CHAPTER TWELVE
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.” Caitlin nervously made the sign of the cross.
“I am here to give you God’s grace,” said Father Tully. They sat together in the galley, empty of sailors now that the morning watch had taken its meal. “What is it that pains your soul?”
Caitlin laced her fingers together. She had confessed to him freely since her youth; she would not avoid his eyes now. “Father, I have committed the sin of lust.”
He lifted one eyebrow. “Sure and have you now?”
“Yes. Last night. With my—with the Englishman.”
“With your husband, you mean?”
“Yes, Father. I beg the Lord’s forgiveness.”
“Faith, not so fast. We must first establish that you have indeed committed a sin. Now, you say that on your wedding night with your new young husband, you committed the sin of lust?”
She remembered the wildness in her heart, the complete abandonment with which she accepted—welcomed—his kisses and caresses, the sweet fulfillment of their joining. “I did.”
He slapped his hands on his knees. “Well, that’s a grand matter indeed, my dear. I’m most happy for you.”
“Happy for me? But—”
“It’s not every woman who can enjoy the conjugal union. Many’s the time I’ve comforted a new wife who has been used ill by her husband. Be glad Mr. Hawkins inspired lust rather than fear or shame.”
“You don’t understand, Father. I don’t want to feel this way about him.”
“You prefer fear and shame?”
“No, but—”
“Then accept what has happened.” He took her hands and chafed them between his own. “Finding delight in your husband is a rare gift.”
Hot anger sped through her, and she welcomed it, for anger threatened her less than the roiling sea of emotions she felt for Wesley. “And should I be delighted that he is dragging me off to London to face Cromwell?”
“He has his reasons.”
“Did he tell you those reasons?”
“The man means you no harm. I believe he will protect you. I advise you to leave the rest in God’s hands.”
* * *
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.” Wesley furtively made the sign of the cross.
“You, too?” Father Tully brushed his black hair out of his eyes. They stood at the rail and watched the gulls dive for herring. The high wind snatched at their voices, giving them privacy despite the fact that Hammersmith’s man, MacKenzie, loitered nearby.
“This is not the first confession you’ve heard today, then?”
“On that matter, my lips are sealed.”
So, Caitlin had already confessed. What had she said?
“Mr. Hawkins, would your troubles be having anything to do with that great colorful bruise on your jaw?”
Wesley touched the tender spot. “I’ve fallen in love with her.”
“And you consider love a sin? Faith, I’d call it a blessing. Have you told her?”
“Had I the tongue of a poet, she wouldn’t believe me.”
“You must, with care and tenderness—not just words—bind your two hearts.”
“But the failure to make her love me is not what I came to confess.”
“Then unburden yourself, a chara.”
A pleasant warmth washed through Wesley at hearing the priest call him friend. So few men in his life had. “I’m lying to her about a very important matter.”
“Then tell her the truth.”
“I can’t. A person’s life is at stake. My own and Caitlin’s, of course, but there is a third innocent who will be hurt if I tell all to Caitlin. To anyone.” He gazed out at the churning sea, the waves slapping down into shadowy troughs. “The truth would force her to make difficult choices. Besides, she’ll know soon enough.”
“Would you be after speaking of another woman?” Father Tully demanded, his thick eyebrows beetling.
“No! I swear before God, it’s not that.”
“Let no secrets come between you and your wife. Secrets can kill a marriage quicker than poison.”
Wesley studied the priest’s drawn and weary face. He recognized the look of troubled sympathy, for he, too, had borne the burden of confession. Putting a hand on Father Tully’s shoulder, he said, “When we make port, will you use Hammersmith’s safe conduct to return to Clonmuir?”
Father Tully smiled wistfully. “Ah, and isn’t it Clonmuir that brings my soul close to heaven?”
“It’s dangerous for you there. Hammersmith fears what I know about his slave trade and the taking of priests. He’ll stay away from Clonmuir for now, but he’s clever. Don’t gamble your safety.”
Father Tully combed his fingers through his black hair. “A priest goes where he’s needed.”
Wesley envied him at that moment, envied the certainty of his calling, the knowing that he had chosen the right path. For Wesley, the way was marked with torn loyalties, self-doubt, and now the agony of frustrated love.
