“Not like that!” Connor took a deep breath. Ilysa should have had a husband who could share her passion—a passion Connor must stop dwelling on. “I suspect he wanted a wife so no one would guess his secret. You were the perfect choice because you’d never gossip with the other women about what happened—or didn’t—in bed.”
“That much is true,” she said, her face going pink. “As a healer, I’m often told women’s complaints about their husbands, but I never told a soul.”
“I can see why he wed you, but why did you wed him?” he asked.
“My mother was dying, and she wished it,” Ilysa said. “She told me Mìchael would be a good husband because he would not be demanding.”
Ach, Anna must have known.
“Duncan was gone, and I had no one else.” She shrugged her slender shoulder. “I suppose I was feeling a bit lost, and Mìchael was a fine man.”
Anna had been a kindhearted but excessively fearful woman. The “undemanding” husband, oversize clothes, and severe headdresses must have been her way, misguided though it was, of protecting her daughter. She had succeeded in hiding her daughter in plain sight.
“I don’t know how I missed seeing how pretty ye are, even covered up as ye were,” he said.
Without thinking, he brushed the back of his fingers against Ilysa’s cheek. He was unprepared for the jagged bolt of lust that tore through him, making him want her so badly that his hand shook. In his mind, he was already carrying her to the bed and stripping off her nightgown. This time, he would savor every inch of her and make it last. He would rein in this tumultuous need until she was gasping his name and…
“It will never happen again,” he said and got abruptly to his feet. Cool air hit his chest where she had been leaning against him. His arms felt empty. “I just needed to know that ye were all right.”
When Ilysa looked up at him, he saw a dangerous longing in her eyes and knew she would let him stay. Temptation dug its talons into him. One word, one touch, and she could be his.
“Ye mean a great deal to me,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt ye.”
He made himself go to the door. As he closed it behind him, Connor was certain he was doing the right thing for her. And yet, it did not feel right—and he had never regretted anything more.
***
It had been two nights since Connor had come to her chamber. Though Ilysa knew he would not come again, she lay awake listening for his knock. She finally gave up on sleep, wrapped a plaid around her shoulders, and went to her window to stare out into the night.
Her attention was caught by a movement in the courtyard. It was probably just one of the men assigned night guard duty, but the way the man skirted the edge of the courtyard as if he did not want to be seen, looked suspicious. When the moonlight caught his fair hair, she knew who it was.
Where was Lachlan going this time of night? He was always disappearing. This time, she intended to find out why.
She ran down the stairs and crossed the hall on quiet feet amid the snoring men. After slipping through the outer door, she stood at the top of the steps of the keep searching the dark for him. He was skulking next to the wall, halfway to the gate. Holding her nightshift up with one hand and her plaid around her shoulders with the other, she raced across the courtyard.
Just as she caught up to him, he spun around.
“By the saints, Ilysa!” Lachlan said in a harsh whisper and put his dirk away. “Ye don’t sneak up on a warrior in the dark. What in the hell are ye doing out here?”
“You’re the one sneaking about,” Ilysa whispered back. “Where are ye going?”
“Nowhere,” he said, leaning close and keeping his voice low. “I just came in, not that it’s any of your business.”
“Then where have ye been?” she asked. “If ye won’t tell me, perhaps you’ll be willing to tell the chieftain.”
She could feel Lachlan’s eyes boring holes into her through the darkness as the silence stretched between them.
“If ye can keep a secret,” he said at last, “I have a confession to make.”
“So long as it doesn’t endanger anyone else, I’ll keep your secret,” she promised. “I’ve been waiting for ye to tell me what it is from the first day.”
Lachlan glanced about, she assumed to make sure that none of the guards on the wall was close enough to overhear.
“You were right about Connor,” Lachlan said. “He is a man worth serving.”
Ilysa’s shoulders relaxed. All along she had felt that Lachlan was good at his core and hoped his attitude toward Connor would change. But since he had not said anything yet that could be deemed a confession, she waited for the rest.
“You were right about me, too,” he said. “I was a threat to him.”