The Chief (Highland Guard #1)(29)

It seemed to finally be dawning on Fraser that he’d overplayed his hand. “No one will have her when it is discovered what has happened here.”

The lass had known what she risked.

And if she hadn’t?

Tor pushed aside the question. He would not feel guilty for having been tricked. He’d made his decision for the good of his clan and nothing had changed. “Then I suggest you stop your people from spreading word before any more damage is done.” He took a threatening step toward Fraser. “Now, it’s time for you to leave before I decide to ignore the truce and give you exactly what you deserve for what you attempted this night.”

Fraser took one look at him and knew it was not an idle threat. His black gaze landed on Tor. “This isn’t over,” he said, his voice teeming with resentment and anger.

But they both knew it was. Fraser had gambled with his daughter’s virtue and lost.

The moment Christina saw her sister, the tears she’d been holding back exploded into a big rush of choking sobs that wracked her entire body. Beatrix didn’t say a word but simply enfolded her in her arms, offering the comfort Christina so longed for after the emotional tumult of the night. She’d traveled from heaven to hell in the space of a few horrible minutes.

Slowly, through halting breaths, the story emerged. Perhaps not the most intimate details, but enough for even an innocent like Beatrix to understand. What had happened had been earth-shattering in a way that Christina could never explain to her sister. But it had left her irrevocably changed, for now she knew a man’s touch. Knew how she could become weak with passion and desire. Knew exactly how intimately a man and woman could be joined.

Beatrix didn’t say a word, just murmured soothing sounds, stroked her head, and allowed Christina to cry until she’d drenched the front of her chemise with tears.

When the tears at last subsided, Christina took a deep breath and looked up at her older sister through swollen, watery eyes. “What am I going to do?”

Beatrix untangled a piece of hair that was stuck in Christina’s lashes with a gentle sweep of her finger. “What happened tonight doesn’t need to change anything,” she said softly. “It won’t be the first time a girl trying to escape a marriage has sought out the sanctuary of a nunnery. Chastity is not required before you enter, only after.” She smiled. “If that is what you truly want.”

“Of course it’s what I want.”

Beatrix gave her a thoughtful look. “Maybe what happened was for the best.”

Christina pulled back in shock. “How can you say that?”

“Because I don’t think a lifetime devoted to God is what you would choose were other options available. Escape, peace, a lifetime of solitude—I understand your reasons for going—but how long before the walls of sanctuary would start to feel like a prison? You want to marry, Chrissi. Escape with him; he’ll protect you.”

There was more truth in her sister’s words than she wanted to admit. The veil would protect her, but once taken, her vows could not be undone. She would have peace and the ability to do something useful with her learning, but not freedom. Nor would she ever again know the closeness with a man that she’d experienced today.

He was wrong for her … wasn’t he? Everything about the battle-hard warlord overwhelmed her. He was too intimidating. Too fierce. Too … too. But he was also honorable, controlled, and—as she couldn’t help but be aware of—handsome enough to make her knees weak.

But none of this mattered. Beatrix was forgetting something very important. “I told you what he said. He doesn’t want to marry me.”

Beatrix cupped the side of her face in her hand and gave her an indulgent smile, looking more like a mother than a sister. “He’s angry. Give him time to think. He’ll see that you had nothing to do with our father’s trickery and do what is right. From everything you’ve told me, everything you know of him, do you believe he could do anything less?”

Nay, not if her estimation of him was true. But Beatrix hadn’t seen his face. Christina shuddered at the memory, having never faced such vitriol. “What if I’m wrong?” What if he wasn’t the chivalrous knight that she’d made him out to be, but the brutal warlord she’d first imagined?

“Is that what you think?” her sister asked.

Did she? What did she know of him? A strange question to ask about a man who’d touched her so intimately, roused her passion, and taken her virginity in one wicked stroke.

She knew that he spoke with authority and carried himself with the pride of a king, that he was a warrior of repute and incomparable skill, that he was capable of mercy, and that he would save a serving girl from rape where others turned a blind eye. Everything she knew of him spoke of honor.

She looked at Beatrix and shook her head. Deep in her gut, she knew she wasn’t wrong about him.

“Then the question is what do you want?” Beatrix asked quietly. “But I think you already know the answer.”

Christina’s chest squeezed, knowing that her sister spoke true. “What if I’m wrong?” she said hoarsely.

“The nunnery will always be there, but this might be your only chance to find happiness. What if this man is your Lancelot? What if he is the man you are destined to love?”

Christina managed a wry smile. “I thought I was the one who let my imagination run away with me.”