KiltedForPleasure (19 page)

His jaw twitched. “You had to know I’d call them. He’s their father.”

“You didn’t warn me. What’s confusing about how screwed up that is? Thirty minutes before they got here you could have shaken me awake and told me to run for the hills. But you couldn’t do that, could you? You can’t even admit that you couldn’t.”

He stayed silent. God. She unclenched her fists so she wouldn’t hit him. “I can’t even say this is out of character for you. You make a decision and that’s that. You decided I’d be the right person to take care of Douglass. We’d sleep together. We’d discover kinks, because I must have some. Like an idiot—”

“You’re anything but stupid, Victoria,” his voice was hard when he said it.

She ignored him, tired of hearing his side. “So why would you even think that you should discuss this with me?” She hated how her eyes suddenly filled with tears, but she refused to let them fall. “You broke your promise, but what did I expect? As far as you’re concerned, you’re married. Those are the only vows you have to keep. I’m just the other woman.”

“
Victoria
,” he said as though she was killing him with her every word. And then he just stopped talking, his jaw clenching.

She sucked in a breath and socked away all the hurt. He didn’t deserve one goddamn tear. While she still had a job, she needed to do it. He stepped forward. She put her hand on his chest to keep him at bay and shook her head.

“I’m going to catch a cab. I have paperwork to do. I’ll check on Douglass when I can, but after his heart attack, it might be best to get him a maid and a nurse to look after him.”

“Burke,” he said and anger filled his tone. “Will you listen to me?”

She tilted her head and met his gaze in a challenge. They both knew he had no legitimate reason for not warning her, and that Victoria had been right in everything she’d said. “What rationalizations do you have?”

“I had to tell them about Douglass. You would have wanted to see him.”

In that, at least, he was right. “But that was for me to decide, Callan. It’s my career to throw away. So ask yourself why did you do it like this?” She put up her hands again because she didn’t want to hear his answer. “You knew how I felt about you and it was easier to end things like this. I never thought you a coward.”

He rocked on his heels as though she’d hit him. “This wasn’t a betrayal,” he threw back. “I couldn’t let them fire you over me. I couldn’t let you cut yourself out of Douglass’ life.”

Cut herself out of his life didn’t need to be said. It was clear in his taut jawline. And he couldn’t admit it. Victoria knew he never would, because sex with her didn’t feel wrong, didn’t feel like he was cheating on his wife. Loving her would be and Callan couldn’t do that to his wife.

Her eyes stung from the unshed tears, but she nodded at his silent answer. “If your actions were so noble why didn’t you warn me, explain to me that’s what you wanted to do?”

He sighed and dragged a hand through his hair. “Let me drive you home.”

“No.” She didn’t even hesitate. There was no way she’d be able to spend another minute around him. “I think we’re done here. With everything, just to be clear.”

Victoria didn’t wait for a reply. She walked away from him and found a bay of phones. The ache in her bones now wasn’t anger, it was reality settling in. He could have followed her and talked her into getting into his car so he could take her home. Callan could have done a million things that would have mattered, that would have meant maybe he didn’t love her but what he felt for her was more than lust. Something to prove to himself at least he wasn’t scared of loving her back.

But he did none of those things. She caught a cab home, feeling more alone in her life than she ever dreamed possible.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Only a week after Douglass’ heart attack, no one allowed the older man to leave the house and there was always someone there with him. This time Tristan had stayed to babysit Papa Baird. Otherwise Callan had no doubt both of his cousin’s would have made this somber trek with him. Even though he’d wanted to go to the cemetery alone. He always did.

Row after row of headstones held names and epithets that he could probably recite from memory. That and the serene quiet gave him a strange sense of familiarity so that he never felt lonely. A bit morbid now that he thought about it as Ian trailed at his side. May explain why he was fucked up to begin with.

Callan clutched the white roses and shoved his other hand deep into the pocket of his trousers. The shift of movement caused his cousin to glance at him. Ian wore a subdued expression and didn’t say anything. They climbed the last crest.

From there Callan could see the new obelisk headstone. It towered over most of the others and sat under a large tree. For so long there had only been a marker with her name etched on it. He stopped, took in a breath and just stared at the erected cross at the tip of the stone. Everything in him hollowed for a moment.

