Warrior's Moon

“After learning how easy he found it to murder my own parents for disagreeing with him, I have no difficulty believing he would kill his human mate.”

“The old laird was still alive when it happened, but my father never voiced his concerns. Now, I understand the old laird would probably not have criticized or even disapproved if he’d known his son killed his mate. Because she was human and they were Fearghall.”

Caelis nodded, his expression grim.

“Believe it, or not, I do understand that the clan needs you.”

“Good.”

“But that does not mean I will disregard my own concerns.”

“I am not trying to do that, either.”

It was her turn to nod and say, “Good. You want me to have faith in institutions when I need to be able to trust you.”

“You do not trust me?” he asked with every evidence of not actually knowing the answer.

Did he think the past twenty-four hours had changed everything?

From the wounded expression on his handsome features, she thought he may very well have done.

“Am I to snap my fingers and all is forgotten? How am I to trust you?”

“I revealed my Chrechte nature to you.”

She thought that must mean a great deal more to his race than it possibly could to her, particularly when he had waited so long to do it. “After hiding it our entire lives, including when you were convincing me to share your furs without marriage.”

The knowledge others had held it from her as well still hurt, but she was doing her best not to hold him accountable for her parents’ actions, or Thomas’s and Audrey’s.

“I could not help myself. I believed you would be mine as well. It was no lie when I promised you marriage.”

“Your wolf wanted its mate.”

And the beast’s needs would have made the younger Caelis convinced of his future plans. Shona could understand that a little better, especially considering how very much those same needs influenced her and she was not even Chrechte.

“Aye. And I was younger; I didna have the control. We had already waited so long.”

She nodded, understanding and mayhap even accepting. “But what is there in that for me to trust?”

He opened his mouth and then closed it again, no words coming forth and the most interesting expressions coming over his face.

First shock, then consternation and finally enlightenment.

“Last night, I didna put my sex inside you.”

She’d wanted him to. He’d known it, too, probably as intimately as she had. “You did not risk pregnancy and I thank you, but you did not leave my bed, either, and allowed Audrey to find us together. You cannot tell me you did not hear her stirring in the next room.”

“Stone walls are thick. I did not hear her until she was outside your chamber.”

“And then it was too late.”

So he had not compromised her on purpose. Another mark in his favor.

“Aye. Do you want me to apologize for staying with my mate?” The frown he gave her said he’d do it, but wouldn’t like it.

Clearly he thought that title gave him all sorts of rights and privileges. She wasn’t sure it didn’t, not with how strongly she felt the pull as well.

“No.”

He stared at her expectantly. She simply looked back, waiting. Either he would come up with better arguments and convince her she could trust him, or realize how little he’d actually done to bring that about.

“I shifted into conriocht in front of you,” he said after several seconds of silence, with the air of a man who should not have had to draw attention to an obvious fact.

“You shifted in front of others as well.”

“I did it for you, to protect you and our children.”

If he but knew it, every time he referred to both Marjory and Eadan as his own, Caelis added to the sturdiness of the foundation for their mating-marriage she was so concerned about.

And this was a point she found easy to concede. “I am convinced our physical safety is paramount to you now.”

“But it wasn’t before. That is what you are thinking.” He turned away again, his body now rigid with tension.

“Is it?” she asked, not so sure that was the way she thought any longer.

“It never even occurred to me that you and your parents would leave our clan. It was your home.”

“But not one where we were welcome, and you knew that better than I.”

His jaw taut, he jerked his head in acknowledgment.

“And yet you believed we would stay, that I would remain with the clan. Unmarried.”

Again that single jerk of his head.

He had said so before; now she believed him. Couldn’t help herself, really. It explained too many of his actions and attitudes that could only otherwise be justified by believing him the monster she’d imagined for six years. Whatever Caelis was, conriocht or human, he was no monster. His assumptions six years ago had been arrogant, poorly thought out and bordering on the idiotic, but he had believed them.

“You thought you could watch over me, but by leaving with my parents, I took that option away from you.” She was now absolutely certain that was how he’d seen it.

But he shook his head. “You would not have left if I had done right by you.” His hands fisted at his sides. “I could have gone with you. I should have left the clan with your family.”

And now he wanted her to return. Could he not see the irony in that?

She could, just as she could see the irony in what she was about to say. “I love you.”

“What?” He turned back to her so fast it was a blur of movement in the glow cast by the single candle burning beside her bed. Absolute shock written over his features and in the very way he held his big body. “What did you say?”

“I love you. I never stopped.” She’d wanted to, saints above had she wanted to, but she’d never been able to turn off her emotions.

She’d tried so hard, to protect herself, to protect her children, but the love and desire burned brighter inside her now than it had six years ago. Which was why she would not, simply could not, marry or ceremonially mate with this man if she did not trust him to do right by her.

She had more to lose than he did, though he would never understand that. His wolf had named her mate before she’d even known what desire was. They had waited for her, Caelis and his wolf, but he had not loved her.

If he had loved her, he would not have repudiated her. Whatever he felt for her, it was tempered by his duty to the Chrechte and always would be.

She could accept that because she had no other choice to do otherwise, but she would not accept that she would always come last.

Oh, Shona had no doubt that he needed her, but he would survive losing her. He’d more than survived these past six years; he’d thrived and found a destiny he could never have dreamed of.

She, on the other hand, had come close to losing her mind and only the love and determination to protect and raise her children had saved her.

He had spent six years celibate. And while she was sure that had been a trial for him, she had spent those same years submitting to the touch of a man who killed a little bit of her soul every time he used her body to slake his lust. She had spent every one of those days until their individual deaths reviled by parents she loved with her whole heart. Each day, she’d stoically suffered slights big and small for being the Scottish upstart married to a man three times her age.