will be safe here should ye choose to leave them behind. Simon will be dealt with.” She took a step back from him, feeling as though she might collapse. He might have hurt her less had he thrust his blade into her heart.
“What can I do to prove to ye that I am loyal? I’m begging ye.”
What could he possibly promise her? The man had lied about his loyalties, betrayed his people. Likely more than once. Who was to say that he wouldn’t do so again? What if he got them all killed? How could she trust him when he had proven to be so adept a liar?
Jenny thought of Camdyn and Isla, so young, so impressionable. The two of them had begun to make lives for themselves in the clan. They were a part of it. Isla had grown so close to Jenny’s mother. If Toran decided to leave and take them with him, she would fight for them. They should not have to suffer his betrayal. Or their uncle’s.
Jenny took another step back. “Go. Please.”
Now she was close to begging, needing him desperately to get away from her so she could think. So she could come to grips. So she could mourn an imagined future that felt as if it had just been ripped out of her.
This was why she’d promised herself to stay faithful to Scotland. This was why she’d vowed that the only important man in her life would be her prince and future king. Because now she was gutted, all because she’d dared to give her heart away.
A choke rose up in her throat, and she worked to keep it down, to hide it from Toran.
She had given her heart away; she was in love with him. Hopelessly in love with a traitor.
Toran finally stood, his eyes full of sorrow. His hand floated toward her but fell back to his side when she didn’t move.
“Go. Now. Please.”
Toran nodded. “If that is what ye truly wish.”
“’Tis.”
“I’m truly sorry, Jenny,” he said, ignoring her demand for the use of her title—a reminder of how close they’d briefly become. “When I first met ye, I thought to make my mother’s death right in my mind. But when I saw how ye were willing to care for your men, how much ye were willing to risk for your country, I started to change. Ye showed me the way.”
She was shaking her head now, not wanting to hear more, but he kept on talking.
“I didna give ye away to the dragoons when I could have. I brought Camdyn and Isla to ye. Why would I risk their lives if I meant to betray ye?”
He made a valid point, but she didn’t want to hear it. Couldn’t right now. “Why did ye not tell me sooner?”
He shook his head regretfully. “There were many times I wanted to, but it always—there is nothing I can say except I’m sorry. My excuses are only that, excuses. There is no explanation for why I kept it a secret save to say I was a coward.”
“There is no room in a rebellion for a coward.”
She might as well have run him through with her sword for the emotion that cut across his face. And it was cruel of her, purposefully so. They were battling here, but words and emotions were their weapons.
The man might have lied to her, might have been confused about which side was on the side of right, which made sense given how he had been deceived. But he wasn’t a coward. A coward would not have broken his cousin out of prison. A coward would not have fought off redcoats. A coward would not have brought her to safety when he could have tossed her to the wolves. He’d risked his life for her already—more than once.
But she wasn’t ready to forgive him.
“Ye dinna have to leave Mackintosh lands this night. But I do need ye to leave my sight,” she said, relenting. That was as much as she was willing to concede to him now. As much as she could live with. For if he obeyed and walked off her lands and she never saw him again, she was certain never to forgive herself.
Toran bowed low before her, and she resisted the urge to reach out and touch the wild mane of his hair as it fell forward and over his face. But the moment was over too soon. He backed away a few steps and then turned on his