Page 37

“Eara. What are ye doing here?”

His voice cut through the room.

She startled violently, the jar slipping from her grasp. It struck the floor and shattered into a multitude of jagged fragments. The sharp crack echoed. Camden didn’t so much as flinch.

Eara jumped aside, skirts swaying as she avoided the shards.

“C-Camden. Ye startled me.” She lifted her gaze to his.

Over the years, he had imagined this moment more times than he cared to admit. In some versions he unleashed carefully honed words, each sharp enough to wound as deeply as she once had. In others, he dismissed her with cool indifference, showing her she no longer mattered. His speeches crafted in sleepless hours were rehearsed meticulously over time.

Now, standing before her, every one of those words dissolved like mist. No words came.

Instead, there was only an odd hollowness inside him, as though something that once occupied his chest had long ago drained away and never returned. No anger. No ache. No lingering longing. Just absence.

He almost laughed at the absurdity of it. This moment he’d once believed would shake him to his core… and all he wanted was sleep.

Eara shifted under his silence, fingers fidgeting as her gaze searched his face.

“How have ye been?” she asked, unease threading through her voice.

“Ye didn’t answer my question.” Camden’s tone came flat, stripped of warmth or hostility alike. “Why are ye here?”

It was not cruelty that shaped the words. Only honest curiosity and the lingering wish that whatever answer she gave might be brief enough to let him return to sleep.

Eara glanced down at the shattered glass at her feet, as though the scattered fragments might help her gather her composure.

“I… my husband and I have returned to Tokavaig. To live.” Her fingers twisted together, wringing one another. “I felt it important ye hear it from me as soon as possible.”

This time Camden did laugh, but the sound was harsh and brittle, stripped of all humor.

“I see. Ye came straightaway then. The morning after dancing in the village square so the entire village could witness yer return?”

Contrition flickered across her pretty face before settling into a chagrined expression. She drew in a slow breath.

“I was wrong to leave as I did. I should have spoken to ye before going. I am deeply sorry for that. Ye must understand… it was nae easy.”

His jaw tightened until the muscles throbbed.

“Should I feel sympathy, then?” he asked quietly. “That abandoning me without explanation proved difficult for ye?”

She faltered beneath his gaze, her confidence wavering. Then, as she had always done when faced with discomfort, she changed the subject.

“Ye look well,” she said softly, her eyes moving over him. “I dinnae recall ye being so tall… or so broad.”

Camden nearly sighed.

The redirection didnae surprise him. It was her way. To sidestep, soften, pretend the wound didnae exist. She had not come here seeking forgiveness. Nor closure.

So why had she come?

“If ye have nothing of substance to say,” he replied, his voice cool as winter stone, gesturing toward the door, “then I must ask ye to leave.”

She didnae move.

Instead, she stepped closer, closing the space between them as though proximity alone might bend him to her will.

“I made a mistake. A terrible one. I should never have left.” Her voice wavered, threaded with urgency. “I have nae been happy, Camden. I have missed ye terribly.”