Page 130 of Auctioned to the Cruel Highlander
The words came out faster than she had intended, almost accusatory in their disbelief.
Thirteen years. Shared mornings, shared meals, shared secrets whispered long after the candles should have been snuffed. Seasons layered one atop another until Isobel’s presence felt less like a visit and more like part of the shape of Ava’s life.
“I ken,” Isobel said softly. “And I have loved every year of it.”
“Then why are ye speaking as if ye are some passing guest collecting her cloak?”
A flicker of fondness touched Isobel’s face. “Because me brother has finally decided he means to marry, and he is making a poor business of it.”
Ava stared at her for another beat, then let out a short sound that was nearly a laugh from pure surprise. “Ciaran?”
“Aye.”
“Yer brother?”
“Aye, the older one.”
Ava sank into the chair opposite without being asked and lowered Bruce onto her lap. “That is the most astonishing thing I have heard all week, and trust me, I have heard alotof strange things.”
Isobel smiled wider at that. “I didnae say the matter is proceeding well.”
“What does that even mean?” Ava asked. “Has he frightened a priest? Has he stared some poor woman into fainting? Has he proposed with all the warmth of a funeral bell?”
“Nay,” Isobel said, and now the humor thinned again. “It means that nay agreement has been struck. Nay one’s offering their daughter.”
Ava looked at the list again. This was no passing concern. Isobel was not chasing gossip or indulging family curiosity. She was leaving because the matter had become serious enough to call her back after thirteen years away.
“And ye must go because of this?”
“I must go because he is me brother,” Isobel corrected. “And because if I daenae help him, I daenae ken who will.”
Ava studied her friend’s face, the loyalty plain on it, the worry too. She could not help it. The truth rose before she had time to soften it.
“Maybe because nay one wants to marry their daughter off to theSilent Death?”
The name changed the air the moment it was spoken. Even Bruce went still under Ava’s hand, though that was likely an accident rather than from dread.
Isobel’s eyes flashed. “He isnae a monster.”
“I didnae say he was. I said people think he is one.”
“He is fierce,” Isobel argued. “That isnae the same thing.”
Ava gave a small shiver, half theatrical and half sincere. “It is close enough for mothers with daughters of marriageable age.”
Isobel leaned back, exasperation and affection tangled together on her face. “He may be grim, and quiet, and terrible at putting anyone at ease, but he is still me brother. I must help him.”
Ava’s gaze dropped once more to the list spread over the desk, and for the first time, she understood this was not some strange little family inconvenience. It was a problem big enough to pull Isobel out of the life they had shared, and it had Ciaran Nairn’s name written over every inch of it.
Even though she had never met Isobel’s brother face to face, somehow his impact on her life had not gone unnoticed.
Bruce shifted in her lap, then gave up on dignity and put both front paws on the desk, sniffing the nearest sheet until Ava nudged him back with one hand.
“Ye are nay help at all,” she chided.
Bruce sneezed on the margin and settled deeper against her dress, which Ava thought was likely his way of disagreeing.
Isobel had already drawn the papers closer between them.
