Claiming Her

Aodh crouched and slit the bottom edge of the tent with the knife, then tugged it up enough for her to roll under. He came after, then they were off, his arm slung around her shoulder for support, hurrying behind the row of tents, into the darkness, into the night.

Chapter Forty-Four

THEY MADE IT to the cave hidden on the western edge of the coast, and crept inside. Katarina propped Aodh against the wall and swiftly removed her gown then laid it on the hard ground. Aodh fell onto it as if he were already dead. He went down first to his knees, then toppled over. He grabbed her hand as he went, pulling her down beside him.

“Give a lady a moment,” she whispered as she pulled her cloak over him.

“Never needed moment…before…to remove gown…for me.” His voice was a hoarse, barely guttural rasp, but that he had made a jest at all filled her heart with hope.

“On account of such arrogance,” she whispered as she tucked the cape up to his neck, then pulled the satchel with salves and unguents in it toward her, “I shall make you wait a full hour before my gown is removed next time we are in the bedchamber.”

“Who waits…for bed…?” A slow, harsh breath. “Ré? ’Mac?”

“Will be here soon,” she whispered. She decided not to mention Bran just yet.

“Fools, all.” His words, already misshapen due to the bruises covering his battered mouth, were getting softer, more mumbled.

“Reckless,” she whispered, brushing back blood-sticky hair from his temple.

“Owe you…life.”

“Nothing, Aodh,” she whispered. “You owe us nothing. We do but return the favors you have done for each of us.”

The hard hand clasping her tightened momentarily, but his words had disappeared into breath before they were fully out, for he had fallen asleep.

She stared at his beaten and bloody body, and since no one was there, and it was dark, she allowed herself the indulgence of one good cry, done quietly and quite wetly, as she knelt beside him and tended his wounds.

They looked worse than they were, mostly cuts, and one that needed stitches, but Aodh barely stirred as she put them in. Then she washed what needed washing, bandaged what needed bandaging, shifted him gently, and resting his head on her legs, she stroked his head, watching him sleep and breathe, giving thanks her rebel was still alive.

*

AODH AWOKE as the linen-white light of dawn glowed around the corner of the cave and illuminated the far wall. As soon as he saw the wall, he knew where he was.

Renegades Cove.

Black rock glowed wetly in the pale pearly light, the delicate veins of white and faint shadings of rose and pale green within almost translucent in the dawn glow. And all across the rock, like some granite tapestry, the faintest hint of etchings, silent, visual diaries left by marauders and outlaws and lost souls through the ages.

He remembered the wall well. In fact, if he were to rise now, he would find his own etchings made, sixteen years earlier, on that hellish, stormy night when he’d landed in England and Ré had dragged him out of the sea. The years had not dimmed the memories much. Landing on a shipwrecked boat, crawling up on land on his hands and knees, spitting ups seawater, intent on one thing: crawling to the Queen of England to resurrect Rardove.

Now, to this moment, crawling away from the queen, beaten and battered.

One had to admire the symmetry of it all, Aodh thought grimly. The patterns re

peating ever after, like the angles of a shoreline or the peaks of a mountain range. He and his father. Katy and hers.

Sacrifice bore its costs. As did love.

He looked down at Katarina’s sleeping form, curled up beside him. The cycles, ever repeating. Until broken.

He’d spent his entire life fighting battles selected by others. Until Katarina. He’d lied—he had every intention of winning her, it had been his single goal—but she was the only thing, in all his world, that had been worth fighting for. And he’d won her.

And now she’d sacrificed herself for him.

If that did not fire a man’s blood, nothing could. This woman, so hard to win, had now transferred her loyalties to him, completely and utterly. He didn’t know if he was worthy, but it hardly mattered, for the deed was done. She was his. Under his protection, at his command—occasionally, he amended in a spasm of honesty— his in every way, from here on.

As for that here on… They had some decisions to make.

Katy was not going to be happy about his.