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“I cannot help what I feel,” he finally said.

“But I swore to my parents that I would do my duty by marrying Adelaide. She is my duty and duty only. But Mae… she is my life that could have been. If you do not think that tears me apart, you would be wrong. And I would never hurt something as priceless and respectable as Mae. You have my word on that.”

With that, he quit the stable, heading out into the cool, breezy day, thinking that somehow, someway, his heart had become a pile of ashes in all of this.

Desmond’s fears were all valid. He genuinely could not become angry with the man for trying to protect his sister.

But that heart that had become so damaged with Tacey’s death had now collapsed into cinder in the wake of his loss of Maitland.

Loss in an emotional sense. The woman was alive and healthy, and would ever be as long as he had any say in it, and he had no intention of making her his concubine as much as he would have liked to.

He simply couldn’t do that to a woman that magnificent.

For once, he’d grown a conscience and he hated himself for it.

But it was the right thing to do.

Thomas needed a distraction, badly, so he headed towards the keep with the intention of finding Caria.

Perhaps he’d take her down to the river or, perhaps, he’d even let her ride the pony he’d purchased for her recently.

He hadn’t had the opportunity yet to show it to her and he knew she’d be thrilled.

It gave him something to think of other than Maitland.

Just as he turned for the keep, however, he heard someone call his name.

“Thomas!”

He knew that voice and it turned his stomach. He almost ignored it but thought better of it. Coming to a halt, he simply stood there, looking off towards the keep.

He knew what was coming.

“I have not seen you all morning, Thomas,” Adelaide said. “I thought you might like to see what I have done in the hall.”

Thomas wouldn’t look at her. “I do not need to see it,” he said. “It does not matter to me what you do.”

He started to walk away but she followed him.

“I have arranged it for our wedding,” she said.

“I want to return to Kyloe Castle, but I have decided we shall be married here before we return. I vowed not to return to Kyloe unless I was married, so we must marry first. It has been six months since our betrothal, Thomas. With my father gone… this is what he would have wanted. There is no reason to delay.”

Thomas came to a halt and looked at her. “Return to Kyloe?” he said. “We have never discussed that. I have no intention of leaving Wark at this time.”

Adelaide was puzzled. “But as the Earl of Northumbria, Kyloe is your seat,” she said. “Wark is merely an outpost for your father. It is not worthy of the Earl of Northumbria. Ask your father; even he will tell you that. As the earl, your place is at Kyloe.”

Much as he hated to admit it, Adelaide was correct in her assessment of their marriage and what his responsibilities were.

Kyloe Castle was an enormous bastion that housed an army of nearly two thousand.

It was the earl’s seat, and when Thomas married Adelaide, he would become the earl. That went with marrying the heiress.

But, God… he didn’t want to go.

His heart sank.

“Let me speak to my father about this,” he said after a moment. “If I am to go to Kyloe, then my father will need to find a replacement for me here at Wark.”

“Then you will agree to a wedding by the end of the week?”

He looked at her sharply. “I will agree to a wedding when my father finds a replacement for me,” he said. “We are all trying to come to terms with your father’s passing, Adelaide. You are not the only one it affects.”

“But we must return to Kyloe soon. I must bury my father in the chapel with his ancestors.”

There was the little matter of the body in the vault, which would not stay incorrupt for an over amount of time. Thomas felt a good deal of pressure knowing that his time as a single man was limited. Now, there was a timeframe on it that he could not refute.

“And we shall return him.” Thomas put up a hand to stop her from whining. “As I said, let me speak with my father about this and we will make definitive plans. I simply cannot run off and leave him without a commander at Wark.”

It was clear that Adelaide didn’t like that answer. “I will not wait weeks,” she said, pointing towards the gatehouse where the vault was. “I cannot wait weeks to bury my father. It is not proper.”

He was nodding even as she finished her sentence. “I realize that,” he said as he turned for the keep again. “I will seek my father’s counsel in the matter.”