* * *
“You made your confession today, didn’t you?” Wesley asked that night as he entered their quarters.
Caitlin bit her lip. “Father Tully abides by the seal of confession. Who told you?”
“I made a guess.”
“Guess yourself to Whitehall for all I care.” She chewed halfheartedly on a ship’s biscuit.
“I guessed when I went to make a confession of my own,” he added.
Caitlin inhaled a crumb. Clearing her throat with difficulty, she said, “I’m sure you bent his ear for hours, then, for you’re a black-hearted sinner.”
“I’m also your husband. Come here.”
“No.”
He sighed. “We wasted hours in argument last night when we could have been making love. Let’s not repeat that mistake tonight, or ever again.”
“Not make love ever again?” She dusted the crumbs from her skirt. “I agree completely.”
“I was speaking of arguing.”
“I was speaking of lovemaking.”
“Good. Let’s carry on with that topic.” Evening light streaming through the stern windows touched his eyes, transforming the gray-green tint to the diffuse color of magic. Framed by burnished hair, the bruise on his jaw contrasted with the healthy color of his face.
“How can you deny our passion,” he asked, propping his shoulder against the alcove support, “when I can look at your lovely face and see the yearning there?”
Resisting the urge to make a sign against enchantment, she planted her hands on her hips. “It’s Clonmuir that I yearn for, not you. You’ve forced me to marry you. The union has been consummated. What more do you want from me?”
“I want you as I had you last night, full of a woman’s desires, your face a picture of unguarded surprise and delight.” He reached up with his hand and made a lazy trail down the post with his fingers. The simple gesture raised a havoc of disquieting emotions.
She tried to block out Wesley’s words, but her heart listened as he went on, “I want you in every way a man can want a woman, and in ways we’ve yet to invent. Every single day and night. Now, come here.”
“No.”
“I’ll give you a son for Clonmuir.”
The suggestion shot her through with fear and longing. He stepped toward her. Only pride kept her from fleeing toward the door. “I want no sons from you,” she stated.
“I care for you.’
“Like a drover cares for a prize pig.”
He reached out, fingered a curl that had strayed from her braid. “Don’t you remember the passion? Don’t you remember the sweetness?”
She did, and too well. His nearness scattered her thoughts. Yet at the same time she saw that he, too, seemed discomfited, and the fact somehow endeared him to her.
“You’re trembling,” she said.
“You make me feel too much. I’m not used to this.”
“Then don’t.” She hated herself for being curious about him, for wondering about every aspect of his life and his past.
Taking her in his arms, he kissed her slowly, softly, drawing away her protests as a splinter is drawn from flesh. She leaned into him, loving the security of his arms around her, savoring the taste of him and marveling, as she had the night before, at the uncanny harmony of their bodies. He had turned her world upside down. He had taken her to heaven and to hell. And she would not have traded a moment of it for the very surety of her soul. God, if only he would disavow Cromwell, she would have a name for the things she felt when he kissed her like this. She would call it happiness.
He lifted his mouth from hers. “Caitlin.”
“Yes?”
“I love you.”
Not now, she wanted to scream at him. How can I believe you now? She stepped back, shaking her head slowly. “Don’t say those words to me. I can never love the man you are.”
His face paled, but she forced herself to continue. “I have only contempt for a man who does Cromwell’s bidding. Don’t you understand, being married to you changes nothing! It’s Alonso I love!”
He let go of her as if she had burned him. He stepped back, and she saw that his face had changed into a visage she had never seen before. Agony, devastation, and finally rage contorted his features. With a jolt of fear, she realized that this was the first time she had seen him truly angry. At her.
“Very well.” His voice thrummed with carefully controlled fury. “So long as you deny what we are to one another, so long as you cling to dreams of your Spanish hero, I will leave you alone.”
She should have felt relieved. She tried very hard. All she felt was a black emptiness. “I think it’s for the best.”
He lifted his hand, stopped himself before touching her. “One day you’ll find the truth in your heart. And then you must come to me, for I won’t reach out again.”
London, June 1658
Caitlin craned her neck to peer out from beneath the canopy of the river barge. “I’ve never seen a paved street before. Even Galway doesn’t have a paved street.”
“Do you like it?” Wesley asked.
“Sure it seems a lot of trouble.”
