“You are saying it well enough,” Iliana corrected gently, taking a step farther onto the room, a smile trembling on her lips. “You have said it with both your words and deeds.”

He tilted his head slightly, expression solemn. “And what is it I be saying?”

Iliana hesitated, head turning so that she could take in the room he had made for her, then back to the tub he sat in, in this, the second room. She smiled uncertainly. “That you would wish me happy because you care for me?”

“Care?” He said the word with some disgust. “Nay, wife. ’Tis not carin’ I feel fer ye. Ye’ve flouted me authority on countless occasions. Refused me me rights on others. Ye are disobedient, contrary, and stubborn. And yet,” he added gently when Iliana started to protest, “yet I was never so scared in me life as I was when I realized I had left ye here with but a handful o’ men to protect ye and Greenweld battering at the castle. And I was never so proud o’ anyone in me life as I was o’ ye when Rabbie told me all ye had done to defend yersel’ and our home. Ye fire me blood. Ye awaken all me passions. I feel alive when I am with ye.”

“Husband,” Iliana took a step toward the tub, only to pause when he stood suddenly, holding out his hand as if warning her away. The water cascaded off him, splashing down into the tub and onto the floor around it, leaving his body gleaming wet where he stood.

“Nay, there is something I would tell ye first,” he said solemnly, drawing her heated gaze reluctantly back to his face. “I love ye. I kenned it when I thought ye dead from the fire and I realized that I might have to spend the rest o’ me life without ye. I love ye, Iliana. ’Tis only sorry I am that I didn’t tell ye when ye blurted yer feelings out to me. I thought to save it fer when I returned. I wanted it to be a special moment. I didn’t ken I might have lost ye ere I could tell ye. But I’m tellin’ ye now, I love ye, Iliana Dunbar…and I need ye.”

Nothing could have held her back then. A small murmur of joy slipping from her lips, Iliana rushed forward, meeting him at the edge of the tub and throwing herself against his upper chest.

Shifting to maintain his balance, Duncan caught her there and kissed her with a gentleness far different than the passion he normally poured over her.

Her eyes opening slowly, Iliana smiled at him. “Husband?”

“Aye?” he murmured, pressing her head to his damp chest and cradling her there.

“You are bathing,” she pointed out, using one finger to trail a drop of moisture down his bare chest.