Chapter Seven
Diana returned to Castle Leod bound in the shackles of marriage. The idea of the union settled over her with the weight of iron.
Fortunately, there was no procession leading them to the uncomfortable intimacy of a marriage chamber. Camden left them upon entry into the castle and Agnes summoned the beasts, great and small, with the promise of bones just cut from a roast.
All at once, everyone was gone, and Diana and Evander were alone.
He led her up the stairs, beyond her room, to a door she’d not had the opportunity as yet to see. But she knew what it was, where it led. Evander’s room.
She was a strong woman. One who could take on a grown man in battle, who could draw a man’s bow and pluck a flower from a tree with her arrow from an impossible distance. She could swing a sword, fire a pistol, kill a stag – all these things she could do as well as any man.
Standing now before Evander’s door with the knowledge of what awaited her within, it was suddenly difficult to even breathe.
Evander opened the door slowly. The hinges groaned in protest and Diana found herself wanting to issue forth her own complaint. He paused and glanced at her.
When she did not move, he turned the warmth of his deep green eyes on her. “I’m no’ going to hurt ye,” he said.
The breath pulled in and out of her lungs, but her lips tingled for more. Why couldn’t she properly draw air?
She entered and kept her stare fixed on him. The room was warm from the blazing fire in the hearth and delicately spiced with Evander’s scent. The furnishings were age-darkened, clearly passed down through generations. Two chairs before the hearth, a wardrobe, and a bed.
A bed.
That was where her visual exploration of the room ceased.
Her insides quavered, threatening to rattle her entire body to pieces. Evander closed the door behind her and she almost jumped at the quiet click.
He smiled. And approached.
Diana’s pulse thrummed wildly. She wanted to run from this room, to scream she did not want to be here. But where would she go?
She had nowhere.
This was now home. The realization punched into her, and she suddenly wanted nothing more than to curl up and cry.
“Diana.” Evander said her name with the careful, sensual roll of his accent. “Take off yer cloak and mantle.”
She shook her head and clasped her hands in front of her chest.
He kept his distance from her. “I’ll no’ touch ye until ye want me to. I’d no’ ever force ye.”
Was he serious? Diana held her ground and kept her hands locked over the clasp of her cloak. Heat burned through her body and left her hands and feet prickling with too much warmth.
“Are ye no’ hot?” he asked.
She pursed her lips.
He pulled the plaid from where it’d been wrapped around his torso like a great shawl before throwing the long end of it over one shoulder.
Diana’s fingers blindly found the clasp, still warm from the heat of her palms, and slipped it open. She eased the cloak off her shoulders with the mantle, and Evander took the bulky pile. The room was cool without the heaviness of her garments.
“The blue of yer gown brings out yer eyes.” Evander set aside the pile.
Diana’s hands wandered to the worn silk of the gown, caressing it for reassurance. “It was my mother’s. I was told I have her eyes.”
When she was a girl, she often thought her mother had left her eyes on earth to always watch over Diana. It was a foolish thought, a childish one made by a girl who clung to cast off memories of others.
“I’m glad yer mother could join us for our union.” Evander put his hand over the nervous fidget of her fingers. “My sister was there as well.”
Diana let him take her hand in his. “Because of Kitzi.”
Evander’s lips thinned into a flat, solemn line. “I take it Agnes told ye?”
Diana nodded. The emotion in his green eyes roiled, deep with caring. She understood the force of his sincerity now. “Does it…” She drew in a long breath to fortify herself and finally said. “Does it make you scared to love again when it opens the opportunity for more loss?”
He shook his head. “Nay. Love is worth risking anything. It hurt when Emilia died. I canna ever let go of that, but I have all the memories of her, and they make the pain less. It’s the same when I think of my parents.”
Her heart squeezed at his words, and for the countless time in her life, Diana found herself wishing she’d known her mother. Perhaps her mother’s love would have held longevity, for surely her father’s had been fickle.
Evander gently touched the underside of Diana’s chin and gave her a long, considering look. “Ye dinna agree?”
The surprising warmth of tears prickled in Diana’s eyes. She pulled her face from his grasp and looked to the side of the room, letting the dwindling fire consume her attention. She could not face the fire the entire night, but at least it was enough time to compose herself, to clear away the ridiculous need to cry.
“I have not had the same experience with love as you,” Diana said finally. Her voice did not shake as she’d feared it might.
Evander’s hand carefully caressed her shoulder in a soothing gesture. “Will ye tell me?”
