“Kind of.”
We talked about her for hours, how she had looked, what it felt like to hold her in my hand and cradle her. I described everything with the greatest detail I could muster, from the events leading up to the delivery to her tiny grave under the trees by the church. He traced the skin of my hands, outlining her shape as I explained it, exclaiming at how tiny she had been.
“And Mark helped you with all of it?” He sounded suspicious, making me wonder just what had been said between them during their earlier meeting.
“Every single thing.” Smiling, I pressed against him, wishing there was a way to be even closer than we already were. I’d missed him so much, had been so scared I wouldn’t see him. To have him with me now was everything I could have wanted, even if I’d had to tell him about Rachel.
My stomach growled unexpectedly and he chuckled, kissing my forehead. “Are ye hungry?”
“A little. I can wait, though. I want to spend more time with just you.” In response, my stomach growled once more, louder this time, as if in protest.
“Hang on,” he ordered, sliding away and standing up. “I’ll have someone bring something in.”
Going to the door, he cracked it open, muttering softly to someone on the other side. I hadn’t realized we were being guarded, feeling completely at home with him.
“They’ll have something here soon.”
“We have a guard?” I asked, not able to help my curiosity.
“Yes, but let’s not talk about that right now. I have a surprise for ye. It’s coming up with the food.”
“A surprise?” Smiling lightly, I fought the urge to laugh. What could he have thought to bring me when he left to chase down my kidnappers? I didn’t need gifts or surprises. Being done with Randall was good enough for me.
There was a knock at the door and he opened it wide. The tray of food appeared first, followed by . . .
“Abella!” Jumping to my feet, I ran to her, hugging her tightly just as Tristan took the meal from her. “You’re alive!”
“Oui,” she responded, laughing. Her arms encircled me as well, warm and welcoming. “Monsieur O’Rourke found me.”
“She’d pulled the dresses out of the wardrobe and bandaged herself up,” he said, staring at her with respect.
“I would have died if he’d come any later. Samantha, I’m so glad that we finally found you. I’ve been so worried.”
“How are you even here?” I asked, stepping back and staring at her in awe. “You would have had to leave with almost no medical care.”
“I wouldn’t let them go without me,” she said truthfully. “Not after the way you sacrificed yourself to try and help me. That reminds me, Monsieur O’Rourke?”
He smiled at her, raising an eyebrow at her formalness. “Yes?”
“Mark Bell is awake. Captain Lomas had me examine his wounds. He’s going to be all right, but they want you to come to talk with him. Samantha, too, if you feel up to it.”
As enticing as visiting Mark sounded, I frowned at Tristan. It didn’t feel like we’d had enough time together. I wasn’t ready to leave this room and go back to the work we needed to finish. If I’d had my way, we would have stayed here forever, just holding each other.
“I think we’ll stay here a while longer,” Tristan answered, seeming to catch on to my feelings. The expression in his eyes said he felt much of the same. “I’ll send word when we’re on our way.”
“Then I will leave you alone to enjoy your meal.” Curtsying, Abella grinned happily and quickly left, closing us into solitude once more.
“Come, sit down. Ye look like ye’re starving.” Holding the tray and taking my hand with the other, he led me to the bed, sitting me down with the order not to move.
“I love you.” Gazing up at him, it felt as though my heart might burst from happiness. Everything was broken and wrong, except for him. As long as Tristan was at my side, I could do anything.
His features softened and he rejoined me, taking my face in his hands. “And I love ye.” Brushing his lips against mine softly, he seemed to put all the tenderness he possessed into the touch, holding me as if I were china that might break.
Finally, I felt the cracks that had been forming in my heart start to heal.
Mark grimaced as I hugged him, emitting a breathy laugh over my worry. “I’m fine. A bit roughed up, but it’ll be good.”
“You’ve been shot,” I argued. “In the chest! It’s a miracle that you’re even alive.”
