“He didn’t mean what he said,” she crooned to him.
“He’s within his right to,” Liam murmured, troubled and yet transfixed by the soft, small hand tucked into his.
“No he isn’t.” She tightened her hold again, and oddly enough he felt a little bit of the pressure in his chest ease so he could take a deep breath. “He loves you. It’s why he’s so angry. He wants you to love him. He wants you to teach him. I think he needs to know that he can be difficult and you will not abandon him.”
Liam clung to her, his only salvation in the crashing and eddying tides of emotion he never allowed himself to examine. “What if it’s too late?” His fear amalgamated into something solid. Tangible. And once he’d given it voice, it grew with enough force to crush him.
“I’m not of the opinion that anything with Andrew was broken tonight that cannot be repaired as swiftly and thoroughly as my door can.” She’d pushed a bit of cheek into her voice; to lighten the moment, he assumed.
Despite that, shame weighted down the edges of Liam’s mouth as he thought of the physical force he’d used against her door. The only illusion she had of safety. “I shouldna have acted so barbaric. I doona want ye to fear me, lass. I’ll have the door fixed in the morning.”
She was silent for a breathless moment. “Think no more of it,” she said. “We’ll hopefully both wipe it from our memory and move forward.”
Liam hoped like hell she’d be able to, though he knew he’d be tormented by the memory of her sumptuous flesh for countless days to come. His eyes had adjusted to the lack of light, and whatever the shadows concealed, his recollection of her perfection filled in the spaces.
“I know this is a sore subject between us,” she ventured. “It’s only that I don’t know what Lord Thorne said to make you think I’d allow him into my room, but I want to assure you that I have no intentions toward your brother, and wouldn’t dream of conducting myself in a manner that—”
“I knew Gavin wasna in yer room,” Liam assured her. “He wouldna dare. I forbade him from bothering ye further, and he left.”
“Forbade?” Liam could tell she didn’t like the word by the perplexed lethargy with which she said it. “If the earl went home, then who did you think…?” It took her mind two very quick seconds to put it all together and snatch her hand out of his. “You came to my bedroom looking for … Andrew? You kicked the door in because you thought your son was in here with me in the middle of the night?” She’d moved past perplexed to mystified, and Liam had to sort through his Scotch-muddled thoughts for something to say.
“Oh, my God.” She stood and turned away from him, retreating a few paces and wrapping her arms back around her middle in that protective gesture.
The loss of her comforting touch drove Liam to his feet. “Rhianna said ye’d both gone upstairs to bed at the same time. The two of ye had been avoiding me for days. When ye werena sneaking away together ye were whispering secrets. I didna ken at the time that it was regarding a wee beastie.”
She slowly twisted to face him, and Liam was glad he couldn’t see whatever awful emotion her gaze contained. “So you thought I … Lord, I can’t even say it.” Her hand flew to her forehead and dragged across it as though to wipe away the offending thought.
Liam groped for something, anything that might make her understand. “Andrew’s sullen moods have driven away every governess he’s ever had, and suddenly he started treating ye like ye’d hung the moon.”
“It’s called fondness,” she hissed. “Affection. We can feel that, you know, without it being some kind of perversion.”
“I ken that.” He took a step toward her, and again she retreated. “But he’s a handsome lad on the cusp of manhood who thinks of little else but women, and ye’re young and damned desirable. Ye canna blame me for suspecting—”
“You had to feel a little more than suspicion to kick my bloody door in!”
Liam said nothing. At first because no one ever dared to interrupt him, and then because he couldn’t ever remember hearing her curse. The lass was right, of course, he’d been quite a bit more than suspicious.
He’d been jealous.
“I should leave,” she whispered, her hand still resting on her forehead as though she were now afraid her mind would escape her if she let it.
Liam pinched the bridge of his own nose. He was turning a misunderstanding into a catastrophe. “Nay, I’ll go, we’ll discuss this in the morning.” They’d sort out the mess when he was thinking more clearly. Every emotion he had simmered right below the surface of his skin, some that he battled constantly such as lust, anger, need, and regret. Others he’d buried with his father, and he should wait until the light of day to sort through them.
And then there were these new foreign ones which needed to be inspected. Softer, tender, almost …
“No,” she lamented, bringing his attention snapping back to her. “There’s no discussing this. I have to depart first thing. I cannot stay here any longer. Not now.”
Alarm seized him. “Ye mean, leave Ravencroft?”
“Yes, I mean leave Ravencroft.” She hurried to her wardrobe with stilting, uncertain steps, blindly reached in, and yanked down an armful of clothing. It was too dark for either of them to truly ascertain what color they were, but she didn’t seem to care as she flung open the trunk at the foot of her bed and began to shove them in.
When she looked as though she’d return for more, Liam placed his body in her path. “Ye’re staying,” he ordered.
She stepped around him. “If your opinion of me is so low that you think I could take advantage of a child, this will never work. I’ll find a different situation.”
“I was…” He didn’t want to say wrong, though he knew it to be the appropriate word. He trailed her to the wardrobe wondering how he’d managed to halt armies in their tracks, but this one wee governess refused to cooperate. “Ye’re not leaving.” He tried a command, which in his book was a bit higher than an order. That ought to work.
“But I must.” She hurried away from him, thrusting her second armful into the trunk.