Wings of Morning (17 page)

“So it was yer doing, was it, that made Roddy try to steal someone else’s cattle?” Anne sighed. “Och, Regan. Roddy was a grown man. He made the choice that led to his death, not ye.”

“Then why do I feel so . . . so g-guilty?” she sobbed. “As guilty as the man who actually killed him?”

“Because ye’re a good, moral person, and ye loved Roddy and regret what ye see as yer unkindness to him that night. And ye didn’t get to say good-bye, and ye feel cheated. And because ye’ve no way left to make amends now, save to bring his murderer to justice.”

Regan took out a handkerchief and blew her nose, then managed a sad little smile. “It’s all verra complicated then, isn’t it? Guilt, I mean.”

“Aye, it frequently is,” her friend said. “Guilt, however, can also cloud one’s judgment and make one do illogical things. Like mayhap refuse to see the truth about Iain and his innocence.”

“As can affection also cloud one’s judgment and prevent one from doing the right thing, no matter how hard it may be!”

She knew where Anne was headed with this, and she refused to revisit the painful considerations again. Indeed, she should’ve known better than to allow Anne to lead her back to the topic of Iain’s innocence. Of course, Anne’s first loyalty would always be to him.

“Och, if ye only knew how long and hard I agonized over what I felt I must do!” Regan cried, her frustration and sense of Anne’s treacherous manipulations searing her heart. “Despite what anyone—especially Iain—thinks, my decision wasn’t one easily made.”

“I never thought it was.”

Angrily, Regan brushed away the remnants of her tears. “Well, then ye’re the only one who doesn’t.”

“Despite what ye may imagine, Iain also realizes the difficulty of yer situation. And he doesn’t hate ye. He’s not a fickle man. He doesn’t flee love for hate as easily as some.”

Regan stared, dumbfounded, at Anne. Had she heard her correctly? Nay, she must have misunderstood. No man, and certainly no Campbell, would tolerate a betrayal such as hers.

“If what ye say is true,” she finally found the words to utter, “then I’m grateful for his understanding. But it doesn’t change what I must do. I’m committed to discovering my husband’s killer.”

“As would I be,” Anne said, “if the same had happened to Niall. But what will ye do if Lord Seton’s findings exonerate Iain, or at worst, don’t present conclusive enough evidence to bring him to trial? How will ye feel about Iain then?”

Regan lifted a puzzled gaze to the auburn-haired woman. “If Lord Seton can offer indisputable proof that Iain’s innocent, then I’ll be satisfied. I don’t wish Iain ill. But to convince me that Iain didn’t kill Roddy, Lord Seton must also bring proof that another is the murderer.”

Anne sighed and shook her head. “Sometimes it’s not as easy as that, my friend. Sometimes the real killer is never discovered. Must Iain then forever bear that taint in yer heart?”

Regan climbed to her feet and walked the short distance to stare once more out the window. “And if he must,” she asked softly, “what does it matter? He’ll be free, and I’ll return to Strathyre. And that’ll be the end of it.”

11

Lord Seton remained at Kilchurn two days, then left once more, this time for Strathyre House. Regan didn’t expect to see him again for about another week, and she settled down to her now usual routine of avoiding Kilchurn’s residents as much as she could. She took to saying her prayers in the chapel before sunrise, followed by a brisk stroll around the roof walk in the first light of dawn. The rest of the day was spent in her room.

With a late afternoon nap to fortify her, she’d then venture from her bedchamber at about 10:00 at night, when most if not all the residents were abed, and after more time spent in the chapel, she’d risk a few hours in the library. It wasn’t much, but it kept her from going mad, cooped up constantly in her bedchamber.

Her schedule permitting, Anne also began spending a part of each day with Regan. The two women would talk and embroider or play a game or two of chess. Though they hadn’t spoken again of Regan meeting with Iain, Anne nonetheless kept her apprised of all the castle’s goings-on, including what Iain was doing. Regan wasn’t able, however, to gain any information on what Lord Seton had garnered from his visit to Balloch. Anne didn’t know, nor did anyone else save perhaps the queen.

The question, however, was foremost in Regan’s mind. She woke with it and went to bed at night with it still hovering at the edge of her thoughts. And now that Seton was likely at Strathyre, she mused early one morning as she began her walk around the roof’s confines, it seemed she couldn’t keep her mind off the investigation.

How was Walter holding up beneath Lord Seton’s questioning? And had the queen’s man yet uncovered
any
information that shed conclusive light on the murderer’s identity? As she walked along, she clenched her hands in frustration. Och, but the waiting, the not knowing anything, was beginning to erode not only her patience but also her tightly held control. Indeed, it wouldn’t take very much at all anymore—

A sound—footsteps—echoed suddenly in the deep silence. Regan wheeled around and realized someone was coming up the stairs. She panicked, glanced wildly around for someplace to hide, but there was none. Aside from a stone bench placed at the best vantage point overlooking the loch, and the small, enclosed stairway entrance, the entire roof was out in plain sight.