“The paving’s necessary. The traffic would turn the streets into rivers of mud.” Wesley settled back, trying to appear composed. The ever-present MacKenzie rode astern with the waterman. Caitlin perched on the edge of her seat like a child on her first trip to a fair. The last thing Wesley had expected after their quarrel was that they would become friends. But it had happened. Perhaps it was better this way. Safe. Reasonably comfortable so long as he kept her at arm’s length.
“What building is that?” She pointed to the structure that shadowed St. Katherine’s Street along the wharf.
The thin slits of windows squinted menacingly from towers and turrets. The thick walls of pale limestone and hard, coarse ragstone brought on a rush of memories that nearly made him ill. “It’s the Tower of London,” he said.
Her interest sharpened. “Is it, then? You mean where the poor princes were murdered? Sure and didn’t Silken Thomas, our own Irish hero, wait out his last days there.”
“Indeed.”
“What’s it like, I wonder.”
“Hell on earth.” Wesley averted his glance to the river, where lighters vied for position along the quays. “There are holes called oubliettes so cramped that a man can neither stand nor lie down.”
Hearing the pain in his voice, Caitlin studied his pale face, his clammy hands. “How do you know this?”
“I was there.”
“Visiting prisoners?”
“Caitlin, I was a prisoner.”
A cold wind of shock swept over her. “You were?”
“Aye.”
“Did they put you in an oubliette?”
“Aye.”
She remembered the scars that laced his back and shoulders, the horror that, in rare unguarded moments, haunted his eyes. He had suffered for the sake of his faith, probably more severely than he had ever told her.
She laid her hand on his. Since they had come to an accord regarding intimacy—or the lack of it—she was more comfortable touching him. “You should have told me before.”
He stared at her hand. “Don’t touch me unless you mean it.”
She hesitated, liking the rough texture of his hand beneath hers, yet knowing where it would lead if she refused to obey. She drew back her hand. “I wish you’d tell me, too, how a Catholic came to be an agent of the devil Cromwell.”
He leaned his head against the leather cushion. “Cromwell and I have been acquainted seven years. Since Worcester.”
“Did you fight with the royalists there?”
He nodded. “When we realized the battle was lost, I was with those who helped King Charles escape. We spent a long day in an oak tree in Boscobel wood. When the searchers drew close, I gave myself up as a decoy. King Charles escaped, and so did I, eventually. I went to the seminary at Douai.” He gave her a sideways glance. “Am I boring you yet?”
“If you were, I’d be after telling you directly.”
A smile pulled at one side of his mouth. “I was sent back to England. I acted as both priest and royalist messenger, but by that time I was neither. I didn’t know what I was. When the priest catchers finally took me, I was sentenced to die. But Cromwell’s man, Thurloe, stopped the execution.”
Gripping her knees, she leaned forward. “Why?”
“Because he realized I was the man Cromwell had been seeking for seven years.”
“How did he know it was you?”
To her amazement, a blush crept up to the tips of his ears. “It was the women who gave me away.”
“What?”
“The women.” He waved his hand in impatience. “At my execution. Some of them recognized me, by sight or reputation.”
Caitlin blinked, unable to envision the scene. “So why did Cromwell spare you?”
“He needed my skills as a thief taker.”
She braced her hands on the arms of the seat. “You were a thief taker, then a cavalier, then a novice to the priesthood?”
“Aye.”
“That’s more careers than most men pursue in one lifetime.”
He stared down at his hands, flexing his fingers. “I was…searching. Trying to find my place in the world.”
Her eyes narrowed. “And you found it with Cromwell, who spared a thief taker from the gallows to take me.”
“Aye.”
As evening gathered in the last rays of the sunset, the barge bumped to a halt at Whitehall Steps. A jumble of boxy buildings loomed over the water’s edge. Torches burned on each side of a doorway, and a footman came to help them disembark.
“Evenin’, gov’nor,” said the footman. “Pleasant voyage, was it?” He gaped at Caitlin in her soft, loose tunic. “Brought along a bit o’ the Irish, did you, sir?” The footman chuckled. “Where’s ’er leash, eh?”
“Around your gullet if you don’t shut that great trap,” Caitlin retorted.
