If You Dare - Cole Kresley. Страница 59

"I've tried and have no' heard back. They probably went east with Otto."

"I'm no' sure they did." Ethan said. "Weyland and I have been working to get the deserters out of Andorra for months. Which was how I'd known you'd chosen…unwisely to ally with Pascal. Weyland's pressured the British ambassador, who's pressured the Spanish to raise the bounties on the deserters. Exponentially. If I know our cousin, Niall would've determined how lucrative it could be. With Court's crew, it'd be like shooting fish in a barrel."

"You think his mercenaries are in Andorra?" Llorente asked. "That's good news."

"Aye. Good for us," Court said. "Bad for your house."

Llorente raised his eyebrows. "Should I ask?"

Hugh quickly said, "No' if you've any sense."

Llorente prudently returned to the matter at hand. "I've studied the deserters and you know the Rechazados, but I don't know Pascal and know you don't either."

"No," Court admitted. "He alters routines, moves domiciles. I could no' find a pattern."

"Neither me."

Olivia coughed delicately. They turned to her, saw her admiring her reflection in a silver spoon. "But I have."

When the others had retired, and Court took his chair beside Annalia again, Llorente remained.

"You care for her. Obviously a great deal," he said, taking a chair on the opposite side of the bed to face him. "Why didn't you marry her before I got here to tell you no?"

"Because I care for her a great deal."

"You kidnapped my sister and forced her into a different country. Apparently, you took over my home—while I was rotting in a cell that you had put me in. You stole from me. You bloody broke my nose. It's hard to imagine that you could do much more."

"But I have."

"Yes, you have. She could be with child."

"She will no' be with child."

"How can you be sure?"

"Canna have bairn." Normally he would never have revealed this to someone like Llorente, but now it seemed so insignificant.

"I should believe that?"

"Aye, it's true, though I dearly wish it was no'." Odd that men always thought if they got a woman with child then they had to marry her. If Anna could be with child, Court would get to marry her.

Llorente hesitated, then said, "Is that why you wouldn't marry her? Not that I would let you anyway, but that's a plus in my mind."

Anna had said he'd lost his wife and daughter. Must've been childbirth. "No, that's no' the reason. Just leave it alone."

Llorente put his elbows on his knees and stared at the floor. "When we finish this I will have to go to Castile hat in hand and ask them to contract a sympathetic match for her. She will hate me for it, but it must be done."

Court gnashed his teeth at the thought. As if she sensed his anger, Anna turned in sleep. "Courtland?" she whispered. "On es ell?"

"She wants to know where you are."

Did Llorente not think Court could understand? Of course he didn't. Court was an ignorant Scot. "I can speak Catalan," he snapped under his breath. Then, dismissing Llorente, Court raised her hand to his lips to reassure her.

"T'estimo, Courtland," she sighed.

Llorente said in a dumbfounded tone, "Then you know that for some ungodly reason she just told you she loves you."

When he heard Ethan's men arriving near dawn, Court rose from his chair. Of course he hadn't slept—he'd taken every minute he could with her after Llorente hesitantly left them last night.

Court lightly touched her cheek, glad at least that her color was back and her skin was warm.

He wanted to kiss her and tell her how much he didn't want to leave, but if she woke and asked him what was happening, how could he answer?

I broke your brother's face last night; we're going to Andorra to stamp out anyone who would hurt you; and afterward, because I took your innocence, you'll be forced to Castile. We won't see each other again, though I'd intended to marry you.

If the Rechazados didn't kill him…

When he brushed her hair from her face, the bruise at her temple stood out starkly. He flinched and a coldness settled over him…enabling him to walk away. "Is tu mo gradh thar gach ni," he murmured to her before he clenched his hands and left. I love you above all things.

Downstairs, he found Ethan preparing for war—Court had expected no less—with Hugh directing the packing of supplies. Both left him with nothing to work on.

So to gain strength for what he was about to do—abandon Anna—he stole into the study and retrieved the book. He'd never voluntarily touched it before, and hated the feeling of it now, but he wanted to read it, and curse it to hell where it belonged. He'd just turned to their page when Llorente walked in.

The timing. Court was really beginning to hate him.

"Ethan told me I'd find you here."

"Did he, then?"

"MacCarrick, I've thought about this all night, and I want you to marry Annalia before we go."

This was unexpected, but still…"No."

"For some inexplicable reason, she loves you, and she won't want to go to Castile. As much as it grieves me to even consider you, I must."

"No."

"Do you think this is easy for me? I'm a proud man and I despise you—the very idea of being related to you pains me. Remembering the prestigious suits I smugly turned down only to be asking you now appalls me. But I will swallow my pride to see her happy."

Maybe he didn't hate Llorente. Had to admire the man's doggedness. Broke his nose last night and Llorente was asking him to marry his sister the next morning. For her. Must be difficult as hell.

"She has her own fortune."

Court's jaw clenched, and he gave him the look his comment deserved.

Llorente appeared surprised. "I apologize if I offended, but you are a mercenary."

The man wasn't going to give up until Court hit him again, which he could no longer do. He would give his explanation, and if Llorente scoffed, then he'd have tried.

"See this book? This is why I will no' marry her." He opened it to the last page and stabbed his finger against it.

Llorente advanced to the table, skimmed over the lines, then faced him with an expression of astonishment. "You believe you're cursed?"

Court sank back in his chair. "The things it says have all come to pass."

"Like what?" he asked, his tone almost amused.

"It says that none of us will have children and none of us ever have."

"Your brothers believe this, too?"

"Aye."

"Then it's a bloody good thing you can't have children, because lunacy obviously runs in your family. My God, my Andorran grandmother wasn't this superstitious."

He looked disgusted and Court couldn't blame him. Court had looked the same way until they'd found their father dead.

"And your father? I suppose his thread was cut?"

"Within a day of our reading the lines."

But Llorente was hardly listening to him. "This is why you didn't marry her before we arrived?" He snatched up the book, as if to hurl it. He froze, slowly turning his face to his outstretched hand. He placed the book down as though it were as delicate as eggshell. Then crossed himself. "Return to the page."

When Court leaned forward and did, Llorente read again, his expression growing more furious. "There's blood there."

"A warring clan stole the book hoping to cripple us. There was a battle to get it back."

"You don't know what it says? Have you tried to wash it—?"

"The blood will no' be lifted."

Llorente shook his head. "But what it says could be heartening."

Court let out a breath. "Or it could be worse."

Llorente's eyes narrowed. "Yesterday. Do you think that was…?"

"Do I believe Anna was crawling through an assassin's blood in the gutter last night because of my fate? Maybe, maybe no'. But I will no' risk the scarcest chance." Whenever that image of Anna arose in his mind, he struggled to replace it with an image of the future he would ensure she had. He saw her safe in warm Spain, among her own people, with golden-skinned children playing about her skirts. "She will be free of them and free of me."