Loving a Lady (Brotherhood of the Black Tartan Book 3)

by Nichole Van

  Ewan swallowed back the panicky taste in his throat.

  How could he ever muster the courage to paint his demons if he couldn’t even speak them aloud to Violet?

  “Ewan?” Violet tugged on his elbow, a silent plea for him to stop.

  He cleared his throat before turning to face her.

  “The woman in the painting isnae Jamie.”

  “Pardon?”

  “The woman in the painting . . . she isnae Jamie,” Ewan repeated.

  “But . . . who is she then?”

  Ewan looked past Violet, staring out over the midnight-blue ocean.

  “I should like to know, if you will tell me.” Violet canted her head. “She means something to you, that woman. You even said as much.”

  “Aye.” Why was there this catch in his voice? “She does.”

  Violet waited. The moonlight still rendered her face in shadowy shapes, painted in deepest violet and inky blue-black. But her lovely eyes caught the moon, reflecting flecks of silver.

  This brave woman. She had shared the pain of her past with him.

  Ewan had to match her courage.

  He took in a long breath. Released it.

  “Mhairi,” he breathed, voicing her name. “The woman is my younger sister, Mhairi.”

  “Mhairi,” she repeated, giving the name the same Gaelic intonation that he had done—VAH-ree, trilling the r.

  Ewan could feel the questions crowding Violet’s tongue.

  Why do you paint Mhairi?

  Why that house? That scene?

  “Why do I feel that Mhairi is lost to you?” she asked instead.

  Ewan flinched.

  “Will you tell me?” she continued, stepping closer to him. “I would like to know you, Ewan.”

  Her words cut.

  I would like to know you.

  He swallowed.

  He would like that, too. He would like to be known.

  He held out his hand to Violet, palm up, a supplication. She looked at it and then slid her own hand down his forearm to thread her fingers through his.

  Her bare palm pressed into his.

  The touch burned, sending skittering sparks up his arm.

  Hand in hand, they began once again up the path.

  Ewan had told the story of Mhairi only once before . . . to Alex. It had spilled out of him that awful night.

  After rescuing Rafe and Andrew from The Minerva, Ewan had carried Andrew’s heavy, unconscious body from the torched village to the safety of the hill above it. Rafe had staggered beside him, bleeding from several wounds. The sheer brutality of the physical effort required and the fear for his friends’ health had kept Ewan’s mind off the village burning behind them.

  But after gently setting Andrew down on a makeshift pallet Alex had formed, Ewan turned to view the village aflame.

  Everything had caught up with him then.

  Terror. Anguish.

  Memory.

  It had been like a club to the head, taking him to his knees, shaking uncontrollably.

  And then Kieran had appeared, running up the hill, screaming at them, begging someone to help him go after Jamie.

  Ewan had grabbed Kieran, holding him back before he could jostle Alex in his work of stitching up Andrew and Rafe.

  Kieran thrashed in agony, sobbing. Jamie was at Cuthie’s mercy aboard the ship, and there was nothing they could do about it.

  All while the village burned.

  Ewan rocked Kieran, holding him tightly, arms trembling, tears falling.

  The chain of events had hurtled Ewan even farther back in time, forcing him to relive the horror of another night, huddled on a different beach, cradling Mhairi as she screamed and sobbed.

  Eventually, Alex finished stitching up Rafe and stabilized Andrew, and then persuaded Kieran into taking some laudanum, anything to prevent the man from harming himself.

  Alex had then sat himself beside Ewan, extending the flask of whisky he usually kept in his physician’s bag.

  They had stared over the glowing embers of the village, Ewan drinking a few swallows of the precious whisky. Alex had been a steady oasis of calm at his elbow, patiently coaxing the story out of him.

  And now, with Violet’s hand tucked in his—walking up another hill, overlooking another ocean—Ewan found himself telling the story again into the dark of night.

  “I was born in a blackhouse along Loch Carron, a sea loch on the mainland just north of the Isle of Skye,” he said, eyes trained on the path before them. “My parents were crofters, trying to eke a living out of the land and sea. My da was a braw man with broad, muckle shoulders like myself. My ma was tender-hearted with a shock of red hair. They had plenty of bairns together, but only myself and my younger sister, Mhairi, survived childhood. We were poor, but we limped along, year after year.”

