“Sweetheart,” Arran called to his niece as he descended the steps. “Your mum wants you inside. You promised to help her with the mash.”
Eilidh happily threw her racket on the ground and ran past him, calling over her shoulder, “Play with Ery, Uncle Arran. She needs practice!”
Laughter burst between my lips, and Arran’s eyes twinkled as he approached me.
“Don’t worry, I’ve been forced to play with her all week, so I know who really requires the practice.”
I didn’t need the reminder that he was good with his niece and nephew.
The memory of our last encounter came to mind instead, and my anger returned. Moving past him to collect the racket, he clasped my arm, halting me.
I glanced hurriedly up at the house and then back to him. “Let go.”
Arran scowled but released me. “I wanted to apologize for being pissed at you about Jared’s reaction. You’re right. His assumptions are not on you for deciding to keep us a secret, and I feel like a shit for saying it was. I’m sorry.”
Tension eased inside me. “Thank you for saying so. Apology accepted. And I’m so—”
“Ery, I can’t do this anymore,” he cut me off.
Panic replaced my earlier tension. “What?”
His blue eyes clouded with a mix of tenderness and frustration. “I didn’t mean to do this here … I just … I want more. I want a relationship with you, but you won’t give me that. And I don’t want to hide what I feel from you, let alone anyone else. I have real feelings for you, Eredine. This isn’t just sex.” He ran a hand through his hair and let out a huff of sad laughter. “If I’m honest, it never was.”
I didn’t know what to say.
A huge part of me wanted to grab and kiss him and promise him I’d give us a real shot if it meant not losing him. But the past had its claws clamped around my ankles, and I couldn’t move toward him. I couldn’t even speak.
Disappointment gleamed in his eyes. “Right. I guess we’re done, then.”
He moved to walk away, and I forced out the words, “Arran, I …” But then I didn’t know what I wanted to say. It was awful.
“It’s fine.” He couldn’t meet my gaze. “We’ll go on as before. I might need some time, but we’ll find our rhythm as friends again, Ery. We promised each other that, and I intend to keep that promise.”
Friends.
I watched him hurry into the house, tears burning my eyes, and I turned away, sucking in a deep inhale of sea air to fight back my panic.
* * *
“You okay?” Regan asked at my side as conversation flowed around us at the dinner table.
By sheer force of will, I’d returned to the house and sat my ass down at the table. I couldn’t look at Arran. It hurt too freaking much.
He’d turned everything upside down. Until him, I was certain I could never be in a relationship again. But this last month with him had been like a relationship. And it had felt great. Better than great. I’d felt alive and not alone for the first time in eight years.
I wanted to give myself to him, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to give him the whole of me, and that wasn’t fair to Arran.
Yet the panic rising within terrified me. I’d never felt that about anyone. In the past, long before Ardnoch, I’d been broken up with. The rejection had stung; it had hurt. But I’d never felt such overwhelming dread.
Never mind that Arran would eventually meet someone and, as his friend, I’d have to endure watching that.
“Ery?”
I unclenched my jaw and looked at Regan.
She’d asked me a question, hadn’t she? “I’m fine. I didn’t get much sleep last night, so I’m a little spacey.”
She studied my face for a second. “Okay.”
I wasn’t sure she believed me.
Glancing down at my plate, I tried to concentrate on the two different conversations happening at the table—one between Thane, Eilidh, and Lewis about a camping trip their father had promised to take them on during the summer holidays, and the other among everyone else about the renovations on the Gloaming’s guest rooms.
Then Arro cut through the noise by calling down the table, “Arran, I meant to say, Mac and I bumped into Lisa Duncan yesterday in Inverness. She’s moved back to the Highlands.”
Lisa Duncan?
My gaze moved to Arran, but so had everyone else’s, so their curiosity camouflaged mine.
“Who is Lisa Duncan?” Eilidh asked.
Her uncle shot her a smirk. “An old friend.”
Arro snorted. “Um, just about the only girl your uncle ever liked who showed no interest back. Until now.”
My heart lurched.
Arran raised an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”
“She gave me her number to pass along. Apparently, she’s single and has changed her mind about you.”
“That’s odd, considering she hasn’t seen him in years,” Regan huffed. “If she didn’t want him then, why now? Could it be because two of his brothers are famous?”