His face as dark as a thundercloud, Wesley stepped from the barge. His booted foot landed squarely on the man’s instep.
“Ouch! ’Ave a care there, sir!”
“So sorry,” Wesley murmured. Reaching down, he took Caitlin’s hand and helped her to the stone quay.
She ignored the hapless footman. MacKenzie led the way along a passageway past the chapel and the Great Hall, across the broad courtyard and under the palace gate, and finally into the Outer Chamber, teeming with protectoral officials, dark-clad clerics, and foreign dignitaries. She fought an urge to hold onto Wesley’s arm for support. At the same time, her eyes combed the crowd. Possibly, just possibly…
“He wouldn’t be here,” Wesley muttered under his breath. “Your grandee wouldn’t mingle with commoners.”
Caitlin flushed, wondering at the ease with which he read her thoughts. She gave her attention to the Great Chamber and then the Presence Chamber. Opulence shimmered in the rooms, dripped from the crown of candles suspended by a chain from the ceiling, and glowed in the sober portraits that lined the walls.
Wesley’s gaze searched the busy room even more desperately than hers had. Whom did he seek? she wondered. A former lady love? For the first time, it struck her that she still knew little of his past, nothing of the people he had known.
“The Lord Protector is with his daughter Bettie, the Lady Claypole, at Hampton Court.” A liveried man hurried forward, extending his hand to Wesley. “He will be back within the week.”
Wesley swore under his breath.
MacKenzie blew the red bulb of his nose. “The puir lady’s still ailin’, is she?”
The messenger lowered his eyes. “Lost her baby son a fortnight ago. Oliver, he was called, after his grandsire.”
Caitlin pressed her lips together. She did not want to think of Cromwell as human, a grandfather grieving with his daughter over a baby’s death.
The official turned to Wesley. “You’re guests of the Protectorate.”
Two soldiers marched forward, swords slapping against their blousy trousers.
“We’re not guests at all,” she snapped, her heart catapulting to her throat. “We’re prisoners.”
* * *
For three days, Caitlin lived alone in guarded luxury. A snap of her fingers brought hot water for a bath. A nod of her head summoned a houseboy with firewood. The amount she ate at a single meal would have fed Mrs. Boyle and her entire brood.
Wesley sent a mercer, a clothier and a seamstress. Simply to escape the stultifying boredom, Caitlin submitted to their measuring and pin sticking.
Her heart ached with loneliness as she gazed out a high window at the cold stone buildings that housed the privy apartments of the Protectorate. She longed for the wild splendor of Connemara, the sharp smell of the sea in the summer air. She missed the evenings in the hall, listening to Magheen playing the harp or Tom Gandy spinning hero tales that grew more and more improbable with each cup of smoky, rye-flavored poteen.
And finally, she admitted to herself that she missed Wesley.
He had banished her from his heart because she would not yield her own to him.
He spent his days closed in a library, a room devoted entirely to books. He met daily with protectoral officials. Sometimes she heard the sound of hearty laughter and thought bitterly that they must consider it a grand joke that Wesley had taken an Irish bride. Other times she heard voices raised in anger and wondered if they would have her head, after all.
On the fourth day, the dressmaker arrived with her trunks and assistants. “The master wants you gowned straightaway.”
A frisson of fear sneaked down Caitlin’s spine. The summons could mean that Cromwell had arrived from Hampton Court. “I dislike these fashions.”
“Ladies of quality adore my designs.”
“As a game hen adores being trussed for the roasting spit,” Caitlin retorted, but she gave in. The sooner Wesley dragged her before Cromwell, the sooner she could go back to Clonmuir and be done with this farce. Besides, the rebel in her wanted to meet Cromwell, wanted to face the devil who murdered Irish babies because, as he put it, “Nits make lice.” She wanted to tell the Lord Protector of England to go to hell.
An hour later, Caitlin studied her wavy image in a tall standing mirror. Wicker farthingale hoops shaped an overskirt of emerald velvet, parted in the center to reveal a silk petticoat. Satin slippers with chunky high heels peeped from beneath the hem. Glittering with gold thread, the bone-stiffened bodice rose in a V from waist to shoulders. The dresser had swept her hair into a loose braid and pinned it up with shell combs.
What a stranger she looked. A Sassenach stranger.
