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EPILOGUE: I DIDN’T BELIEVE IN DESTINY

Three months later …

“LOOK … SHE HAS yer eyes.”

Brodie glanced up from where he was digging a spoon into the pot of heather honey, to see his wife smiling down at their daughter. “Nonsense,” he murmured. “I’m sure she has yers.”

“Her eyes started out grey, to be sure,” Greer replied, glancing up, a smile stretching her lips. “But look … they have turned hazel.”

Brodie put down the spoon and leaned over, deciding to humor his wife. However, when his gaze alighted upon Lorna’s pixie-like face—she most definitely had her mother’s features—his heart gave a little kick.

“Hades, ye are right,” he murmured.

Lorna stared up at him with bright hazel-green eyes. His eyes.

Reaching down, he let his daughter take hold of his finger. She clung tight before giggling.

Aye, she looked to take after her mother in nature too. The bairn was a happy one, full of smiles and squeals of delight.

Brodie was madly in love with her. He couldn’t believe he’d once sworn never to have children; fortunately, his life had turned out differently from how he’d expected.

“What do ye think of that, lass?” he asked. “Ye have yer Da’s eyes, it seems.”

“She does,” Greer said firmly.

Brodie glanced up, and their gazes met. Of course, it went far deeper than that. Despite that Lorna’s early arrival had been proof enough, there was still a part of him, and maybe her too, that believed Lorna was Sutherland’s child. Brodie had insisted it didn’t matter—and it didn’t.

Lorna was his daughter, come what may.

But the proof of it caused something deep inside to unravel—a tension he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding close.

There had been a kernel of worry inside him, after all.

He hadn’t been proud of the fact that he’d been secretly jealous of Malcolm Sutherland.

There had been a part of him that had wanted Greer to hate the man.

However, relationships were often more complicated than that—and Greer wasn’t given to hating someone without good reason.

With his free hand, Brodie pushed a curl of golden hair from his wife’s cheek that had come loose from its braid. “What matters most is that she has yer character … lord knows, she doesn’t want to grow up ill-tempered like her Da.”

Greer huffed a laugh. “Ye aren’t that grumpy,” she chided. “One just has to know how to handle ye.”

Brodie arched an eyebrow. “Handle me?”

“Aye … like a temperamental stallion.”

He barked a laugh, let go of Lorna’s finger, and pulled both his wife and daughter onto his lap. And then, careful not to crush Lorna, Brodie cupped the back of Greer’s neck and drew her down for a kiss.

It was a deep, passionate embrace for such an hour, and when Brodie released his wife, her cheeks were flushed. The three of them sat at a table in his forge, breaking their fast together. It had become their habit of late, for their small family now lived here as well.

Brodie was in the process of knocking down an annex next door that had once been used to store bricks of peat. Instead, he would build an extension to his quarters that would be Lorna’s bower.

He’d asked Greer if she wished to live inside the broch, as there was space for them there, and she’d surprised him by answering ‘no’. Instead, she wanted them to have a place of their own.

Brodie wasn’t sure how long the forge would suit them as a home, especially if their family grew. But for now, it was perfect.

And his life had transformed.

Greer spent most afternoons with Bonnie, sewing and embroidering with her in the ladies’ solar, yet her mornings were spent helping her husband in his forge.

Brodie had tried to tell Greer she didn’t need to work alongside him.

Forging iron and steel was men’s work. Yet with her usual determination, Greer dug her heels in.

She started off sweeping the forge, filling and emptying the slack tub, and cleaning his smith’s tools. But over the last few days, he’d been showing her how to hammer iron.

“Shall we continue making those horseshoes this morning?” she asked hopefully. “I should get faster with practice.”

“Aye,” he replied before favoring her with a wry look. “Although, I don’t know how I feel about my wife toiling over an anvil.” He gave her upper arm a teasing squeeze. “I don’t want ye to develop blacksmith’s muscles.”

“Rogue!” She gave him a playful swat.

In return, Brodie pulled her down for another kiss.

As always, their embrace turned passionate quickly. Brodie’s groin stiffened and started to ache as she wriggled upon his lap.

He was considering putting Lorna in her crib so he could carry his wife back to bed and give her a seeing to, when the wail of a horn vibrated through the broch.

Lorna gave a small cry of fright, and Greer pulled back, her brow furrowing. “Is Iver due visitors?”

Brodie shook his head. “Not that I recall.” With a sigh, he rose to his feet, dislodging his wife gently from her perch. He then adjusted his braies, willing his throbbing erection to subside. Now wasn’t the time for his rod to demand attention. “Come … let’s see who it is.”

Taking Greer’s hand, he led her from the forge and into the barmkin beyond. Standing together, they watched as Kerr’s men opened the gates and winched up the portcullis.

Kerr himself descended the steps, his white-blond hair glinting in the morning sun.

“Who is it?” Brodie asked.

“Not sure,” Kerr replied. “A couple on horseback … neither of them wearing clan colors.”

“They might be merchants?” Greer suggested.

Kerr shrugged. “It’s most likely.”

A moment later, the clatter of hooves on cobbles filled the barmkin, and two travelers rode in upon feather-footed horses.

