He relived her words, a hundred times.
When Adaira returned to her bedroom, the last thing she expected to find was Jack lying on her floor. A searing bolt of panic went through her, making her forget all about Moray and the plot to assassinate Innes, until Jack raised his head, saying, “I’m all right. Come lie down with me. The view is impeccable from here.”
Adaira locked the door, brow arched. “And what view is that, Bard?”
“You have to come closer to see it, Adaira.”
She did, easing down beside him on the rug. That was when she saw the letter on the floor, her dark-inked words on parchment. The pinch of concern she felt was quickly overruled by relief.
She sank fully to the floor at his side, staring up at the rafters.
“You’re reading my post, I see.”
“A post addressed to me,” Jack was swift to retort.
“Hmm.”
A lull came between them. It wasn’t uncomfortable, but Adaira could only wonder about Jack’s inner thoughts, about what her words might have roused in him. Sometimes he was still difficult for her to read.
He turned on his side to look at her, his hand fanning over her stomach. “Why did you take the poison?” he asked softly.
Adaira sighed. “At the time, I took it because I needed to have a place at the nobles’ table. I wanted to prevent another raid, because I believed it would spark a war between the two clans. But now? I think I took it because I was desperate to show my mother that I have a place here. That I am strong enough to thrive among the Breccans, even poisoned.”
Jack was quiet, listening as she began to tell him everything. About Skye, about the jewel effects of Aethyn-laced blood, about Innes’s worry that Adaira was fated to suffer the same painful death as her younger sister.
“There’s a good chance Innes will ask me to dose myself again soon,” Adaira said. “She might even ask it of you, Jack.”
He was quiet, but his hand moved along her ribs, coming to rest over her heart. “I won’t be able to take it.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to be able to play my harp and sing at a moment’s notice. It would be foolish of me to ingest something that would prevent me from doing that.”
“You plan to play even though my mother forbids it?”
Jack’s hand drifted from her heart, down to her ribs again. As if measuring her breaths. “Yes. When the time comes. It could be an hour, a day, a month from now.” He paused, watching her. “Do you want to take the poison again?”
“I don’t know,” she replied honestly. She worried that he might press her about the matter, and she was about to ask him how his dinner with Niall went, when he spoke.
“You and I have faced many things alone,” Jack murmured. “Between the mainland and the isle, the east and the west, we’ve carried our troubles in solitude. As if it were weakness to share one’s burdens with another. But I am with you now. I am yours, and I want you to lay your burdens down on me, Adaira.”
She could hardly breathe, listening to his words. She turned to face him, and his arm came around her, strong and possessive. She savored his warmth as he held her tight against him.
Adaira remembered being lost earlier that day, wandering the wilds. If she had never come home, if the land had devoured her whole and stolen this moment from her, she would have perished from regret. She would have fallen apart, thinking of all the things she had wanted to say and do and yet had not, for reasons that felt tangled as vines within her. But she sensed that her reticence stemmed from her pride, hammered into steel, and the duty she had been raised to uphold. To faithfully guard herself and appear invincible, as a laird had no other choice but to be.
“I don’t need autumn, or winter, or spring,” Adaira said, letting the words bloom. “I want you eternally. Will you take the blood vow with me, Jack?”
He was silent, but his dark eyes glittered in the firelight. Adaira’s pulse was thick in her throat when he reached down to unsheathe the dirk at his belt, his old truth blade. They had once cut themselves with it, baring their hearts to each other. Adaira still had that faint scar on her palm, and she shivered as Jack sat forward, drawing her up with him.
“I thought you’d never ask, Adaira.”
She countered with a sharp smile, “Is that a yes, Bard?”
“Yes.”
She shifted to her knees, realizing she should have planned this moment with more intention. They had no strip of plaid to bind their bloodied palms. There was no one to oversee their vows. There was no one but themselves, the fire burning in the hearth, and Jack’s truth blade. And yet it felt right. It felt as if they were always supposed to be here, on their knees, facing each other, alone save for the flames.