Ian clapped a hand on his shoulder. Callan moved forward again until he stood in front of Diana’s grave. He’d worked many hours, tucked away every spare cent and had seen the headstone in various stages as he paid it off. It had always broke him in some way whenever he had to deal with her death again, but now peace settled inside him. It’s exactly what he hoped for, and still somehow the emotion felt empty. He’d expected a visceral kind of closure.

He scoffed in disgust at himself. “I’m an ungrateful git.”

Surprise flicked over Ian’s face. “What?”

All week he’d allowed himself to wallow in misery. When he was in a giving mood, he’d shared it, with everyone who crossed his path. His cousins and uncle had tolerated it after he’d told them about the headstone. And still it wasn’t enough for him. “I’m just a whiny shite. Do you know the last words we said to each other?”

Ian’s brow was up and he had the look of someone talking to a crazy person. “Are you okay?”

Callan ignored the question. “I was hurrying out the door to get to work. She dragged me back over the threshold, kissed me proper and told me she loved me. I said it back.” His voice turned hoarse. “Do you know how fucking lucky that makes me? Our last words weren’t inane. It wasn’t a fight. It’s the one thing everyone wishes were their last words to a loved one.” He glanced back at the headstone. “I love you. We said it and meant it.”

Ian’s other brow rose. “So?”

He hadn’t thought any other woman could make his chest ache from missing them, but it had happened. It’s why he’d been a miserable shite all week. “What the fuck is my problem? Why can’t I say goodbye?”

His cousin stuffed his hands in his pocket and looked at the gravestone. “I didn’t understand it before. Not really, but if something were to happen to Jocelyn, I don’t think I’d be all right. For a long,
long
while. A day wouldn’t go by where I didn’t ache for her. That’s normal.”

Callan waited and when his cousin didn’t go on, he pushed. “But?”

Ian sighed. “What would Diana tell you about the way you’ve been living your life?”

In her memory, to preserve as much as he could, Callan had hurt someone else. “She’d kick my arse.”

Ian shrugged. “I’d happily do it if it means we can stop having this heart-to-heart.”

Callan then did something he had never done at Diana’s grave—he laughed. “Fucker.”

Ian just smiled and continued to take in the headstone. It was as tall as them both and decked in black marble. Beneath her name and her birthdate and date of death it said, “She loved as wildly and deeply as she lived.” Those words never felt more important.

He squatted down and placed the flowers at her grave. It was then he realized that even if his cousin wasn’t behind him, there was nothing left for Callan to say. For two years whenever he visited he’d poured it all out until there was nothing left in him. He never felt her presence, never felt better after talking to her grave, because they’d never have those babies they dreamed about having once they both had stable incomes. Never get a big house and fill it with those children and a shared life. It was never going to happen so he’d made the choice to stop living.

She was no longer in his future, but he still had one. A sad smile tugged at his mouth because she’d belt him for wasting it. For the first time neither anger nor grief welled up inside him at the truth—he wanted a future that didn’t have her in it. What more did he need?

Victoria.

The past week he hadn’t let his mind drift to her or what she had said…too much. He’d let her vent because in order to argue one had to have an opposing view. And she’d been right. So scared he’d replace Diana with someone else, he’d treated Victoria as though she were the one who was replaceable. He’d shattered her heart. Twice. His actions, no matter how much he wanted to believe otherwise, weren’t noble. His actions had shored back up every wall she took down to be with him.

Callan rose as that new ache clawed at his heart. His actions had forced Victoria to cut him out of her life. Without her he wouldn’t be standing here, his final promise to Diana fulfilled. He owed her for that. The least he could do was learn how to live again. Coming here had been the first step. For himself.

For Victoria
.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, because he’d lost her. Had made sure of it. Making amends wouldn’t be easy and he didn’t know how or where to start. He only knew he had to before she left.

Until then he had his rat bastard cousins to annoy. “Let’s get smashed at Baird’s. Maybe have a drink in Diana’s honor.”

Ian’s brows went up again. “Interesting.”

