Page 220 of Auctioned to the Cruel Highlander
He rose to his feet almost immediately. Sitting there while she said it had made him feel trapped in a softness he could no longer bear. Ava remained where she was on the coat, looking up at him with fire and hurt in her eyes.
“This cannae continue,” he insisted.
“And why do ye think so?” The question came without hesitation.
He should have spoken with more care. He should have kept hold of the language of duty and fit and practical correction. He should have done anything except tell her the truth in the shape it lived in him.
Instead, he exhaled and forced the words out before they killed him alive. “Because I daenae want ye here anymore.”
Ava flinched as if he had struck her, and the sight of it made the next second worse than the one before. He had meant to drive the conversation to a stop, but as usual, he had landed on where he usually did—cruelty.
Her voice came lower. “Say that again?”
He could not.
“Say it to me face, Ciaran,” she demanded.
Ciaran dragged a hand through his hair and turned away a step before turning back. The night had narrowed, and everything around them seemed to press in out of nowhere.
“Why?” she pressed.
He exhaled heavily.
“What? Ye have nay reason?”
“That isnae?—”
“Am I that undesirable to ye that ye would tell me ye nay longer wanted me while me father was still here?”
Ciaran exhaled again. “Ye have it all wrong.”
“Oh, do I? Ye must forgive me if I cannae think straight while ye throw this news at me.”
“Ye want to ken why I want ye away? Because ye drive me mad. If ye remain in this castle, close to me, under me roof, I am going to lose me mind.”
The words came out raw and suddenly grew too loud for the softness that had seemed to be the major accomplice of the loch a minute ago. He did not care. The truth had ripped out of him, and there was no way he could soften it.
Ava went still. He could hear his own breathing. He could hear hers, too. The ugly weight of his confession sat between them. She got too far inside him. She made him want too much. She made the life he had built feel unstable in his own hands.
“I was never supposed to…” He stopped, his jaw set, and began again. “I cannaethinkwith ye near me. I cannae keep any sense. I dance with ye once in front of yer father and spend the rest of the night half mad from wanting to do it again. Ye lie beside me for a comet, and I am thinking how to keep hold of yer hand. Yewalk into a room, and everything in me turns toward ye before I can stop it.” He looked straight at her. “Is thatreasonenough?”
Ava’s lips parted. The hurt had not vanished from her face. Something else had entered it and made it harder to bear.
They were close enough now that one step would close the distance between them. Close enough that he could see the flutter at the base of her throat. So close that he knew exactly how she would feel in his hands if either of them moved.
“There. Are ye satisfied?”
Ava stayed where she was on the coat, looking up at him with the comet still overhead. He stood over her with his own confession still raw in his mouth, and both of them breathed inside the wreck of the moment, too close to pretend they could go back to what they had been before.
Then she looked away from him and lay back down. The movement was small, but for some reason, it landed harder than if she had struck him.
“Ava, did ye hear me?”
“Aye,” she responded, her voice clear. “I did.”
“Are ye certain?”
“Go inside if ye want,” she muttered. “I am staying here.”