“The bullet was stopped by one of his ribs,” Abella said behind me. “They had a doctor look at it when they first brought him over. It really is a miracle.”
“See!” Smiling at him, relief coursed through me. A broken rib was easily survived and much preferable to a punctured lung or gouged heart. He would be sore and need time to heal completely, but the only real risk he faced was infection, which was something he knew how to avoid.
“You had a doctor look at me?” he asked Tristan, glancing past me to my husband for the first time. Surprise tinged his features, along with disbelief.
“I couldn’t have ye dyin’ before ye told us what ye knew.” Tristan’s voice was somewhat strained and I was astonished at his distrustful expression.
“Thank you.” Mark sounded equally hesitant. “I don’t think I’m ready to die, just yet.”
Turning to watch Mark, I frowned at the marks on his face. His jaw was bruised, as well as his forehead. Tristan admitted he’d knocked him out again, but it looked like more than just that. What passed between these two while I wasn’t there?
“Captain Lomas asked that we let him know as soon as you were awake,” Abella piped up again. “Shall I go get him now?”
“Uh . . .” Mark trailed off, meeting my stare. “Is there any way Sam and I could talk alone for a moment, first?”
“Sure,” I replied easily, smiling gently at him.
“No,” Tristan said at the same time. Stepping to my side, he folded his arms, his jaw set in a way that made me think he wasn’t going to change his mind.
“Why not?”
He examined me, gaze softening some at the genuine curiosity in my voice. Pausing, his eyes darted toward Mark, but then he sighed, releasing his stance. “I just got ye back, lass. It was awful enough, leaving ye alone while I helped take care of the hostages. Now that I have ye again, I don’t want to be without ye if I don’t have to.”
“It probably doesn’t help that I told him I love you, either.” There was some distant laughter in Mark’s eyes. “I wouldn’t want to have my wife alone with anyone who had done that. That’s what I wanted to speak to you about—apologize about, anyway.”
“Apologize?” These two were full of curve balls today.
“I’m sorry for the way that I told you, for how it happened.” He flinched in pain, moving away to sit down, leaving me beside my husband.
Truth be told, he had caught me so off guard with his declaration, I hadn’t even known what to do or say. Preferably, I would have liked to never mention that moment again. Such a conversation was sure to hurt his feelings and, even though I knew he would want the truth to be out for everyone to see, I didn’t want to have to tell him there was no chance of us ever being together.
“I’ve always known what my place in this was,” he said, smiling as if he could read my mind. “You love your husband. Anyone with eyes can see the two of you want and need nothing but each other. Telling you how I felt and acting on it was never part of the plan. Every day, I woke up resolved to keep you safe and alive for him.” He nodded at Tristan then, who was watching him with a narrow stare and hard-set lips.
“But ye did tell her,” Tristan replied, a dangerous air about him. “And acted on it.”
“In my defense, I thought we were both about to be tried and hanged as pirates.” Mark glanced pleadingly at me then, his eyes begging me to listen to what he had to say. “I have been running since the day they told me you drowned on Oak Isle, to Florida, Texas, and even back in time.
The Apache let me go, Mexico City allowed me to flee, and when Thomas Randall took my ship, he let me run right into his crew and his plans. I got tired of slipping away. When I thought of you, convicted and dead, I didn’t want to hide my feelings any more. Your husband wasn’t coming. All I wanted was for someone to know how I really felt before I disappeared completely.”
He shrugged, resting against the back of his chair, hands folded in his lap. “I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m sorry for the position I put you in and the hardship I caused for your family.”
I wanted to say there had been no hardship, but looking over at Tristan, I could see there was. Mark’s apology seemed to have gotten to him the most, his brows furrowed as he stared at my friend. I couldn’t read what emotions he felt, or guess at his thoughts, but it was clear that he hadn’t liked what he heard.
“You don’t need to run anymore,” Abella offered kindly in the absence of my reply. “You are with people who will take care of you and treat you as one of their own. I know Samantha—I know Tristan, too—and they would not want you to flee now. Stay. Let us help you.”