“Easy now,” she whispered in an attempt to calm herself. “Likely it’s but Jane or Anne, searching for ye.”

And then her worst nightmare exited the stairway enclosure. Iain paused, glanced around, and found her. If the truth were told, at that moment Regan wanted nothing as desperately as to faint dead away.

Unfortunately, her usually well-appreciated, strong constitution failed her most miserably. The best she could manage was total loss of her tongue and an inability to move.

Iain, however, appeared to suffer no such infirmities. His gaze turned resolute, his shoulders squared, and he strode toward her.

“So, Jane was right,” he said, drawing up before her. “Ye do take clandestine, early morning walks up here.”

Though her heart was clamoring in her breast and her knees were quaking, somehow Iain’s particular choice of words irked Regan enough that anger gave impetus to her speech. “My walks are hardly clandestine,” she managed to choke out, not quite looking at him. “I just prefer my privacy, that’s all. Now, if ye don’t mind,” she added, gathering her skirts and beginning to sidle around him, “I’m finished with my walk and must return to my bedchamber.”

He neatly stepped in her way. “And what’s the hurry? It’s not as if ye’re all that busy these days, going hither and yon about Kilchurn.”

He had moved close, and Regan found her eyes at chest level to him. She didn’t want to meet his gaze but knew there was no way now of avoiding it. Ever so reluctantly, she looked up.

Deep blue eyes stared back at her. Eyes that held neither a look of hatred nor affection, but rather were mildly amused and considering. She wasn’t so sure, though, that she liked that any more than she would animosity or compassion.

“We’ve naught to talk about, and well ye know it, Iain Campbell!” Regan finally spat out. “So, unless ye find some sort of cruel pleasure in tormenting me, let me go.” She made a quick move then to dash around him, but he was quicker still.

“On the contrary, sweet lass,” he said, taking her now by the arms, “we’ve quite a lot to talk about. And since I tire of waiting for ye to come to me, I thought it time for me to come to ye.”

She hadn’t realized how much she had missed him. Missed hearing his rich, deep voice. Missed his touch. Missed his manly scent of sandalwood and leather and wool.

At this moment, as she stood so close she could feel his heat, hear him breathe, soak in, even if just one time more, that bright, wonderful energy he always seemed to exude, Regan thought it surely worth whatever was next to come. She had been so long bereft of him, and needed, oh, how she needed, the sustaining essence, the soothing balm that was Iain! Almost as if some force drew her, Regan leaned toward him, her need for bodily contact all but overwhelming her.

Then, like the chill splash of water on an icy morn, reality returned with all its sudden, disconcerting might. She reared back. “Let me go, I say!” she cried, twisting in his grip. “Ye’ve no right to lay hands on me, much less hold me here against my will!”

His grip on her tightened. “Are ye such a coward, then, that the strength of yer convictions isn’t enough to provide sufficient courage? Indeed, it speaks verra poorly to the rightness of yer cause if ye cannot face me and hear what I’ve to say.”

He wouldn’t let it be, Regan thought. He must persist in reaping yet again and again a harvest of anger and pain and hard words, when all she wanted to do was spare him whatever she could.

“Fine,” Regan said with a sigh of resignation. “I suppose, since the last time we spoke we were in the queen’s presence, I robbed ye of the opportunity fully to vent yer spleen on me. So pray, get it over with. Tell me of yer anger, yer disgust and hatred. That I’m the most ungrateful and unfeeling woman ye’ve ever known, and a liar and backstabbing traitor in the bargain.” She paused to drag in a swift breath. “Have I left aught out?”

To her surprise, he chuckled. “Nay, that pretty much sums it up or, leastwise, what
ye
imagine I think of ye.”

Regan didn’t know what to say. Her mind raced, trying to anticipate what Iain’s game might be, and when and how he’d drive the knife of his own attack into her. For a game it must be. No man would tolerate what she had done without retaliating. Leastwise, no man
she
had ever known.

Roddy had a quick and violent temper, and his pride would brook no dissent or disloyalty. It was an anger quickly over, though, if one survived the initial attack. Walter’s anger, on the other hand, was of a far quieter and more lethal kind, long simmering as he considered every possible way to take his revenge. And, when his vengeance came, it was always far more vicious and enduring. It also frequently appeared at the most unexpected time, long after the slight had been forgotten and the other party had moved on to other things.

Which way would Iain react? Well, one way or another, she’d soon know.

“Then get it over with, will ye?” she demanded, glaring up at him. “Obviously, I haven’t a notion what ye’re really thinking. Tell me what ye came to say and be done with it!”

“I don’t hate ye, lass.” His eyes burned with a fierce intensity. “I’m hurt, confused to be sure, but I don’t hate ye. I just want to understand . . . understand why, after all the time we’ve spent together, after what I thought was growing between us, ye’d imagine I was capable of murder. That’s all, Regan. That’s all I want to know.”

