“I watched the two of ye, and I figured ye just needed some time together for this to happen,” he said. “So I let ye both believe I was going to make ye wed that Alain Maclean, though he is even madder than his father Shaggy.”

“Ye did that on purpose?”

“Aye,” her father said, grinning from ear to ear.

She couldn’t believe it! Despite all her efforts to thwart her father’s plans for her—from putting her fate in the hands of a stranger to traveling all the way to Edinburgh—she had ended up doing exactly what he wanted.

“I went home to Barra before coming here to wait for ye,” he said before she could gather herself to shout at him. He stooped to reach into a cloth bag at his feet and pulled a soft blue gown from it. “Your stepmother made ye a new gown to be wed in.”

“It’s lovely!” Glynis said, holding it up. “That was kind of her, truly. Oh, da, I wish I could see the rest of the family.”

“They all miss ye,” her father said. “Tell that new husband of yours to bring ye for a long visit soon.”

Glynis prayed she would not be coming home alone and in shame again.

*  *  *

Alex stood at the front of the hall, flanked by Connor and Duncan on one side and by the MacNeil chieftain and Ian on the other, waiting for his bride to make her appearance. And waiting. When Glynis’s father took a step, looking as if he meant to fetch her and drag her down the stairs by her hair, Alex grabbed his arm in an iron grip.

“Give her time.” Alex locked eyes with her father and did not let go of him until the chieftain nodded and stepped back.

When the voices in the hall hushed, Alex turned and sucked in his breath at the sight of Glynis at the far end of the hall. She wore a soft blue gown that drew attention to her slender, elegant figure and flowed about her as she walked. With her rich brown hair pulled up in a crown of flowers and ribbons, and then cascading down her back, she looked like a wood nymph come from the forest to enchant him.

But beneath her crown of flowers, Glynis’s face was strained. Her wide gray eyes had the same look of panic Alex had seen in a wounded doe’s as it lay on the ground with an arrow in its side. Glynis hesitated at every step, looking as if she might bolt if someone made a loud noise. It seemed to take her forever to cross the length of the hall. Finally, she stood before him.

Glynis had not changed her mind. But it had been close.

*  *  *

Alex was breathtakingly handsome, tall and striking in his saffron shirt and plaid with greens that matched his eyes. Most of the people gathered in the hall—particularly her own clansmen—must be wondering how such a skinny, difficult lass had come to be the one that Alex chose to wed.

Glynis darted glances left and right as she traversed the endless hall, a different question dragging her steps. How many women in the room had Alex slept with? Two? Three? A dozen?

“Ye look beautiful,” Alex said, playing the part of bridegroom, when she finally reached the end of the gauntlet. “I believe we sign the contract first.”

By we, he meant her father, of course. All the same, Alex took her with him to the small table where the contract had been laid out. She had learned to read, but she was too overwrought to make sense of any of the words.

“Is it acceptable to ye?” Alex asked, which was kind, but pointless, since her father had already signed it.

She could not get a word through her throat, so she nodded. When Alex signed, his signature was big and bold with a flare, just like he was. She felt like a skinny, brown mouse next to him.

After she and Alex returned to their places, the two chieftains made speeches about a glorious union, fertility, and such. She saw no priest, so it appeared Alex had not succeeded in finding one on short notice. Glynis ignored the speeches and closed her eyes to say her own prayer.

Please, God, give me a few months with him before he breaks my heart.

“Glynis!” When she heard her father say her name, she opened her eyes to find both chieftains staring at her. “Say your pledge,” her father hissed.

Her heart hammered so loudly she thought they must hear it.

“I…” Her throat was too dry, and she had to stop to swallow. It took her three tries, but she got the words out. She fixed her gaze on the floor as she waited for Alex to say his vows.

He was silent. The longer Alex did not speak, the more his silence seemed to expand and fill the hall. When Glynis risked a sideways glance at him, he was staring at her with a fiercely grim expression on his face.

Alex grabbed her by the wrist. She had to struggle to keep her feet under her as he proceeded to haul her out of the hall with his long-legged strides.

“O shluagh!” she whispered. What had she done to deserve this?