  Ewan paused, remembering running down the path toward the blackhouse, Mhairi squealing behind him, trying to catch him. She had been three years his junior. His shadow, he called her, both in fondness and exasperation.

  Violet said nothing at his side as they walked.

  “Then what happened?” she asked.

  “Then . . . came the fire.”

  “Oh, Ewan—” Her voice caught at the end.

  He sucked in a deep breath, forcing the words out. “I dinnae ken tae this day how the blaze started. It doesnae matter, I suppose. It was late in the evening, and I was out tending tae one of the sheep who had just lambed. I saw the flames against the sky and raced toward the house. My da met me at the stone fence, carrying Mhairi who had burned her legs.” Care for Mhairi. Keep her safe. “He ran back inside the burning building tae save Ma. The roof collapsed before they could get out.”

  Ewan felt Violet’s gasp in the spasm of her fingers.

  That wee bit of empathy stung his eyes. He clutched her hand tighter.

  How could this still be so raw? The events of that night were over twelve years past.

  But he could still feel the sting of smoke in his eyes.

  Still taste the ash in the back of his throat.

  Still hear the horrific crash of the roof collapsing, silencing his mother’s screams.

  Still feel the shaking in his own body as he held Mhairi against his chest, realizing that they would only have one another going forward.

  “How old were you?” Violet whispered.

  “Fifteen.”

  She inhaled sharply. “Too young.”

  “Aye, far too young tae be thrust out into the world. But there was no other family to help us. We buried our parents the next day. From there, I did what I could tae provide for Mhairi and myself. We fashioned a lean-to out of the remains of the blackhouse. I sold some of the sheep, and Mhairi helped the fishwives with their catches, despite being only twelve years old. We managed tae survive that first winter, but it wasnae easy. I grew too much. A man in the village said that if I went to Kyle of Localsh, I could earn half a crown for fighting. Or, rather, for allowing myself tae be beaten. They promised I wouldnae be killed.”

  “Half a crown? For allowing yourself to beaten?!” She leaned her weight into their joined palms and clutched his arm with her free hand, her fingers wrapping around his elbow. “That’s horrific!”

  Ewan shrugged, pulling her a wee bit closer as they walked. “I had nothing tae lose at that point. And so I went, fully expecting tae come home bloodied but with enough money tae fill our bellies for a month—”

  “You won, didn’t you?”

  “Aye. I did.” He snorted. “And from there, I shifted my focus. Prizefighting suddenly appeared a way to provide for myself and Mhairi. An older prizefighter agreed tae train me, tae show me all the tricks and tips tae fighting. Initially, he even arranged bouts for me. But soon, I’d grown beyond his knowledge. I fought every chance I got, traveling as far as Fort William or even Inverness once for matches. I used the money I won tae move Mhairi out of the ruined blackhouse and into a small white-washed cottage. It even had a wood floor and glass in the win
dows. Can you imagine the luxury?”

  He said the words flippantly, but he supposed there was a part of him that wanted Violet to understand the massive chasm between them. That her life of privilege was a world away from the hard-scrabble existence of his past.

  “Then what happened?” Violet asked.

  Her voice was steady, no hesitation. As if she were saying, I see what you are doing here, but I am made of sterner stuff. You will not frighten me off.

  They approached the high, stone wall surrounding the kitchen garden. The door through the wall was just ahead. He would leave Violet here, as she would be safe once through the garden door. Not that he wanted to part with her, but he could not be seen with her at this late hour.

  “And then?” Ewan took on a long breath before uttering the words that hurt the most. “Mhairi betrayed my trust.”

  “She betrayed you?!” Violet came to an abrupt halt, tugging on his hand and forcing him to stop. “What did she do?”

  Ewan could hear the outrage in Violet’s voice. He wanted to feel angry, too. To feel that burst of stinging betrayal.

  But after so many years, he recognized that his anger had been replaced with a profound, bone-deep hurt.