She had picked up on another meaning I’d missed in Mark’s words; he was offering to leave. Staying with us was either too painful for him, or destructive to my marriage.
“Don’t go,” I said suddenly. “Please.”
“Why? I can’t do anything to help. I shouldn’t even be in this time to begin with. Who knows what I’ve changed over the past ten years?” He laughed, humorlessly, and shook his head. “I’m better off on my own, where I can make sure I don’t screw up anything important.”
Still not knowing what to say to him, feeling awkward over the whole affair, I huffed, trying to think of a way to convince him not to go off on his own. It was true that there would never be anything romantic between us, but he was still my friend. I wanted him to be kept safe.
“Mark is a historian,” I told Tristan, who was opening his mouth in confusion. “A pirate historian, to be specific. He knows more about what’s going to happen on the oceans over the next one hundred years than anyone else I’ve ever met.”
“Which is exactly why I should stay away from you and your pirate husband,” Mark argued. “I’d already found a record of you when I was researching Randall’s shipwreck. The future is changing because we’re here and I’m not okay with that!”
“What did ye say?” Tristan butted in, stepping forward in an excited way.
Mark, startled, stared at him like a deer in headlights. “We’re changing the future,” he started.
“Not that.” Cutting him off, Tristan waved to Abella, who promptly left the room without another word. “Randall’s shipwreck?”
Eyes widening, the man from the future gazed at the man from the past, and he nodded. “Of course. The ship that sent her down was a Templar vessel.”
Quickly, Mark relayed his expedition in the Gulf of Mexico to Tristan, detailing the boat and Mission, as well as the records he’d discovered at the site and in other parts of the world. “I know where he is,” Mark spoke, astounded. “I know where Randall is going.”
“That’s good to hear.” Captain Lomas stepped through the door, Abella behind him, and entwined his fingers behind his back. “All traces of the Black Knights have vanished from the city and there is no trail to follow. We estimate that around fifty men managed to flee the coup at the warehouse. I’ve been readying the men to follow them to the north on foot. We can catch them within a few days, I’m sure of it.”
“They aren’t going north on land,” Mark explained, shaking his head as he stood up. “They’re on their way to Veracruz and their ship.”
“We have to leave now,” Tristan continued for him, turning to the captain and putting up a united front with Mark. “It’s already been almost two days. If they’re smart, they’ve been running through the night and taking limited breaks. They’ll reach their ship in another day, at least.”
Lomas looked between all of us, thinking hard. “Sí,” he said finally. “We’ll leave within the hour.”
The Order was amazing when it was on a mission. Each member of the party had a job, and they did it with ease and finesse that Randall’s crew lacked. Where the Black Knights made up for their shortcomings with violence, it was like the Templars had none, merely achieving anything they set out to do.
The pace of our trip back to Veracruz was fast. Everyone was always on the lookout for Randall and his men, but what Tristan had said appeared to be true; they had already reached their ship and sailed away. So it was, after three and a half days of practically non-stop trekking across the lower end of North America, we reached the Templar ship and set sail toward the tiny Mission Mark assured everyone was waiting for our arrival.
Unlike the warship I’d last traveled on with the Order, this boat was medium sized and fast, the bow breaking through the water with hardly any effort. I watched the skies with a hopeful heart and pleading prayer whenever I was on deck. It was now hurricane season and we couldn’t afford for a storm to blow in and slow us down. If the worst were to happen, though, and we were caught in the gale, I felt fairly confident we would hold together enough to make it through.
Hopefully.
“We’re only two days behind them, with any luck.” Tristan wrapped his arms around me from behind as we stood at the bow of the boat. “The wind is good. We’ll catch them.”
“What happens when we do?”
Mark had said there would be a fight. Randall’s vessel would be burned to the decks and sink, leaving almost no trace of anything for more than three hundred years. However, fire was the Black Knight’s calling card. Who was to say that it wouldn’t be our craft Mark would work on, confusing his data and naming the wrong crew as the losers in this battle?