A footman came to accompany her down the grand staircase to the broad foyer. Wesley stood at the bottom.
He, too, looked the stranger, dressed in loose black trousers cinched at the waist by his ornate belt, and cuffed knee boots polished to a high sheen. A flowing black cloak was drawn back to reveal a dress sword at his hip. A hat with the brim turned up jauntily on one side shadowed his face.
She caught her breath. Were she an artist, she would yearn to capture the picture he made—his easy pose, his insouciant grin and the riveting masculinity that emanated from him. Were she a poet, she would try to shape his appeal in words—the blithe charm on the surface, the undercurrent of pain and regret in his eyes, the nearly invisible world-weary lines about his smiling mouth.
She must be losing her mind. They were enemies. Her goal was to be rid of him and find Alonso, whose memory became more distant each day she spent with Wesley.
“I’m ready,” she stated.
He used one finger to tip back the brim of his hat. His expression changed from astonishment to delight, then finally to a frank lust that nearly propelled her into his arms.
Instead she fixed him with a frosty stare, swept out the door, and marched across the green quadrangle with no notion of where she was going. Wesley’s long, swift strides quickly brought him to her side. “You didn’t give me a chance to tell you how beautiful you look.”
She smoothed her hands over her skirts. “It’s the dress that’s beautiful, by English standards. Devil admire me, but I’m the same as I’ve always been.”
He reached across and cupped her face gently in his hands. “What you are, Cait, and what you have always been, is beautiful.” Leaning down, he kissed her, his lips lingering over hers until she clutched at him. He pulled back, a grin playing about his lips. “I’ve missed you, too,” he said. “But when you come back to me, I want all of you.”
“Forever is a long time.”
“I invited you to dine with me each evening. Why did you refuse?”
“I don’t like being summoned. Besides, England puts a great weariness upon me, and the food disagrees with me.”
His eyebrows clashed in concern. “Are you ill?”
“In the way of a swallow put in a cage, perhaps,” she said.
He subjected her to a long, probing stare that traveled from her face to her breasts to her belly. “Could it be—”
She thrust up her chin. “I presume I’m all tricked out like this because you’re taking me to see the murderer, Cromwell.”
“In time.” Wesley started along a path to the left. MacKenzie scudded watchfully in their wake. “And it would behoove you to refrain from calling him a murderer.”
“You’re right. It’s too good a word for the devil.”
“If you want to get back to Clonmuir, you’ll keep your opinions to yourself and show respect.” His voice dropped, and she heard real fear in his tone. “I mean that, by God. You risk both our necks with your tart tongue.” He took her hand, rubbed her chilled fingers. “So cold.”
“England is a cold country, even in summer.”
A look of revelation passed over his face. “You’re afraid, aren’t you?”
“Of course I’m afraid, you great lout. What Irishwoman would not be afraid of Oliver Cromwell?”
“It’s a side of you I’ve not seen before, not even when I abducted you, not even in the heat of battle.”
“When I can meet a man on a battlefield and pit my speed and my wiles against him, I have no reason to fear. In an honest battle, God’s will prevails. But I’m not used to battles of words, waged by cheaters and traitors.”
“Just remember, I’m on your side. I want to protect you, and then I want you to go free.”
She sensed excitement in him and wondered what he was about. “Do you, Wesley?”
No, he thought with a lurch of his heart. I want to hold you and keep you always. I want to bring you and Laura together.
But he could not speak of Laura yet. He was too close to getting her back to risk a confession now. Later, when Laura was safe in his arms and the confrontation with Oliver Cromwell was behind them, he could tell all to Caitlin.
And probably lose her for good.
They entered the privy chamber. Perfect. His timing was perfect. The scene he had orchestrated so carefully was about to unfold. God forgive my cruelty, he thought.
No, he told himself. He would not feel guilty for grinding Caitlin’s dreams to dust. She needed to see the truth, to see that her ideal image of the Spaniard was false.
His hand brushed the dress sword that rode at his hip. If Caitlin’s grandee dared to harm her, Wesley would take great pleasure in running the bastard through.
A shiver passed over Caitlin as she studied the men and women in the crowded room. Gowned officials, resembling crows in their black winglike cloaks and with their shiny dark eyes, stood deep in conversation. Other groups spoke in foreign tongues. Ambassadors, she realized.