  He sighed and leaned his shoulders back against the garden wall, looking into the shadows of Violet’s face, her hand still clutched in his. “I am sure if ye were to ask Mhairi, she would say she saved me. But it’s always felt like a betrayal.” He scrubbed his free hand over his face, knowing he had to finish the story. “By the time I was nineteen, I was fighting more and more. Mhairi was sixteen, and I worried for her future. I was determined tae earn enough money to provide her with a small dowry that would allow her tae marry well. A shopkeeper or blacksmith, perhaps. Mhairi wanted me to stop fighting altogether and focus on my painting.”

  “Ye have too much talent, Ewan, tae be throwing it away on boxing. If ye’re going to be a painter, then be a painter. I tire of this game. Go make a name for yourself,” Mhairi would say. “Cease this milling. Ye hate fighting, and I hate tae see ye doing it.”

  “Just one more match,” he would reply. “Just one more, and I’ll have enough for your dowry.”

  “I dinnae want a dowry, Ewan! I want ye alive and painting somewheres far away from here.”

  “I was adamant. She was stubborn. I returned from a fight in Oban tae find she had married.”

  Violet gasped. “She what?!”

  “She eloped with another crofter from up the coast, Michael McDoughal. The man had been introduced to her through his cousin who was a neighbor of ours. McDoughal was nearly three times her age, but that didnae stop him from pursuing Mhairi. His wife had died the previous year, and he wanted someone tae be a drudge—part-wife, part-servant. I knew the man had his eye on her, and I had heard stories of him, of how he had driven his first wife tae her grave. But I thought Mhairi had more sense. She knew what he was like. She knew what her life would be with him. Of course, a sixteen-year-old girl doesnae need permission tae marry in Scotland. Bans dinnae need tae be read over the pulpit for three consecutive Sundays. No one needs to wait. Mhairi recited her marriage vows with his brother and the local tacksman as witnesses.”

  Ewan hung his head, gritting his teeth against the pain of that moment. Of arriving home and learning what she had done. The realization that Mhairi had viewed his love as a burden. That allowing him to care and provide for her had been a gift she was unwilling to receive.

  He clenched his jaw and continued. “I marched over tae McDoughal’s house and demanded to see Mhairi. McDoughal blustered and said she was his now. That my guardianship of her ended with her marriage. I threatened him. Finally, Mhairi came tae the door, angry and stubborn. She told me—” His voice broke. He shook his head, refusing to allow the tears that clogged his throat. After a moment, he managed to continue, though his voice was tellingly hoarse. “She told me that she didnae want tae see me. That she had chosen McDoughal, and I was tae leave her be. She said I was only tae return once I had made a name for myself as an artist.”

  “Oh!” Violet pressed her free hand to her chest, her entire body swaying toward Ewan. “She sacrificed her future for yours.”

  “Aye.” Ewan dragged his sleeve over his eyes. “She slammed the door in my face, but I couldnae accept it. I left and journeyed tae Fort William, convinced that I could earn enough from fighting to steal her away from McDoughal.” He hiccupped, the memory a vicious weight. “I returned months later, begging her tae leave with me. She adamantly refused. Said she was happy in her life with McDoughal, though I could scarcely believe it. She seemed pale tae me, as if life was slowly draining all the color out of her. But she could be so . . . stubborn.”

  Mhairi’s final words echoed still, their cruelty an endless loop.

  I’ve already cast ye out once. Ye need tae stay gone, Ewan. I dinnae ever want tae see ye again.

  “McDoughal made it clear that he would have me tossed in gaol for interfering with his wife. And so . . .” Ewan’s voice trailed off.

  “And so . . .”

  “And so . . . I left.” A terrible deadness echoed in his words, a finality. “I havenae heard from her since. After a few years, I decided tae try to make amends. But it’s been in vain. I’ve written over and over, even reaching out tae the vicar in a nearby village, but tae no avail. I dinnae even know if she yet lives.”

  Why had he not done more over the years? Why had he not tried harder to reach her?

  He had long blamed Mhairi for abandoning him—for giving up on him—but somewhere that dynamic had shifted.

  Now . . . was he now guilty of abandoning her?

