“Now, lass, ye cut me off enough. It is time that ye let me have me own turn at speaking.” He raised his brows at her, and Willow couldn’t help the laugh as she closed her mouth again. “I was wrong before, lass. I’ve a habit of being so when it comes to feelin's. But Damon set me straight, started me on the right path.”
“He’s all right?!”
“Aye, and that’s the last question I’ll answer until ye let me finish.” Keegan eyed her, but there was a playful air behind it, and Willow blushingly ducked her head. “Damon reminded me that I daenae only have a responsibility to me family and clan but also to meself.”
He stepped closer, pressing his body right up against Willow’s, and she stared up into his eyes as he met hers unblinking and with utter candor.
“I daenae wish for ye to leave. I couldnae stand it if ye were ever parted from me, in fact. Because I love ye, Willow. I love ye as I’ve never loved anyone, and I think I have since the moment I woke up with ye plastered to me side in that cold bed.
“I want ye to watch over these people with me, at me side. I wish for ye to carry me heir, but because I want a family with ye, nae only a duty. I am truly sorry for what I have said and done to push ye away. I was…I was terrified of losin' more of what I care about most. But in doing so, I nearly lost ye, the person that fills me heart to burstin'. So, please, please stay. With me. As me wife.”
Willow had rarely experienced a time when she didn’t have something to say about any given situation. She was quick-witted if she said so herself, and keeping the silence from finding her was a specialty.
But she was indeed at a loss for words.
Keegan eyed her, lowering his face into her eyeline so that he could ask her to say something with just his stare. Still, Willow had learned so much after these few weeks, and she knew now that occasionally, it was best to let your actions speak for you.
Leaning up onto her tiptoes, a tiny smile curved her lips only seconds before she crashed them against Keegan’s. Her arms flew around his neck, and she kissed him with everything she had—all the grief, the loneliness over the years, the joy of finding him, the terror for the unknown future, and the optimism for something better than she could imagine.
Willow gave it all to Keegan, and she knew without a shred of doubt that together, they would tackle each day and everything life threw at them.
He felt so incredibly right against her, his soft lips pressed to hers, and Willow let herself go. She stopped holding herself together, she stopped putting on a brave face, and she stopped denying what she truly felt for Keegan.
Pulling back from him just a hair, tears streaming freely down her cheeks, Willow shook her head as she mumbled out her words through sobs.
“I have been so alone, Keegan. I have done everythin' to protect Lilith and survive each day. And then ye came into me life, and ye brought such strange and sudden joy. I wasnae prepared for the way ye made me feel. It is all-consumin', and I find that I will never be the same. Ye have changed me life so fundamentally, and I wouldnae have it any other way.”
Taking her chin, Keegan lifted Willow’s face toward him, getting her to look into his beautiful ice-blue eyes.
“So, shall I take that to mean that ye’re stayin'?” They both chuckled, and her husband wiped the tears from her cheek. “If ye still need more of a reason, I meant to tell ye before all this madness that I’d have three more blankets brought into the chamber for the bed. I ken how ye get mighty cold.”
Willow laughed, settling back down on her feet as she stared up at Keegan, holding the side of his face with her shivering hand.
“A fine idea. I am presently near frozen solid.” He eyed her, gesturing with his head to the fire. “Aye, a problem of me own doin'. But I thank ye for startin' it up again.”
Her chest thrummed with the enormity of the emotions flowing through her.
“I thank ye for seein' me, Keegan.” Her smile was gentle and small but so genuine. “I love ye. I love ye with every corner of me heart. It all belongs to ye.”
Keegan’s glassy stare held hers as he swept his thumb back and forth across her cheek.
“It is verra good to learn that it isnae too late for me, lass. I promise ye, I’ll never forget how grateful I am to have ye.” He lowered his forehead to hers. “And so verra lucky.”
“It wasnae luck, Keegan.” Willow melted herself into his arms. “It was meant to be.”
“Aye, lass. It was.”
EPILOGUE
Aswirl of Keegan’s tongue had Willow right on the edge of release. She clutched at the pile of her skirts that had been pushed up around her hips, her head falling back against the headboard.
“Keegan, we…”
But her words drifted away as the pleasure took hold of her. They’d been dressed and ready to make the trip to McCallum castle to seat Damon as the new Laird when Keegan had decided to throw her back against the freshly made bed and drive his head between her legs.
Complaining wasn’t what she wanted to be doing, truthfully. Her wonderful husband had an incredible way with his mouth—as well as every other appendage, for that matter—but the others were waiting on their arrival so that they could depart in the carriages.
Slipping his fingers into the work made Willow cry out, and she flew over that edge of passion, her vision going blurry.