Page 39 of Promised to the Forbidden Laird

Roy turned his head. “Which wall?”

“The one upon which ye nearly dropped a timber.”

“I didnae nearly drop it.”

Donaldina looked back at him. “Inside.”

Roy looked at her intently. She raised her chin, adopting the same confident expression she used when correcting councilmen who mistook the volume of their voices for authority. “I have repairs tae inspect,” he shook his head.

“Someone else will inspect them.”

“They answer tae me.”

“At present, they appear tae possess more sense than ye.”

Several nearby clansmen developed sudden interest in their boots.

Roy lowered his voice. “Donaldina.”

“Roy.”

His name sounded different when she spoke it in anger. More intimate somehow, as though she had already grown accustomed to using it and resented being given cause.

“It is a shallow wound,” he tried to explain.

“Then it will require little time tae tend.”

“I have endured worse.”

“I have nae doubt. That doesnae improve this one.”

Roy felt the eyes of the yard upon them, though no man was foolish enough to look openly. A laird being ordered indoors by a woman was apparently a spectacle that demanded great concentration on unrelated tasks.

Donaldina stepped closer and reached toward his side, then stopped before touching him.

“Does it hurt?” she asked.

“Nae.”

Her eyes lifted to his. Roy had lied to kings, enemy officers and men whose blades rested against his throat. He found lying to her unexpectedly difficult.

“A little,” he amended.

Donaldina’s mouth tightened. “Inside.”

This time, the order was softer which made it harder to refuse.

Roy looked once toward the wall. The masons continued their work. Hamish had already taken the inspection list from one of the guards with the air of a man who expected victory and intended to be intolerable about it later.

Roy exhaled. “Only until it is bound.”

Donaldina stepped aside to allow him past. “Naturally.”

He began walking toward the hall. After two paces, the wound pulled sharply enough to shorten his stride. Donaldina noticed.

She moved beside him without comment, close enough that her shoulder nearly touched his arm. She did not offer assistance. She understood him too well for that already. Yet she remained there.

Roy had spent years teaching himself that pain was easier to bear alone. As they crossed the cold courtyard together, he began to suspect that ease had never been the same thing as strength.