He stilled. “What?”

“You…” His cousin shifted uncomfortably. “You didn’t call her your wife. You always do.”

Callan hadn’t even noticed. “Aye,” he said on a sigh. “Get moving or I’ll feel another heartfelt moment coming on.”

That’s all he had to say. Ian beat him to the car. Callan laughed as he followed behind. He almost, for a second, felt like his old self again.

*****

For the next two days Callan split his time between Glasgow and his workshop. Three or four hours of sleep was all his mind allowed. Bone tired, he climbed the steps to Douglass’ flat.

Lana, a girl barely legal, answered the door. Her smile was bright, her hair dark and she was efficient. Yet she scuttled around in fear whenever he so much as looked at her. She didn’t cuss, tell him he was a grouchy jackass or make him laugh. Nothing about her made him want to flirt, much less made his cock twitch. He didn’t like her and that came as no surprise. She wasn’t Victoria. He walked past the ordinary girl with barely a nod of acknowledgment.

“Auch,” Callan said to his uncle who was straightening up the kitchen. “What are you doing up and about?”

Douglass had puttered around for a week but now he truly seemed on the mend. “My heart went to shite, not my legs. Between you, Tristan and Ian, I feel like a fragile old woman.”

Douglass banged around the kitchen until he found his teakettle. Callan did his best not to help or fret.

He settled into a chair. “The way you’ve bitched, I can’t tell the difference.”

His uncle glared at him. “I can’t ask about the love of my life, and no one is willing to talk about her. Victoria was a pain in my arse, but I miss her dearly.”

Sly bastard. The man had brought her up when finally, just for two seconds, Callan could forget about her. The ache that was always there when he let himself think about her again strummed, hard. Auch. He pressed a fist to his chest and rubbed. “She hasn’t come by?”

“She’s called.” Douglass peeked down the hall where Lana had disappeared and shuddered. Callan bit down on his tongue. He wanted to know everything they’d talked about. How did she sound? And like a teenager he wanted to know if she’d asked about him.

“Probably working,” Callan said with care.

He hadn’t seen her so he could only assume. Wasn’t for a lack of trying. Whenever he woke up, her car would already be gone. She had also made sure to delegate any task that involved him. He’d finished a piece and had a decent excuse to go up to MacDougal’s castle and, somehow, another item arrived at his door. She wanted nothing to do with him. If he even knew how to make amends, she’d probably cram it down his throat. He couldn’t blame her.

Shoving his hands through his hair, he finally relented. “I screwed up big time and I don’t know how to fix it.
If
I should fix it. She’s made it clear I should piss off.”

Douglass snorted and poured two cups. “What did you do?”

He shook his head. He’d done nothing and that somehow made it worse. He had given his cousins a slight warning and an explanation that she’d be at Douglass’ bedside and then stepped back. He balled his hands in his hair and tugged. “Diana—”

“Don’t do that.” The recrimination was clear.

“What?”

“Compare. When you met Diana you were both young. You were still trying to get your business up and going. You were wet behind the ears and you were both stumbling to find your way in life. Can you honestly say you’re the same man after Diana died? Why do you think you’d love someone the same way? Or believe it would happen in a logical, predictable manner?” Douglass had added nothing to his tea. When he took a sip, he let out a long sigh of satisfaction. “The point is, you’re comparing apples to oranges and expecting the same conclusion.”

“They’re both fruit.”

“They are both women, but they aren’t the same woman. You made me promise to not tell Ian about what she’d been doing for me. I kept that promise even after having a heart attack. What’s your excuse?”

He dropped his hands to his lap at that hit. “You could see what was going on between us a mile away. Do you really think Tristan wouldn’t have noticed?”

“Bollocks.”

Callan leaned back in the chair. He’d called his cousins and then watched her sleep. He’d liked the way it felt to know she was there with him, for him. He loved the thought that he’d be there when she woke up. His need had been selfish though. She had every right to break it off with him. “I was a dobber. I am one.”

“Much better and honest.” Douglass waved his hand. “The bottom line is you’re a manky bastard. You know it or else you wouldn’t have had that expression every time I’ve seen you.”