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“Need I remind ye how ye married Dougal?”

Skye’s mouth snapped shut. Color rose into her cheeks, the first she’d had in days. “That was different.”

“Was it?”

“I had time to get to ken him. Weeks. And I was already…” She looked down at the baby, her voice softening. “I was already falling for him. Ye ken I was.”

Freya did know. She’d watched it happen, the whole slow tumble, from the safe far side of the room where she always stood. She’d been happy for her sister with her whole heart, and she’d felt a little more like furniture every day of it.

“Listen to me.” She tipped Skye’s chin up. “Nothing bad is going to happen. What’s going to happen is that Clan Muir and Clan MacKinnon will find themselves bound by blood to the most dangerous man in the Highlands, and there’s nae a laird from here to Inverness who’ll look at either of ye sideways again. That can only be good.”

“Nobody looks at us sideways now.”

“Nobody’s tried the Wolf yet, either.”

It was ironic that it was her sister comforting her. When had Skye grown up so much, and how had she done it so fast? It must’ve happened between her moving in with Dougal for that month and then starting a family of her own.

Freya had been content with the way her life was. She had been content with how everything was, but then Evander had to come into her life and mess everything up.

Three weeks.

It would be fine. Everything would be all right. If it had the nerve to do otherwise, she would make it all right.

“I’ll be fine. I’m always fine.”

Skye frowned. “If ye are trying to reassure me, ye are doing a poor job of it. All I’m doing is worrying more than I was before!”

“Skye, I told ye everything will be well. I’ll be back home in three weeks, and everything will be just as it was. There is no need to worry about anything.”

“Ye worried about me when I moved in here,” Skye reminded her.

Well, Freya had fussed over her being so far from home. A little. Hardly anything to pay attention to, really. However, that was in the past, and she wasn’t going to think about it right now.

Before Skye could say anything else, Aileen knocked on the door. She shifted uneasily in place, looking as nervous as she had the day Evander showed up at the castle.

“Excuse me, Lady Freya, the Wolf is here.”

Skye shot Freya a worried look. “Freya⁠—”

“I’ve made up me mind, Skye. I willnae be discussin’ it any further with ye, understand?”

She sighed. “Fine.”

She looked meek. Resigned, even. But Freya doubted it would be the last time her sister confronted her about this.

8

One bag.

Evander couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing at first. Freya was a lady, and ladies didn’t travel light.

Once again, his wife surprised him. He wondered uneasily how many more times she would catch him off-guard.

He had seen men march to war with more than she was carrying down the steps. A single satchel, hanging off one shoulder, and her traveling cloak, and a scowl she’d clearly been working on since she woke. It sat on her face like a badly fitted helm. He found he wanted to reach out and smooth it.

Instead, he leaned on the pommel of his saddle.

“Happy to see me, I see,” he teased. “I’d had hoped ye would have a cheerier disposition.”