing he had never been happier. A warmth had settled in his chest that he could not recall ever experiencing before, not even as a child. It was a different sort of happiness from that carefree, youthful exuberance, more fulfilling, more satisfying, and it had a feeling of permanence that he found he liked very much.

It had banished the loneliness that had dwelled in his heart since losing first his mother, then his father, and then, most tragically, his beloved Bridie.

And it was all down to the small woman with the beautiful face, kind eyes, and quick wit sitting next to him at the Laird’s table in his very own dining hall. He was trying to be a good host to her brother, who was a very good fellow, as it turned out, yet his eyes and mind kept wandering back to Daisy.

She’s goin’ to marry me! She’s goin’ to be me wife!

The words kept going round and round in his mind like a celebratory chant and would not stop. He felt on top of the world!

He came out of his reverie slightly to hear Dominic saying, “I have some good news for ye, Sister.”

Bellamy could guess what it was by the way the man’s eyes were dancing, and unusually, he felt joy for him.

“Aye, me and Violet, we have a bairn on the way,” Dominic said.

To Bellamy’s amusement, Daisy let out a little scream of joy and jumped up to run around the table. She embraced her brother warmly.

“Och, that’s wonderful news, indeed!” she cried, her face glowing. “I’m to be an auntie again!”

“Aye. I wish Faither was here to see it,” Dominic said, and Bellamy saw his eyes turn a little dark above the scar that marred one of his cheeks.

“I ken, Braither. Dakota and Delilah said exactly the same thing when they were expecting, d’ye remember? ’Tis natural to feel that way. But I like to think both Maither and Faither are looking down on us all and ken what’s going on. They must be so proud of ye, Dominic,” she told him.

“Thank ye, Daisy. I hope that’s true.”

“I hope ’tis true also,” Bellamy chimed in, warmed by the little reunion between siblings. “I often think of me maither and faither, especially me faither when I’m in a tight spot. But I miss me sister the most. Bridie was always full of kind words and encouragement for everyone.”

“Have ye just one sister, Bellamy?” Dominic asked.

“Aye, she passed a few years ago.”

Bellamy did not want to elaborate just then, but he caught the tender glance Daisy shot him when she came to sit back down beside him again. She patted his hand affectionately.

“Well, I have three, and I can tell ye, I dinnae ken whether it’s a curse or a blessing at times,” Dominic said, his eyes twinkling at his sister, who slapped his arm in mock reprimand. “It took me ages to get rid of this one. I thought she’d never leave. After me accident—” He gestured to his burns. “—she made me her wee project. She was determined to heal me. All she did was drive me mad. It was a bloody nightmare. And wait ’til ye meet the other two, wheesht!” He shook his head at Bellamy, grinning widely before taking a deep draught of his ale.

“Och, I think ye’re lucky if the other two are anything like Daisy,” Bellamy said, looking at her, his heart overflowing with love. He laughed to see her blushing.

“Shush,” she chided him with a smile. “Ye’ll give me a big head.”

But he went on. “She’s helped me so much, finding out what was wrong with me daughter and staying to help me people during the recent attack. We couldnae have gotten through it all without her.”

“Aye, that was a nasty business with yer wee lassie. ’Tis a good thing ye got the bastard that did it, in the end,” Dominic said.

“Well, the business isnae concluded,” Bellamy explained. “For though it was Lachlan Pearson who gave the order to poison Elodie, it was his sister, me ward Nadia, who gave it to her. She’s in the dungeons now. I still havenae decided what to do with her,” he admitted.

Dominic helped himself to some slices of beef from a nearby platter. “She’s the one ye saved when ye thought ye wiped out the McGowans, is that right?” he asked, looking at Bellamy with interest.

“What will ye do with her?” Daisy put in. “I wish I could feel sorry for her, but I cannae, not after what she did.”

Bellamy scratched his head. “I’m nae sure, to tell ye the truth. What d’ye think, Dominic?”

Dominic chewed on a mouthful of beef before answering. “Well, if it was me, I ken I couldnae bring meself to kill such a young lassie, though what she did was wicked. Ye could send her to a nunnery, I suppose. Or banish her from yer lands,” he suggested.

Bellamy nodded. “Aye, ye’re right. I couldnae kill her, but banishing her could be the answer. Thank ye, I’ll think on that,” he said, sincerely glad to have another laird’s opinion on the matter.

“So, when is the wee bairn due?” Daisy asked—keen to get back to happier subjects, Bellamy thought.

“Around Christmastide, Violet thinks. And there are twins in her family, so we could get two for one,” Dominic replied, beaming.

“Och, ye look so pleased when ye say that. Ye must both be so excited,” Daisy said. “I’m excited meself on yer behalf. I can hardly wait to give Violet me congratulations.”

“We should drink to the wee bairn, and the expectant parents,” Bellamy said, refilling his and Dominic’s tankards and then topping up Daisy’s goblet with wine.