Greer’s gasp drew Brodie’s attention first, and then, when his gaze alighted on the faces of the man and woman, recognition dawned.

Inghinn and Errol Forbes.

“God’s teeth,” he murmured, incredulous. “What are they doing here?”

Greer cut him a quick look. “I don’t know … but we shall find out shortly.”

With that, they both moved forward to greet the couple.

Both Greer’s former maid and Captain Errol were smiling, which eased the tension that coiled in Brodie’s gut. Instinct told him that these two didn’t bring ill tidings.

“Greer!” Inghinn dismounted so quickly that she nearly tripped. Nonetheless, her man was at her side, steadying her. “I heard ye had a bairn. Congratulations.”

“My mother didn’t burn my missives then?” Greer replied, her tone suddenly brittle.

Indeed, Greer had written to her family a few times over the past three months, yet never heard back.

Inghinn’s smile slipped, and Brodie realized that the letters hadn’t been well-received.

“One of the servants overheard yer mother and father talking about ye,” she admitted after a pause.

“And news reached me.” Inghinn swallowed then.

“I’m so sorry how they treated ye, Greer.

” Her moss-green eyes glistened with tears then.

“Don’t be sad,” Greer murmured, moving closer. “I am happy … happier than I’ve ever been.” She gestured to Kerr before beckoning Brodie. “Ye both remember Kerr and Brodie.”

“Aye,” Errol rumbled. He stepped up and clasped arms first with Kerr and then with Brodie in a traditional warriors’ greeting. “It’s good to see ye again.”

“And ye,” Brodie replied, nodding to him. “Although, this is a long way to come to pay us a visit.”

Errol grimaced. “It’s not a visit,” he replied. “We have left Druminnor.” He then cast Inghinn a sidelong glance and the pair of them shared a look.

Inghinn cleared her throat. “After what happened with ye, things were never the same for us at Druminnor.”

Greer’s brow furrowed. She then hitched Lorna against her and reached out her free hand, clasping one of Inghinn’s. “I’m so sorry, Inghinn … but surely, my parents didn’t blame ye ?”

Inghinn’s expression turned strained, letting Greer know that they had, while Errol gave an embarrassed cough. “If there is no work for us here, we understand,” he said gruffly. “We shall move on to Ceann Locha and look for something there.”

“No need for that,” Kerr spoke up for the first time. “We lost warriors at the Battle of Arkinholm. If ye are willing to take orders from me, ye are hired.”

Errol grinned, relief suffusing his features. “Aye. Thank ye, Kerr.”

Kerr nodded to him before shifting his attention to Inghinn. “My wife is just a week or two away from giving birth,” he went on. “She will need a maid to assist her, if ye are keen?”

Inghinn rewarded Kerr with a beaming smile. “I would be honored.” She then glanced over at Greer, her joy dimming just a little. “But first, I must be certain that ye want us here … do ye?”

Greer sniffed, dashing away a tear that escaped and trickled down her cheek. The sight made Brodie’s chest constrict, and he stepped close, putting an arm around her shoulders. “Of course, I do,” she replied huskily. “I’ve missed ye” —she flashed Errol a wobbly smile— “ye both .”

“Come.” Kerr cast them another affable smile. “Hand yer horses over to the lads, and follow me indoors. Iver and Bonnie will want to see ye too.”

Two of the stable hands stepped forward to take their coursers, yet Inghinn hesitated, casting Greer an apologetic look.

“Go on.” Greer stepped back and nodded to her. “We’ll be out here waiting for ye when ye’re done.”

They watched the couple follow Kerr into the broch, and then Greer turned to Brodie, her eyes still sparkling with tears. “I can’t believe it,” she said huskily. “All the people I care about most in this world are here … living in the place I love most in this world.”

Brodie grinned, warmth spreading through him. This woman had such a big heart. All the same, Greer was stoic. She wasn’t one to complain about her lot, and he hadn’t realized she’d missed Inghinn so much.

Stepping close, he chucked her under the chin.

“Ye know, I’ve never understood why ye love Dun Ugadale as much as ye do,” he teased.

Brodie’s feelings toward his birthplace were complex, although these days, he’d made his peace with it—but Greer had grown up elsewhere, and in much finer surroundings too.

“The broch caught me from the first time I set eyes on it,” she replied, a pretty dimple forming on her cheek as she smiled.

“And when I met yer family, I just knew this was my place.” She paused then before reaching out and catching his hand.

“But it’s ye that makes this broch truly my home, Brodie. ”

He stared down at her, his throat thickening.

“As do ye, mo chridhe,” he whispered. It was true.

The events of the past year had changed his relationship with his brothers, yet for the better.

He no longer clung to them as he had before.

Brodie loved Iver, Lennox, and Kerr as much as ever, yet now he truly felt their equal.

He was his own man these days, and he liked who he’d become.

Greer’s smile widened. “Aye … some things are written. We were fated, Brodie Mackay, before we ever met.”

Read a special bonus epilogue!

Let’s jump forward a decade into the future and see what all four couples are up to. Read the bonus epilogue to find out!