Diana gave a short, hard laugh. “There’s not much to tell. I killed my mother with my birth and never knew her. It was an act my father never forgave me for. He doted on me when I was a child, indulged my every whim. When I grew up, when I looked like her, but did not act like her, he realized I was beyond his control. He hated me for it, and the more he tried to push me into submission, the more I hated him for it.”
It wasn’t all entirely true though. Even after having endured the punishments and the rejection, she’d craved his affection and wishfully hoped for a reconciliation. Admissions she found she could not give voice to when the pain ran so deep.
“And what of yer wolves?” Evander asked.
“My wolves?” Diana looked up at him, the hurt of her wayward father suddenly pushed aside as the thought of her noble Zeus and Hera’s undying, gentle kindness.
“Is loving them worth the risk?”
Diana sucked in a breath. She had known love. She had just not recognized it for what it was.
“Yes,” Diana whispered.
Evander searched her eyes. “That’s how I feel about ye. I want to love ye, Diana. Ye’re worth the risk.”
He leaned over her, close enough that his breath washed over her lips, warm and spiced, a delicious scent that made her heart skip faster. The same as it had when they were wed at the kirk, when his mouth brushed over hers. The gentleness of his touch, the way he looked at her, it all made her crave more.
Her eyes closed of their own volition and the warmth of his mouth swept over hers. An indiscernible sound came from the back of her throat – a moan, a whimper – a form of tangible longing. His hand slipped up to the nape of her neck, threading through her clean hair. Delicious shivers prickled over her skin. He lifted her face upward and pressed his mouth more firmly to hers.
Her heart pattered happily in her chest, eager for the affection while her mind screamed out a warning. This could not happen. She could not go through the act of consummating their marriage.
Yes, he’d said he wanted to love her. Yes, he’d said she was worth the risk. But how would he feel when he found her father had deceived him?
How patient and loving would Evander be when he realized she was no longer a virgin?
Evander desired his wife. Every fiber of his being hummed with want of her. To caress her silken skin, to lose himself in the heat of her mouth, to press her slender body against his.
Aye, Evander desired his wife the way a man should.
He teased his tongue over her lips and they opened for him. She shivered slightly in his arms. He held her more closely to him.
“I willna hurt ye,” he said against her mouth.
But her trembling did not cease. He put his hand on her waist to still her. She went stiff and drew back from him, her eyes wide. “I can’t. I’m not…I’m not…” Her hands balled into fists. “I’m not…”
“Ye’re no’ ready.”
The tension on her face bled away and she nodded. “Yes. I’m not ready.”
Evander tamped down the disappointment warring in his body. His blood still pounded with need, his cock hard and eager with it. “I understand.”
“You’re not angry?” she asked.
“Nay, lass. I stole ye from yer home, trapped ye in a carriage, and had us wed as soon as we arrived after over a fortnight of travel.” He smirked. “I expect most lasses wouldna be ready under such circumstances.”
She studied him for a long moment. She remained tense with wariness.
“I did what I did for my people,” Evander said.
She hesitated. “I know.”
“My people will have their food now.” He came closer. She snapped upright and met his stare with a challenging glint. “Everything between us now will be because we want to. We. Both of us.”
Her chest rose and fell heavier than normal. Finally, she nodded.
“I want to get to know ye,” Evander said. “What ye like and dinna like. To share yer memories and dreams. I want us to have a happy life together, to have love.” He longed to reach out to her, his right hand burned with the yearning to do so, but he clenched it at his side instead. “What do ye want?”
She lifted her face. “I want the freedom to come and go as I please, to be able to go out into the forest, on the land. I have no intention to become a wife trapped with needlepoint and children.” She watched him carefully as she spoke, as if daring him to deny her boldly stated desires.
He nodded. “And what do ye want for us?”
The soft hiss and pop of the fire in the hearth replaced the sounds of their conversation. Diana stared into its flames and stayed silent for a long while. “I don’t know.”
Evander could not help the stab of disappointment her answer delivered. Yet could he blame her? This woman had grown up with guilt in place of a mother’s affection, and a father who had bribed Evander to kidnap her.
Diana was a woman who had not had love in her world, save those of her wolves. Was it any wonder she did not know what she wanted from him?
Evander’s parents had loved one another, as well as him and Emilia. Their family had been a joyful one.
Now he had Diana, and the opportunity to teach love to a woman who had never had it. He was up for the challenge.
“If ye dinna know what ye want for us,” Evander said at long last, “I hope to help ye find yer answer.”