A Laird for All Time by Angeline Fortin (room on the broom read aloud txt) 📗

She wasn’t ready to leave him. She could provide that one assurance though she wasn’t sure it would be enough for Connor.

What to do?

Unable to find a solution to that problem, Emmy turned her thoughts instead to Dory.

Her words from the night before echoed through Emmy’s mind. They had the markings of delirious ramblings, but there was an element of truth to them that Emmy knew she would have to confront.  She wondered what Dory could offer in her defense.

An hour later, Emmy strode around to the opposite wing to her patient’s room with Dory’s words pounding through her mind.  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out, despite her musings that perhaps she had heard Dory wrong, but what would Dory have to say for herself?  Emmy had breakfasted and dressed going first to the nursery to check the babies before moving on to Dory’s room.  At her knock, Ian opened the door.

“How is she?” she asked as he moved aside to let her in.

“She had a rough night,” he confessed in worried tones.  “She was in a great deal of pain and had a few nightmares.”

‘I’ll be she did, ’ Emmy thought with a twist of her lips.  “I’d like to check her incision and change her bandages, if that’s all right.”

He nodded tiredly.  “I was just going to get something to eat anyway.”

“Why not try for a nap when you’re finished?” she suggested.  “You look done in.”

He smiled and nodded as he left.

Dory was awake when Emmy examined her, enthusing tiredly about her sons and thanking Emmy for saving them all.  Emmy accepted her praise as she washed her hands.  But after a long uncomfortable silence, she took a seat next to the bed as she dried her hands.  She regarded Dory with a level stare that finally made the woman look away.  “You were quite talkative during your labor last night, Dory,” Emmy commented.

God forgive me, she had mumbled almost unintelligibly.

“I was in pain,” Dory responded evasively.  “People say strange things when they think they are about to die.”

God forgive me for the hurt I have caused, for the lies I have told…

“Sure they do,” Emmy said leaning forward propping her elbows on her knees.  “Confession is good for the soul right?”  Emmy waited for Dory to speak.

  …for the bigamy I have committed.

“Don’t have anything to say?” she asked winding her hands on the towel but Dory remained silent.  “No?  Fine, let me start.  Are you out of your friggin’ mind?!” Emmy hissed swatting at Dory around the head and shoulders with the towel.

Dory raised her arms to protect her face but offered no other defense allowing Emmy’s ire to vent while knowing that this would not be the best moment to chide Emmy for her foul language.

“What on earth were you thinking?”

“I don’t know what you are talking about,” was the meek reply.

“Like hell you don’t know what I’m talking about, Dorcas MacLean,” Emmy leaned in and snarled, “or should I say Heather MacLean?”

              “I’m not...”Dory started but was halted by the look of warning of Emmy’s face.

              “Do not lie to me,” she warned tightly.  “You confessed to bigamy last night.  Begged God’s forgiveness for it.  Are you going to lie there now and tell me you aren’t Connor’s wife?”

“I am! But I’m not Heather!” she protested then caved into tears.  “Oh, please don’t tell anyone!”

“Oh, I’m going to tell anyone.”  Before Dory could draw a breath of relief, Emmy continued, “You are.”

“No!” Dory/Heather whispered in horror.  “He’ll kill me!”

“Which one?” was Emmy’s sarcastic reply.  “You married Connor then turned around and then pretended to be another person and committed bigamy with his own brother!  I will ask again, what were you thinking?  You had to know it would not end well.”

But I’m not pretending to be another person!” she claimed.  “I am Dorcas!  It is my name!  My real name!”

Emmy paused at the ring of truth and frowned.  “Now I’m confused.”

“My father brought me here to take Heather’s place,” the woman bawled.  “Heather was ill and the doctor’s thought she might not make it through and the wedding had been planned for so long.  Rather than risk losing the settlement the earl had paid my father by trying to negotiate a change in brides from my sister to me, he made me take her place.  It was a huge settlement!  He kept insisting on calling me Heather, saying no one not even our mother could tell us apart.  I think in a moment of madness, he may have truly believed I was her,” Dory whispered.

“You expect me to buy that load of crap?” Emmy sneered.  “I wasn’t me, it was my twin nonsense?”

“It is true!  I swear!”  Emmy snorted but Dory, Heather? grabbed her hand.  “I swear to you on the soul of my mother and the lives of my wee babes that I am telling you the truth.  I am not Heather.”

Emmy stared into her desperate blue eyes for a long moment.  She was in earnest that much was true.  Was it possible?  Had her nutty dad thrown her to the wolves for money?  And at eighteen, what could she have done to stop him?  “Wait, but you are his wife?”

  Dory nodded miserably.  “What I told you before was the truth.  I fell in love with Ian the moment I saw him,” Dory swallowed painfully and continued.  “At first I thought he must be Connor, my betrothed, then Father led me to Connor and introduced him…not Ian… as the one I would marry.  I was devastated,” she sobbed.

“Connor isn’t a bad guy, you know,” Emmy chided.

“He scared me at the time, sometimes he still does,” she admitted.  “But he didn’t love me and before you say anything, he never would have.  I knew it and, I think, he did, also.  If it had been Ian, I knew I would have a chance at real happiness, but in less than two days of Connor’s company,