Page 106 of Blood of the Thistle

“I am honor bound to do so after what we shared last night.”

Her face fell. “So you don’t want to marry me?”

“I have just said that I do,” he ground out.

“No. You said you feel honor bound to marry me.”

“I am.”

She gave a short, incredulous laugh and reached for her gown. “You don’t have to marry me because we had sex.”

His jaw hardened. “I willna take a woman to my bed and afterward disclaim all responsibility for her.”

Anastasia winced. “Wow. You somehow made it worse.”

“How in God’s name is that worse?”

“Because I don’t want to be your responsibility!” She dragged her gown into place with an angry jerk.

“Ye would rather I behaved dishonorably?”

“Those aren’t my only choices!”

“Then what choices are there?”

She stared at him as though the answer ought to have been obvious, and then she sat on the edge of her small bed and pulled on her hose.

Bram stared back, increasingly vexed that she expected him to solve some riddle she refused to state plainly.

“Do you even hear yourself?” she finally asked. “That is the most god-awful proposal I’ve ever received.”

Bram’s temper flared. “Have ye received so many?”

“Well, no. That’s my first,” she confessed, yanking on her short boots. “But it was... God, Bram, it was terrible.”

“I dinna ken how to do it better!”

“Of course you do. You just don’t want to say any of the things that would make it better, or I don’t know, you feel it would make you vulnerable to admit that you have feelings for me.”

“I do have feelings,” he clipped. “They’re bluidy rushing through my body at this very moment.”

Anna’s throat worked once as she met his saddened gaze. “Let me know when they reach your heart,” she said, turning for the door. She paused on the threshold to look back at him. “Be safe, Bram.”

The blast of the horn sounded before he could answer.

One hand on the buckle of his sword belt, Bram went still and listened as the long note rang across Craig na Coille. A second followed before the first fully faded, and whatever remained of the argument disappeared beneath instincts honed over too many years of war.

He finished fastening the belt and crossed the chamber, snatching up his boots on the way. Anastasia had already reached for the latch.

“Nae.” Bram moved past her and put his hand upon the door before she could open it. “Ye remain within.”

“Bram—”

“Anastasia.” He looked down at her. “Ye stay inside the keep until I ken what the horn announces.”

She looked as though she might argue, but whatever she saw in his face changed her mind. “All right.”

Bram opened the door, then stopped.