He only asked what she had asked herself over and over again in the past few weeks. Yet what answer could she give him, save the same ones—that all evidence pointed to him, that it wasn’t personal, that she just needed to obtain justice for Roddy’s death. But Regan realized now, perhaps just because Iain had finally asked it, that the answer was a lot more complex than just that.

She wasn’t the same person she had been before, when her memory was gone and everything seemed far more simple. She was now the old Regan, wary and self-protective, mightily guarding the portal of her heart. She had closed herself off from others and backed away, choosing to keep a wide distance. And an empty ache deep within her throbbed. Och, how it throbbed!

“I’m not the woman ye first knew,” Regan finally replied. “Indeed, I was never truly that woman. So ye don’t know me, Iain. If ye did, ye’d understand why I’m capable of accusing ye of murder. And ye’d see that I’m not at all the sort of woman ye’d ever care for, much less love.”

“Och, but of course ye are, lass!” He pulled her to him, held her tight. “Ye’re both those women, to be sure. The part of ye I saw when ye’d lost yer memory is how ye’d have been if yer life had taken a different course, with different people to love and care for ye. And aye, I see how ye’re now, marked as ye were by different people and experiences. But both women are parts of ye, lass. I know it’ll be difficult, but nonetheless it’s up to ye to choose which aspects to keep and which to discard.”

She clung to him, though she knew she shouldn’t, drinking in the feel of his big, strong body, hearing the reassuring beat of his heart, encircled in the safe haven of his arms. Here, at this moment in time, Regan almost imagined what he said was possible. That she wasn’t forever bound to the old habits and ways of seeing things, that she could choose who and what she wanted to be.

But she also knew Iain saw the world far differently than she did, that old Regan whom she had known the longest. She was safe, comfortable in her old skin. She knew how to react, what to do and think. And that happier, more innocent girl she had temporarily been was already beginning to recede, to shred and dissipate. Indeed, even now, Regan could barely remember her.

The only part of
her
that lingered on was her love for Iain. Somehow, that had remained strong and clear, never wavering, no matter how hard she tried to kill it. But kill it she must. The real Regan MacLaren wasn’t worthy of a man the likes of Iain Campbell. How could she be? Her parents had left her, her own clan didn’t want her, and she had all but driven her husband to his doom. At the very least, she was death to any who dared love her.

Breaking contact with Iain, Regan pressed against the barrier of his arms. “Ye don’t understand,” she said, forcing herself to meet his gaze. “I
have
chosen who I want to be. And I’m not the woman for ye. Leastwise, not anymore and, in truth, not ever.”

For the first time since he had found her here, pain twisted his features and uncertainty darkened his eyes. She could see the battle he waged, the doubts, the questions, the fear. At any second, Regan thought, Iain would arrive at the same conclusion, and the wall would finally rise before his heart.

A wild impulse to stop him, to call back her lie, shuddered through her, and she almost succumbed to it. But if she did, where would that leave Roddy’s retribution? Where would it leave Walter and, even more importantly, little Molly, who saw her as the only mother she had ever had?

She knew how to be Regan MacLaren. She didn’t know how to be that girl Regan, the clanless, family-bereft waif Iain and his mother had taken in. And she would never know how to be the sort of wife a man like Iain Campbell deserved and needed.

“And I think ye’re wrong, lass. About not being the woman for me,” he said softly, even as he released her. “Verra, verra wrong.”

She stepped away from him. “Let it be, Iain. I’ve caused ye enough pain. Let it be.”

“And what of yer pain? Do ye really wish to return to that, to live the rest of yer life with it?”

“And why not?” Regan’s laugh was strained and strident. “It’s all I know, after all.”

“But it doesn’t have to remain that way.”

Och, but he spoke so sweetly, and the look in his eyes fair to took her breath away. But he didn’t understand. How could he? He was so very, very different than she.

“Will ye force me, then, into some mold ye’ve formed for me?” she whispered.

“Nay! Never!” Iain gave a savage shake of his head. “Never would I do that to ye!”

“Then let me be, Iain.” Tears filled her eyes, and she didn’t bother to hide them. “Let me be.”

With that, Regan darted around him and fled toward the stairs. This time, Iain didn’t try to stop her. She started down the steps, weeping now, and almost collided with someone in the staircase. With a mumbled apology, Regan eased past the woman.

Only later, when her tortured thoughts had had a time to settle, did she realize the woman had been the queen.

A week later, Lord Seton returned late in the afternoon. No sooner had he dismounted and his horse was led away than Niall escorted him into the queen’s presence. Regan began to pace the confines of her bedchamber, her anxiety mounting with each passing minute. Finally, an hour later, Anne came to fetch her.

“Have ye heard aught?” Regan asked her as they headed down the corridor toward the main stairs. “About what Seton found or what his final conclusions are?”