Thomas headed off towards the keep, moving swiftly away from her to keep her from arguing with him. He passed through to the inner bailey and was nearly to the stairs that led up to the keep when he heard something behind him and turned to see that Adelaide was following him. He stopped.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

She looked at him expectantly. “I am going with you so that we may speak with your father.”

He shook his head. “I will speak to him alone. Go back to the hall and I shall find you there later.”

Adelaide sighed sharply. “Why can I not come? We will be discussing my wedding and my father.”

The familiar annoyance with the woman was starting to flood his veins.

“Adelaide, let me be plain,” he said with thin patience.

“You cannot always have what you want. In this family, the men make the decisions and the women do what they are told. I told you to go back into the hall, and you shall. Do whatever it is women do in preparation for a wedding and let me talk to my father alone.”

He took the steps, but Adelaide remained at the base of them, watching him.

“I will not be cast aside,” she called after him.

“My father permitted me to help with his decisions and I shall do the same for you. I am no one to be trifled with, Thomas, and I will not allow you to continue to show me such disrespect.”

Thomas didn’t even answer her. He wouldn’t argue with a fool but, with every step he took, he was feeling sicker and sicker to his stomach.

He was going to have to deal with that woman for the rest of his life and he was certain it was because God was punishing him for all of the sins he’d committed, for the men he’d killed and the women he’d widowed and the bastards he’d produced.

Everything Dhiib aleasifa had ever done, everything Thomas de Wolfe would ever do.

It was the only explanation.

God wasn’t going to let him be happy.

Once inside the cool, dark keep, he shut the door behind him as if to block out Adelaide.

She hadn’t come up the stairs behind him, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to.

He knew his father was up in the master’s chamber, so he set his sights on that, but as he headed for the stairwell, he passed the chamber that Desmond used.

The one that Maitland had stayed in during her brief visit.

The door was closed but it brought him to a halt.

He’d passed the door many times since Maitland had departed Wark but, every time, the sight of the door brought back memories of a woman who had captured his attention.

Their week of separation had done nothing to cure those feelings.

If anything, they’d only grown stronger.

He paused by the door, putting his hand on the jamb and running his fingers over it as he thought on the lovely woman with the reddish-brown eyes.

Life was such a cruel thing sometimes. But as he sadly turned away from the door, thoughts lingering on Maitland, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and the dagger he always kept on his belt was abruptly unsheathed.

He lifted it just in time to see Adelaide’s German nurse nearly on top of him.

Startled, he jumped back, away from her, as she gasped.

“ Verzeihen !” the woman cried. “Forgive me, mein herr . I did not mean to startle you!”

Realizing he wasn’t about to be gored by a petite old woman, he sheathed his dagger. “No harm done,” he said.

He tried to push past her and go up the stairs, but she stopped him. “ Mein Herr ,” she said quickly. “I must speak to you. Please.”

Thomas wasn’t in the speaking mood but he paused, out of courtesy. “What could you possibly have to say to me?”

The woman appeared nervous, very nervous. Her fingers, her jowls, everything about her was trembling. “There is not much time,” she said in her heavy accent. “I must tell you about Lady Adelaide.”

“What about her?”

The woman was beginning to look distressed on top of being nervous. “Where is Lady Adelaide?”

Thomas lifted his big shoulders. “Outside,” he said. “I left her at the bottom of the stairs. I assume she is going back to the hall. Why do you ask?”

The woman put her hand to her mouth. “ Gott hilf mir ,” she whispered. Then, she looked up at Thomas, utter terror in her eyes. “God help me, she is not who she seems. Be very careful, mein herr . She can kill you.”

Normally, Thomas would have disregarded such rantings, but something in the woman’s eyes made him take notice. “What are you talking about?”

The woman glanced anxiously at the keep entry before continuing. “I must tell you what I know,” she said. “While the herr was alive, I could not, but now that he is dead, I fear only Adelaide, and I trust that you will not tell her what I say.”

“What do you have to say?”

The woman leaned towards him, lowering her voice. “That she has planned for you,” she whispered. “Adelaide has been betrothed to two men in the past and she killed both of them.”

Thomas looked at the old woman as if she’d gone daft. “ What? ”