CHAPTER 35

Alex dragged Glynis into a large bedchamber that she assumed must be the chieftain’s because it adjoined the hall, though it was plainly furnished and the walls had no decoration at all. After sitting her down in a chair, Alex pulled another up opposite so that they sat face-to-face with no more than a foot between them.

“Glynis, I cannot go ahead with this marriage when ye look as if you’re going to your own hanging,” Alex said. “We’ll end this right now if it makes ye this unhappy to be my wife.”

She was too shocked to speak. After doing everything he could to persuade her to wed him, now he wanted to release her from her pledge?

“I hoped ye would come to see me as a man ye could be content with and reconcile yourself to the marriage,” he said. “But it appears ye cannot, and I will no raise my daughter in a house filled with anger and unhappiness.”

Glynis’s heart was pounding so hard that her chest hurt.

“It won’t be easy convincing your father that I haven’t taken ye to bed and given him cause to force the marriage,” he said with a resigned sigh, “but I will.”

She did not want to return to her father’s house to be put on display for an endless stream of unsavory suitors again. “What about all those people waiting out there for us?”

Alex dismissed them all with a wave of his hand. “I know I pressed ye hard to do this, but you’re a stubborn lass who knows her own mind. So tell me, why did ye agree to wed me?”

Glynis paused to lick her lips. She was unsure whether to tell him the truth, but she had nothing else to say. “Because I feared ye would wed Catherine, and I believed she would harm Sorcha.”

Instead of dismissing her accusation as foolishness or demanding proof, Alex simply looked at her steadily and waited for her to explain herself.

“Because Sorcha is silent, she senses things that others miss.”

“Aye, I’ve noticed that,” Alex said.

“I found Catherine taking Sorcha out in the loch where no one could see,” Glynis said. “I could tell that Sorcha was frightened to death of her.” She told him the rest of what happened, though there was not much more to tell.

“One brings danger,” he muttered as he ran his hands through his hair. “I had no notion Catherine would want to harm Sorcha.”

Glynis was used to her father—and everyone else—dismissing her judgment. It touched her that Alex did not question her perception of what had happened at the loch that day.

“Well, I was right about one thing,” Alex said with a sad smile. “Ye would be a good mother to Sorcha.”

“A child alone cannot bind us,” Glynis said, blinking hard to keep back tears. “As ye said, being a wife is more than being a nursemaid.”

“I wanted ye for myself as well,” he said, and touched the back of his fingers to her cheek. “I know it is important to ye that your husband is faithful. Is that part of what is making ye so miserable about the prospect of being married to me?”

Glynis dropped her gaze to her hands folded in her lap and nodded.

“Then I would give ye my promise that so long as we share a bed as man and wife, I’ll take no other.”

When he first spoke of marriage, he had only promised to be discreet in his affairs. He was willing to give her the promise she wanted now, but could she trust him? Even if Alex meant it now, would he still mean it in a month?

“I can’t do more than give ye my word on it.” He got to his feet and looked down at her. “I wish that were enough.”

If Alex had shouted at her and stormed off, Glynis might not have stopped him. But instead, he leaned down and kissed her cheek, a tender gesture that left her blinking back tears again. Then he turned and walked quietly toward the door.

As Alex said, he was the best of her choices, by far. But more than that, he was the only man she wanted. Was she brave enough to take the risk that he would hurt her? Was she strong enough to survive if he disappointed her? All Glynis knew for certain was that she could not bear the thought of him wedding another.

“Alex!”

When he turned around, his face, which was normally so full of humor, looked ragged.

“Ye were right. I did not fulfill my side of the bargain,” she said. “Since I said I would wed ye, I should not have done it begrudgingly. That was wrong of me, and I’m sorry.”

“Ye needn’t apologize,” Alex said, sounding tired. “I’ll go tell the others now, and I’ll have someone bring ye supper so ye don’t have to face them.”

When he started to leave again, she sprang to her feet. “Wait. Ye don’t understand me.”

“That’s true enough,” he said, giving her a bittersweet smile.

“What I mean is, I think we should marry,” she said in a rush. “I’ll make the best of it.”

He gave a dry laugh. “Make the best of something ye hate? Nay, that’s no good enough.”

“I want to marry ye, Alex,” she said, and it was the truth. With all her heart, she wanted him. “And I will try to trust ye.”