Page 19 of The Highlander’s Untamed Lady

Her insides quavered, threatening to rattle her entire body to pieces. Evander closed the door behind her and she almost jumped at the quiet click.

He smiled. And approached.

Diana’s pulse thrummed wildly. She wanted to run from this room, to scream she did not want to be here. But where would she go?

She had nowhere.

This was now home. The realization punched into her, and she suddenly wanted nothing more than to curl up and cry.

“Diana.” Evander said her name with the careful, sensual roll of his accent. “Take off yer cloak and mantle.”

She shook her head and clasped her hands in front of her chest.

He kept his distance from her. “I’ll no’ touch ye until ye want me to. I’d no’ ever force ye.”

Was he serious? Diana held her ground and kept her hands locked over the clasp of her cloak. Heat burned through her body and left her hands and feet prickling with too much warmth.

“Are ye no’ hot?” he asked.

She pursed her lips.

He pulled the plaid from where it’d been wrapped around his torso like a great shawl before throwing the long end of it over one shoulder.

Diana’s fingers blindly found the clasp, still warm from the heat of her palms, and slipped it open. She eased the cloak off her shoulders with the mantle, and Evander took the bulky pile. The room was cool without the heaviness of her garments.

“The blue of yer gown brings out yer eyes.” Evander set aside the pile.

Diana’s hands wandered to the worn silk of the gown, caressing it for reassurance. “It was my mother’s. I was told I have her eyes.”

When she was a girl, she often thought her mother had left her eyes on earth to always watch over Diana. It was a foolish thought, a childish one made by a girl who clung to cast off memories of others.

“I’m glad yer mother could join us for our union.” Evander put his hand over the nervous fidget of her fingers. “My sister was there as well.”

Diana let him take her hand in his. “Because of Kitzi.”

Evander’s lips thinned into a flat, solemn line. “I take it Agnes told ye?”

Diana nodded. The emotion in his green eyes roiled, deep with caring. She understood the force of his sincerity now. “Does it…” She drew in a long breath to fortify herself and finally said. “Does it make you scared to love again when it opens the opportunity for more loss?”

He shook his head. “Nay. Love is worth risking anything. It hurt when Emilia died. I canna ever let go of that, but I have all the memories of her, and they make the pain less. It’s the same when I think of my parents.”

Her heart squeezed at his words, and for the countless time in her life, Diana found herself wishing she’d known her mother. Perhaps her mother’s love would have held longevity, for surely her father’s had been fickle.

Evander gently touched the underside of Diana’s chin and gave her a long, considering look. “Ye dinna agree?”

The surprising warmth of tears prickled in Diana’s eyes. She pulled her face from his grasp and looked to the side of the room, letting the dwindling fire consume her attention. She could not face the fire the entire night, but at least it was enough time to compose herself, to clear away the ridiculous need to cry.

“I have not had the same experience with love as you,” Diana said finally. Her voice did not shake as she’d feared it might.

Evander’s hand carefully caressed her shoulder in a soothing gesture. “Will ye tell me?”

Diana gave a short, hard laugh. “There’s not much to tell. I killed my mother with my birth and never knew her. It was an act my father never forgave me for. He doted on me when I was a child, indulged my every whim. When I grew up, when I looked like her, but did not act like her, he realized I was beyond his control. He hated me for it, and the more he tried to push me into submission, the more I hated him for it.”

It wasn’t all entirely true though. Even after having endured the punishments and the rejection, she’d craved his affection and wishfully hoped for a reconciliation. Admissions she found she could not give voice to when the pain ran so deep.

“And what of yer wolves?” Evander asked.

“My wolves?” Diana looked up at him, the hurt of her wayward father suddenly pushed aside as the thought of her noble Zeus and Hera’s undying, gentle kindness.