Her Irish Warrior by Michelle Willingham (top rated ebook readers txt) 📗

want Bevan to witness those answers. Not until Genevieve could learn more. If Sheela’s story were false, then there was no need to bring up painful memories.

‘May I speak with you in private?’ Genevieve asked Siorcha. To Bevan, she said, ‘There are some women’s questions I would ask her.’

As she’d hoped, Bevan did not object. ‘I will be outside the door should you need me.’

After the door had closed behind him, Genevieve regarded the healer. She did not know precisely how to begin, but before she could say anything Siorcha spoke. ‘It takes time before a woman knows if she’s breeding.’

Genevieve flushed. ‘I realise that. But I do not think I am.’

The older woman eased down beside Genevieve, her gnarled hands clasped in her lap. ‘What do you wish to know?’

‘I want to know if Fiona ever saw a man called Raymond Graham, the Baron of Somerton.’

Instantly she saw the look of alarm on the older woman’s face before Siorcha shielded it. The healer shook her head.

‘Do not lie to me. I know Fiona did not die in battle, as they say.’ Genevieve clenched her hands to prevent them from shaking. She hoped that Siorcha would deny it.

Instead, the healer’s face was haggard and wan. ‘I shall tell you the answers you seek. For Bevan’s sake and yours. I have seen him find peace at last, and what I did is my sin to face,’ Siorcha said. ‘The time has come for me to atone for it.’

‘Then it is true. Fiona is still alive.’ Her mouth felt dry, her lungs barely able to breathe. Closing her eyes, Genevieve knew she did not have the courage to tell Bevan herself. ‘Bring my husband inside. Tell him the truth. You owe it to him if you hold any loyalty for him at all.’

Siorcha started to shake her head. ‘I will be punished. I cannot.’

‘Your punishment will be far worse do you hide the truth from him any longer.’ Genevieve’s fury was so great she no longer felt the effects of her illness. She started to rise, but Siorcha had already opened the door.

The older woman wrung her hands, tears forming in her eyes. ‘I meant no harm. I loved her as a daughter.’

‘What is going on?’ Bevan demanded.

Genevieve gathered her resolve and took a deep breath. ‘Siorcha has a confession to make. It concerns your wife Fiona.’

‘The past no longer matters, Genevieve,’ Bevan warned.

‘It matters to me,’ she said, her heart aching. ‘And what she has to say affects both of us.’ Tears spilled down her cheeks and she swiped them away. Bevan came to her side, to offer comfort. His presence made it more difficult.

‘Tell me, then,’ he said. ‘If it is so important.’

Siorcha sank down onto a bench and bowed her head. ‘I shall tell you the truth of what happened on the day Fiona died.’

A sense of foreboding sent a chill through him, but Bevan nodded. ‘Continue.’

‘When Fiona was fostered as a babe, I was her nurse. I raised her with my own daughter, and she was like my own child in all ways save her blood. I would have done anything for her. Years ago, I saw that my Fiona was unhappy. She loved her babe, Brianna, but restless she was. She would wander for hours when you were away.’

Her words made him uneasy. Bevan had suspected this, though he hadn’t wanted to believe it.

‘One day she met a man. And Fiona confessed to me that she was in love with him.’

The confession made Bevan feel as though he’d taken a blow to his stomach. He had given Fiona everything he had to give. And she had been unfaithful in spite of it. A dark anger formed inside of him at Siorcha’s words.

‘The man was a Norman. His name was Raymond Graham, Baron of Somerton.’

The red haze of anger tightened in his chest, blurring all rational thought. Dimly, he was aware that Genevieve had taken his hand. Her quiet support kept his rage in check.

Siorcha continued. ‘Fiona met him when she was out alone riding one day. His soldiers were camped nearby, and the Baron found her by the stream. She loved him from the moment she saw him, and he loved her—though it was forbidden. Each time you went off to battle she sent word to him, and he came to her. I helped them meet, though it was wrong.’

Genevieve squeezed Bevan’s hand, and his fingers held hers in a tight grip. Such raw grief ravaged his face. She could sense his hurt, his broken pride. He had adored Fiona, and to learn that she had betrayed him…Genevieve could only imagine his pain.

She leaned in, trying to exude the silent message that she would stand by him, no matter what else was revealed.

‘When Strongbow’s army planned the attack on Laochre, Raymond asked Fiona to run away with him. He intended to capture her, and for you to die in battle. But Fiona would not allow him to kill you.’

Siorcha’s face softened. ‘She did love you, you know. But not in the way she loved Raymond.’ She took a breath. ‘And so Raymond ordered you to be struck down but left alive.’

Bevan remembered his wife’s screams as they had taken her away. Those screams had not been real. She had wanted to go, wanted to leave him.

‘No one saw her go,’ he said softly. ‘I buried her body.’

‘You buried her maid, Nuala. They looked alike, and Nuala traded clothes and jewels with Fiona. They meant for Nuala to be taken by the soldiers, so that all would think Fiona was captured. But Nuala’s body burned inside the cottage you found that day.’

‘Why did you never speak of this before now?’ Bevan’s voice was deadly quiet. He remembered the feeling of horror when he had found the burned body wearing the silver torque he had given his wife. There had been no question in his mind that he’d found Fiona.

‘Forgive me.’ Tears rolled down Siorcha’s face, and she covered