Her nerves thrummed, and her gaze sharpened on a knot of dark-haired men near a marble hearth, chafing their hands near the flames. The beautifully coiffed and oiled hair, the glittering costumes, set them apart from the drab-robed English. One man held himself tall and straight, his head cocked slightly as he listened to his stocky companion.
Alonso.
Joy washed over her, as sweet and pure as sunshine. She stood riveted by the sight of him. Yet at the same time she felt Wesley tensing beside her.
Her memories of Alonso paled beside the reality. Four years had broadened his shoulders, added maturity and wisdom to his handsome features.
A sense of unreality gripped her. So close. After years of anxious waiting and unbearable yearning, she stood mere steps away from realizing her long-cherished dream.
She pressed her fists to her breastbone, felt the pounding of her heart. How would he react when he learned she had wed another? He would understand, she told herself. He would help her find a way out of the mess with Hawkins. With a guilty thrill, she prayed Alonso would not hesitate to express his jubilation at seeing her again. The one chaste kiss they had shared had sustained her for years. But now she knew the meaning of passion. Like it or not, Hawkins had given her that.
Closing her eyes, she envisioned coming together with Alonso, mouths pressing hard, bodies straining for completion…. Her eyes flew open and filled with tears. For the man in her vision had not been Alonso, but—
“Caitlin.”
She turned at the sound of her husband’s voice.
Hawkins. Damn him. He had invaded her fantasies. His frank, rough affection had overrun her dreams of Alonso as the English had razed Ireland’s forests.
He gave her a gentle push in the direction of the Spaniards. “Go and greet him.” His voice was soft, but edged by irony. “It’s what you’ve been waiting for, isn’t it?”
She hesitated. What could be his purpose in bringing her here deliberately? She decided it was not important. Smoothing her hands over the bony structure of her farthingale, she tossed Wesley a defiant look and started forward.
“Excuse me.”
The four gentlemen turned to her. She was unprepared for the appreciation that lit their faces. Each smiled. Each allowed his gaze to stroke her from head to toe.
Perhaps this English frippery had a purpose, after all.
Braving a rush of bashfulness, she smiled directly at Alonso. Although his gaze devoured her, no recognition flickered in his eyes. With courtly stiffness, he took her hand and bowed over it. “A pleasure beyond compare, I assure you, señorita.”
The lucid thoughts streaming through Caitlin’s mind surprised her. When Wesley touched her, she could not think at all. “Alonso,” she whispered. “Don’t you know me?”
His eyes narrowed. They were smaller than she remembered. Darker. “No, señorita. Should I?”
She stepped back, her hand going out behind her, reaching against her will for support.
For Wesley. But he stood several feet away, watching, his face unreadable.
Cheeks flaming, Caitlin ignored the curious stares of the other Spaniards. “Alonso, it’s Caitlin MacBride of Clonmuir. For the love of God, do you not remember?”
His face changed. A hardness came over his features.
Questions roared through her mind. Had Alonso already learned of her marriage? Did he understand why she had been forced to break faith with him?
Yes. He must. True love knew no jealousy. True love was the essence of pure understanding, unconditional forgiveness. There had never been a love so pure as the one she and Alonso had pledged to one another that day high on the crags of Connemara.
And yet…what was it she had felt, in the dark when Wesley was deep inside her, and their very souls seemed to mate?
Animal passion, she insisted stubbornly. Not the soft, dreamlike emotions she felt for Alonso.
He cleared his throat. A delicate sound. A sound of polite discomfiture. “I did not expect to see you here, señorita.” He bowed to his companions and said something in Spanish. Then he led her out to the long green courtyard and stopped in the shade of an ornamental yew tree.
“Alonso.” His name came on a rush of breath. “I’ve waited so long and fought so hard. There’s so much to discuss.”
He seemed not to hear her. Furtive hunger shadowed his eyes. “Dios, but you have become a beauty!” he exclaimed.
With a cry of joy, she flung her arms around his neck.
With an oath of fury, Wesley strode across the green toward them. Caitlin jumped back. Her heart thumped at the deadly expression on her husband’s face. Fury boiled in his eyes and blazed across his features. As he came forward, his hand went to the hilt of his dress sword.