  21

  Violet’s heart thrummed in her chest, a struck bell.

  It was as if a thread were tied to Ewan and each pang of his own heart reverberated in hers, echoing with the grief of remembered pain and loss.

  They both had sisters who had made disastrous marriages. At least Dahlia had written after she eloped. Violet had never felt cut off from her sister; she had never felt a lack of love.

  How devastating for Ewan. To fight for Mhairi’s future, only to have it cast back into his face.

  But . . . how equally devastating for Mhairi. To deliberately consign herself to a life of hardship and drudgery in order to force her brother to chase his talent as a painter.

  Ewan was frozen, watching her, his eyes glittering in the dim light. He leaned against the wall surrounding the kitchen garden. The moonlight raked him, casting him into a hodgepodge of shapes—triangles, rectangles, circles. He towered over her, a sentinel guarding her path.

  And yet, he clasped her palm with attentive reverence, his thumb drawing soft swirls on the back of her hand. That simple point of contact hummed.

  “Where did you go?” she asked him. “After Mhairi . . . cast you out that second time.”

  “I traveled south.” He shifted his weight. “Or, put another way, I literally fought my way out of the Highlands.”

  “Oh, Ewan.”

  “I allowed hurt and anger to fuel my fists. I had always had a talent for prizefighting. But I forced myself tae become lethal. I took on bout after bout. I changed the spelling of my name from Eòghann Caimbeul to Ewan Campbell and shed my Gaelic roots more and more with every mile I traveled south. I even acquired a moniker—the Red Renegade. I felt red . . . blood and choler and madness. For a while, I lost sight of my goal.”

  “That is understandable. What changed?”

  He snorted, shaking his head, a shadowy motion. “One afternoon, at a particularly low point, . . . I met a kind, refined lady who took pity on me.”

  Violet gasped. “Me?”

  “Aye, lass.” He used his free hand to tuck a loose lock of hair behind her ear, the touch sending gooseflesh skittering. “When ye rescued me that day . . . when ye allowed this brute of a Highlander tae stay in your carriage . . . I finally accepted that I couldnae continue on like I had. There were good people like yourself in the world. I needed tae realign my life,
to begin again to pursue my hope of becoming a serious painter. I needed tae ensure Mhairi’s sacrifice mattered.”

  He dragged his coat sleeve over his eyes again. The brutal efficiency of the motion tugging again on the string connecting them.

  “Mhairi was not wrong, you know?” she said, squeezing his hand.

  “How is that, lass?”

  “You are destined for greatness.”

  He absorbed her compliment with a mere nod.

  “Have you truly not seen Mhairi since?” she asked.

  A beat.

  “No,” he whispered. “I have heard nothing at all of her. All my letters have gone unanswered. But . . .” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, a rolling shadow. “. . . I have not done all that I could to contact her. I have tae face the truth: I’m a coward.”

  “How so?”

  He paused and then, “I worry that Mhairi will reject me again. I worry that she no longer lives. I worry that I will find her worn and haggard before her time and, like before, I’ll be helpless tae assist her in any meaningful way. I fear my own impotence in the face of her pain.”

  A quiet hush waited between them.

  Life needs more of this, Violet realized. This truth-telling . . . spilling words into the muted silence of night. It was communing, soul to soul, in its purest form.

  And perhaps it was this sense of stillness that loosened her tongue.

  “You are anything but a coward, Ewan Campbell. From that first moment in my carriage, I knew that you were one of the strongest men I had ever met. Literally, of course.” That earned her a weak chuckle. “But also in ways of the heart.”

  Her words appeared to hit him like a blow. He sucked in a quick breath, the rise and fall of his chest a shape-shifting shadow.

  “You paint me a wee bit of a saint, lass. But ye must know that isnae the case. I’ve spent many a year angry at Mhairi. And yet, time has helped me see the situation from her point of view. ’Tis a heavy burden tae be beholden to another, tae watch them sacrifice their life for ye. Mhairi couldnae do it any longer, and so she flipped the table on me, forced me to accept the weight of her sacrifice for my freedom. But . . .” He drifted off.