“Aye, let’s!” Daisy agreed, her eyes sparkling and making his heart skip a beat, for she looked so happy and so bonny at that moment. “Have ye chosen any names yet?”

Dominic shrugged. “Well, we thought Hudson for a lad, after Faither, of course, and Ruby if ’tis a lassie. That’s for Violet’s maither.”

“Och, both grand names. Shall we drink to Hudson and Ruby?” Daisy suggested, looking to Bellamy to propose the toast.

“To the safe arrival of wee Hudson or wee Ruby, to their good health and happiness, and that of their Ma and Da,” Bellamy declared, raising his tankard high.

The siblings joined in, repeating the toast merrily, and then they all drank deeply to the health of the coming child.

As the dinner went on and Bellamy listened while brother and sister caught up on other family news, the warm feeling that had lodged inside him only seemed to grow. Growing up, with their mother passing away so young and their father kindly but usually busy with clan affairs, it had mostly been just him and his little sister left to their own devices.

He and Bridie had been very close, and he could see it was the same with Daisy and Dominic and all the Winfreys. He had already warmed to Dominic, and now, he could hardly wait to meet Dakota and Delilah, too. He was especially intrigued to meet Delilah, the famed runaway bride, and the hero Evan, who had saved Dominic’s life, and no doubt Daisy and Delilah’s, too, in the process. He sent up his silent thanks to the man he had yet to meet.

He found himself wanting to be part of this family of theirs, to be part of the same close family bond, to have the luxury of knowing there was always someone who had his back. Now, he realized that before Daisy had entered his life, he had been alone for too long.

Except for Elodie, of course. He so wanted her to have the same close bond, that feeling of belonging to something greater than oneself, which the Winfrey siblings were blessed with.

Elodie had cried with joy to find out that Daisy was not leaving, after all, and she had been on her best behavior when meeting the Laird of McGunn. Daisy had forewarned her about her brother’s scars.

“I’m telling ye because ye may think he looks a bit scary, but he isnae at all,” she had told the little girl.

Bellamy had been so proud of Elodie when he had presented her to Dominic. She had given him her brightest smile and a curtsey worthy of any grand lady. And then, before he could stop her, she had asked, “Daisy told me about yer scars. How did ye get them?”

Bellamy had felt himself cringe with embarrassment, expecting a disapproving silence from Dominic, and he had been ready to make fulsome apologies for his child’s rudeness. Even Daisy had looked worried when they had exchanged glances.

But Dominic had defied all expectations by dropping to his haunches so he could meet Elodie’s eyes, and then he had taken her hand.

“Well, ’tis a long story, and maybe I’ll tell it all to ye one day, but I dinnae think we have the time just now, hinny. But I was knocked unconscious, and there was a fire. I didnae ken anything until I woke up looking like this,” he had explained calmly, gesturing to his scars.

“Do they hurt ye?” Elodie had asked, looking at them curiously while Bellamy still waited on tenterhooks.

“They used to, for a long time after the fire, aye. But I think it hurt me more in me heart if ye ken what I mean.”

“Ye worried what people would think,” Elodie had said with her usual perceptiveness.

“Aye, that’s right. I became very grumpy with everyone, even Daisy here, and thought I was a monster that people would run away from.”

“Ye dinnae look like a monster,” the little girl had told him gravely. “I have pictures of monsters in me books, and ye dinnae look like any of them. And ye have nice eyes, just like Daisy’s.”

“Well, ’tis very kind of ye to say so, Lady Elodie, especially coming from such a pretty lass as yerself. I used to think all the lassies would run away from me, so ye must be a special sort of lassie, like me wife, Violet. Lucky for me, she didnae think I looked like a monster either.”

“I should like to meet her. She sounds nice,” Elodie had said, smiling happily. “Can I touch yer scars?”

“Elodie!” Bellamy had finally burst out. But Dominic had looked up at him and smiled as he shook his head.

“’Tis naething, Bellamy. She’s right to ask questions. If we dinnae ask questions, we dinnae get answers, do we, Lady Elodie?”

Elodie had nodded in reply.

“Ye go ahead and feel me scars if ye want to,” Dominic had added.

So, Elodie had lifted her hand and gently touched his scars with her fingertips.

* * *

Daisy retired to bed, feeling so exquisitely happy and believing that it had been such a day of extreme emotional ups and downs, she would fall asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow. But in practice, the opposite proved to be true.

Whichever way she turned beneath the covers, she simply could not get comfortable, and try as she might to empty her mind of thoughts, they simply refused to cease their teeming. At last, she stopped trying, arranged her pillows, and sat up, leaning against them, accepting that she was just too excited to sleep.

She settled back, smiling happily to herself as thoughts of Bellamy filled her head. She reflected on all she had learned about the amazing man who had kidnapped her and then won her heart.

It was endlessly intriguing to her how such brutal ruthlessness could combine with such intelligence, such gentle vulnerability, and such fiery passion within one single body.

I’m in love with Bellamy Kane!