The Saint (Highland Guard #5)(11)

He turned and blinked once, as if not sure whether she were real or an apparition. The hardening of his jaw told her he’d figured it out. “You’re early.”

The sarcasm and flatness of his tone unsettled her. She searched his gaze for the man she remembered. But the warm, caramel depths of his eyes seemed hard and unfamiliar.

Ignoring the do-not-approach aura that seemed to radiate from him, she took a tentative step toward him. “I came to find you.”

He stood up. “Why? To rehash old memories?” He shook his head. “It would serve no purpose. Go back to the castle, Helen. Where you belong.”

That was just it. She didn’t belong anywhere. She never had. Only with him had she felt the possibility.

Helen searched for the slightest hint of anger, the slightest touch of pain. But his tone gave no hint of any emotion other than the vague sense of weariness she heard in her father’s voice when she’d done something “wayward.”

Three years was a long time. Perhaps the feelings he’d once had for her were gone. She felt a twinge of uncertainty but pushed it aside. This was Magnus. Calm, steadfast Magnus.

“I made a mistake,” she said softly.

If she’d hoped for any reaction to her words, she was to be disappointed. Taking a deep breath, she forged on. “I should have gone with you. I wanted to, but I couldn’t leave my family. My father was ill, and he needed me to help care for him. It was happening so fast.” She gazed up at him, pleading for understanding. “I was surprised—scared. You’d never mentioned marriage before. You’d barely even kissed me.”

His gaze pierced hers, his mouth a thin line. “What purpose does this serve, Helen? It is all in the past. You have no need of absolution from me. You owed me nothing.”

“I loved you.”

He stilled. “Obviously not enough.” The soft parry sent a blade right through her heart. He was right. She hadn’t trusted her feelings. Then. She’d been eighteen. She hadn’t known what she wanted. But she did now. She knew in her heart that he was the man who’d been meant for her. She’d been given a rare chance to have love, and she’d failed to grasp it. “I still—”

“That’s enough.” He crossed the distance between them in a few strides and grabbed her by the arms. The feel of his big hands on her was like a brand. For a moment, her heart had leapt, thinking that he’d snapped. That the calm indifference of his response had proved to be an act. But as he held her up so that her toes dragged on the ground, he looked perfectly in control. “Whatever you have to say, it’s too late.” He released her and took a step back. “For Christ’s sake, you are about to marry a man who is like a brother to me.”

The blasphemy, the small hint of emotion, urged her on. She moved closer to him—much closer—and put her hand on his arm, feeling a jolt of awareness as the muscles leapt at her touch. She looked up into the handsome face that had haunted her dreams, locking her gaze on his. “And it means nothing to you?” She moved her hand to cover his heart; beneath the hard shield she felt the thump against her palm. “It doesn’t bother you here.”

He looked down at her completely still and achingly silent, his expression unreadable. She looked for a sign that it mattered. Instinctively, her gaze went to the small muscle below his jaw. But beneath the shadow of dark stubble, there was no tic to betray him. He was perfectly controlled—as always.

Carefully, he extracted himself from her touch, setting her away from him. “You are embarrassing us both, Helen.”

She sucked in her breath, feeling the knife of shame cut through her heart.

He looked into her eyes and said, “I feel nothing.”

He turned on his heel and left her standing there, watching as her chance for happiness slipped silently away. This time she could not delude herself that he would come back for her.

Two

Helen didn’t know how long she stood there in the woods, frozen with heartbreak. Of course it was too late. What could she have been thinking?

By the time she returned to the castle, the women were in a mild panic. Bella took one look at her face and took charge.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked quietly.

Helen stared numbly at her. No. Yes. She didn’t care. What difference did it make?

She must have nodded because she soon found herself gowned, perfumed, and coiffed, with a circlet of gold upon her head, retracing the steps she’d taken only hours before.

Only once did she falter. As her brother Will, now the Earl of Sutherland, led her to the place where her betrothed waited for her outside the chapel door, she took in the crowd that had gathered to stand witness to the ceremony. There, in the front, standing beside a handful of other warriors, she saw him. Magnus had his back to her. The once familiar form was broader, more muscular, and much more formidable, but she would know him anywhere.

Disappointment sank like a stone to her gut. His presence did away with any lingering doubt she might have had that this mattered to him—that she mattered to him.

“Is everything all right, Helen?”

She blinked up at her eldest brother. “You stopped,” Will pointed out.

“I …”

Every instinct clamored stop, do not do this.

“She’s fine.” Kenneth had come behind them. “Come, sister, your betrothed is waiting.”