“Here, sir,” Alonso snapped out. “Who are you?”
“Your worst enemy,” Wesley said without slackening his pace.
“Wesley, no!” Caitlin stepped in front of Alonso.
He stopped walking. Huge and powerful, he had the look of a man who had never lost a battle. His sword sliced from its sheath. “Step aside, Caitlin,” he said. “Or is your lover in the habit of using a woman as a shield?”
“Never!” Alonso pushed past Caitlin. His own bright blade glittered in the sun. He stepped forward and sketched a neat challenge in the air with his sword tip. “I refuse no invitation from an English commoner.”
“You’ll wish you had, you Spanish bastard.” Wesley lunged with his sword arm extended.
Their crossed blades made a metallic whine.
“Stop it, both of you!” Caitlin shouted, knowing even as she spoke that they would ignore her. They were two furious champions, each intent on victory. Alonso fought with the agile precision of a well-schooled swordsman. Wesley battled with the unearthly strength and dogged will that slapped formal training in the face. In an odd way, they were well matched: Alonso’s crafty quickness against Wesley’s raw fury.
Alonso extended himself in a perfectly executed lunge. Wesley leapt back, bumping into a stone bench behind him. Undaunted, he made a grand backward jump and mounted the bench. He took full advantage of the added height, his wrath blazing in the face of Alonso’s icy composure.
Alonso’s close-playing wrist sought entrance to Wesley’s broad-reaching defense. The Spaniard fenced magnificently, cold as steel, his eyes blank and pitiless. In contrast, Wesley flamed with passion.
He leapt down from the bench. By main force he battled Alonso backward across the greensward, where a crowd had quickly gathered. Alonso made an ill-timed thrust. Wesley caught the blade with the edge of his. They came together, swords crossed, chests heaving, muscles trembling, with deadly effort.
“Tell me, my friend,” said Wesley, panting hard, “do you make it a practice to seduce other men’s wives?”
For a split second, Alonso’s cold composure vanished. His jaw dropped. His grip on the hilt faltered.
Wesley’s booted foot came up. In a ploy that would appall any master swordsman, he stomped on Alonso’s foot.
The Spaniard cried out. Wesley plucked the sword from his hand and flung the blade away. With the same motion, he whipped his point to Alonso’s throat.
“Wesley!” Caitlin rushed forward. “I beg you, don’t—”
“He won’t,” said Alonso in a shaky voice. His eyes flooded with relief as he looked past Wesley’s shoulder.
Swords drawn, Alonso’s companions raced toward them. Two women wearing lacy black shawls hurried in their wake. The plump younger one carried a baby on her hip.
“Release me,” said Alonso, “or my men will run you through like a sausage on a stick.”
Wesley hesitated for a heartbeat, then lowered his sword. The heat of madness cooled; his anger turned in on himself. He should have exercised more self-control. He should not have surrendered to the rage that had gripped him on seeing Caitlin fling herself at the Spaniard.
The younger woman clung to Alonso and spoke in rapid Spanish, making sure he wasn’t injured. In moments, Caitlin would know the truth. Wesley hated the dark satisfaction that crept over him. “I’m sure Mrs. Hawkins would be delighted to make your acquaintance,” he said to the woman.
Alonso gave a hiss of anger as he looked from the Spanish woman to Caitlin. He wiped a bead of sweat from his brow, then snapped a practiced bow. “Doña Maria,” he stated. “And this is little Federico. My wife and son.”
Wesley would have traded his sword arm to spare Caitlin the pain he saw so clearly in her eyes. The amber jewels seemed to splinter like shards of sunlight. The color dropped from her face. Her hands clenched into fists.
But she was still the MacBride. She recovered in scant seconds. Like a queen bestowing royal favors, she nodded at her Spanish swain’s wife, then swept back toward the palace.
Sheathing his sword, Wesley hurried after her. “I’m sorry. But you had to know.”
She gave a bitter laugh. “You English bastard. You planned this. Is it your mission in life to hurt me, make me miserable? Do you take pleasure in my pain?”
“You have to feel the hurt before you can start to heal.”
“Oh, spare me.” She tossed her head and quickened her stride. “Don’t we have an appointment with Oliver Cromwell?”