Unfortunately, Mark and I seemed to be the only people who thought that might be a possibility. Everyone else took what he shared as pure truth, especially after everything I’d said about the Treasure Pit had turned out to be right.
“What if I’m wrong?” he’d said to me, his face hidden in the darkness of the crew quarters where we were all camped out. “What if I’m leading these men to their deaths?”
“We won’t know until we get there,” I replied, unhelpfully. “Try not to think about it.”
“Samantha?” Tristan’s voice brought me back to the present, worry in his tone. “Are ye okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just thinking about where we’re going and what Mark said.” Sighing, I reclined my head against his shoulder, staring out over the water. Blue reflected down from above, not a cloud in sight.
“Mark.”
Tristan hadn’t exactly been mean to him, but he wasn’t really welcoming Mark into the ranks. Sometimes they would share a glance and I knew there was a struggle in my husband to accept that he wasn’t a danger or threat to us. Sometimes, I wondered how it must appear to him, the two of us, time travelers, sitting and talking together. Was I still the same Sam he’d left in Paris? Did I look different to him?
He had no comparison for Mark, though. He hadn’t seen him when he was ten years younger, laughing and carefree as he tried to solve a mystery that had intrigued him for most of his life. All he saw now was an aging man, with crow’s feet that appeared whenever he smiled and some flecks of gray in his beard.
It was still strange, to see my friend aged so much in the short time since I’d been away. It wasn’t short for him, though. Ten whole years had passed in his life, completely changing him from the man I’d known into the fierce presence he was now. There was a reason no one had bothered me on Randall’s ship—Mark didn’t seem like someone you would want to mess with.
“Do you hate him?” I asked Tristan softly, curious.
“Hate him? No.” He sighed, putting his chin on my head, like he so often did. “I think I perhaps envy him some, or even feel jealous, but I don’t hate the man.”
“Jealous? Why?”
“He gives ye something that I can’t—a companion fro
m yer own time. No matter how much ye tell me and explain it, I’ll never know what it’s really like there. He does. He’s also held my only child.”
“And you’ll never get to,” I finished for him, sadly.
There hadn’t been time to stop and show him Rachel’s grave. In all honesty, I hadn’t wanted to when we were close by. I wanted him to meet her without the burden of his duties to the Order hanging over his head, or thoughts of having to catch Randall. We both needed the time to sit beside her and mourn, and our current situation didn’t allow for that.
“I’ll hold her in my heart, always.”
His words brought tears to my eyes and I spun in his arms, resting my forehead on his chest. The wound was so achingly fresh for the both of us, but we had each other to heal with.
That was when the cry came from up above, the sound that would draw every man onto the deck, anxious to see what would happen next. It was a vibration that seemed to echo around us, filling me with anticipation and fear.
“Sails!”
Mark held the spyglass up to his eye, studying the ship in front of us carefully. It seemed as if everyone was waiting with bated breath for him to say whether or not it was the vessel we wanted. Tristan stood beside him, observing the small spec in the distance with his naked eye.
“Is it his?” he asked Mark, leaning toward him in an attempt to keep their conversation more private.
Captain Lomas, who hovered on the other side of the group in his Blue uniform, tilted his head as well, listening for the answer.
The men conferred for a moment, whispering among themselves. Anxiously, I anticipated the verdict, pondering why Mark didn’t just tell everyone the Black Knights were only a couple miles from us. I recognized the flag they flew on the back of the ship—the laughing skull with blank, white eyes. Even from this distance, I could just barely see it, my memory helping me fill in the gaps the space between us created.
“Is it them?” Abella asked next to me, whispering as well.
Checking to make sure everyone standing right next to us was occupied, I looked across the deck. “Yes,” I uttered back, barely moving my lips.
Carried Away (The Swept Away Saga, Book Two) Page 28
