The Duke Is Mine
Page 66

“Brandy,” Quin barked over his shoulder, only to realize that Grooper, his capabilities exhausted, had fled to the deck. He wrenched open a cabinet and snatched a bottle, which turned out to be the finest French cognac, the kind even dukes drank only sparingly. Oh, for the life of a smuggler.
Turning back, he dribbled a little brandy into Rupert’s mouth. The marquess gasped; his eyes flickered open.
A familiar feeling of helplessness clutched Quin’s heart. He knew he should say something, but he had no idea what. It was rather as if he were facing Evangeline again, when she would accuse him of being no more emotional than a piece of wood, and he hadn’t the faintest idea what she wanted from him.
Probably Rupert would like to hear poetry—but Quin didn’t know any poetry. His tutors had never bothered with that sort of thing. His mind spun with furious frustration. If only Rupert wanted information about wave patterns . . .
“Who?” Rupert’s eyes searched his face, confused.
“I’m Olivia’s friend,” Quin reminded him. “We brought Lucy to see you, and we’ve come to take you home to your father, to England.”
Rupert’s fingers curled around Lucy’s ear and he gave it a little tug. Lucy nudged his hand.
“Too many miles,” he said.
Quin silently agreed with Rupert. What was one supposed to say to a dying person? A psalm, he thought, except he couldn’t remember any.
“Sleep,” Rupert said, his eyes drifting shut again.
Suddenly, somehow, Rupert’s poem came back to Quin, as clearly as if Olivia had recited it to him a moment ago. Before it could vanish, he said it aloud: “Quick, bright, the bird falls down to us, darkness piles up in the trees.” It made no sense in this context, but he said it again, more slowly.
Rupert’s face brightened and he said something, so quietly Quin almost didn’t catch it. “And they fly . . .” A long silence. His breath stopped, started again.
Quin looked desperately at the porthole. There was no sign of dawn yet. He knew what Olivia would say. He knew what she wanted. He knew . . .
Rupert’s chest stopped moving again. Then he took another breath, like a little gasp.
So Quin sat, holding tight to the hand of the man who was giving him Olivia, who had written a poem that spoke to Alfie’s death, who was flying with sparrows fallen from trees.
And all the time the dearest person in his life was back there on a foreign shore without him, guarded only by two exhausted and trembling soldiers.
Damn, but he must love her to—
The thought cracked like thunder in his head. He froze, noting that Rupert had stopped breathing again, but he’d done that before . . . Love?
His mother had told him when he was only a child that love . . . what had she said about love?
That it was dangerous and not for people of their rank. That it was impulsive and the sign of someone foolish and ill-bred.
But . . . when did she say that he wasn’t able to love?
He loved Olivia, more than life, more than light, more than . . . anything.
The analytical part of his brain, which had been counting silently, spoke up, suggested that the bird was winging its way through some other sky, a silent sky.
Quin looked down and saw that it was true.
Rupert was gone. Gently, Quin disengaged his hand and tucked Rupert’s sheet more securely about him.
Lucy was curled next to her master’s body. She lifted her long nose and looked at Quin, whimpering a little. He couldn’t fix Rupert, the way she was asking him to. And it didn’t seem right to leave her next to her dead master. So he plucked her up, stashed her inside his coat, and ran up the stairs.
Once in the water, he set himself to the oars faster than he should have, catching the water, sending it arcing . . . He had time. He still had time. His heart beat the same sentence over and over. The eastern sky wasn’t yet turning pink. It wasn’t dawn. He had time.
He tried to slow down, make the oars quieter . . . couldn’t stop himself, rowed as fast as he possibly could.
He was still too late.
Twenty-eight
One Putain, Two Putain . . .
After Quin left, Olivia waited outside the hut, her cloak wrapped close and the hood up, head tipped back against the rough planks. A light wind drifted by, carrying the scent of rotting fish and the peppery, sweet smell of crushed strawberries.
The stars seemed too bright for spring. They should have been so distinct, so clear, only on the coldest of winter nights. Minutes passed . . . until finally she knew for certain that Quin had not come straight back, that he was waiting at Rupert’s deathbed.
The stars wavered above her, but tears never fell. That was a point of pride. No crying. Instead, to distract herself, she watched for a falling star, though she knew it was a foolish superstition to think it proclaimed the creation of an angel.
And all the time she listened for the tramp of soldiers’ feet, for a burst of French jests. The men who had guarded Rupert had fallen asleep on the floor, telling her to rouse them if she heard anything.
“The battalion marches at the same time every morning,” Togs had told her, his voice raspy with the relief of giving over Rupert’s care. “Still hours from now.”
No stars fell, but she was still watching for them when a hand clapped over her mouth and pulled her into the woods. She was too shocked even to scream.
It wasn’t dawn! There wasn’t even the faintest hint of light, and there had been no cheerful French badinage, no tramp of boots to warn her.
By the time she gathered her wits and began to struggle, it was too late. With one swift movement she was pushed down and flipped onto her stomach. All those years of French tutoring stood her in good stead, though: “Aidez-moi!” she shrieked when the hand left her mouth. “Lâchez-moi immédiatement! Coquins! Vermines!” The only response was a foul-smelling scarf, tied so tightly around her mouth that it jerked her head back.
Still shouting, though her words were muffled, Olivia twisted, trying to kick the man pinning her to the ground. But her captor swiftly wound a rope around her wrists, hauled her upright, and gave her a rough shove.
“Allez!” The word sounded with the ping of a fat hailstone striking a window. Then a poke between the shoulders forced her forward. “Avance!”
She walked, telling herself that Quin would be there any moment, that the English soldiers would wake to discover her missing. She caught a glimpse of the sleeve of the man shoving her. It was ragged and blue, the kind of thick fisherman’s shirt she remembered seeing on a childhood trip to Brittany. Not a soldier’s uniform. Her heart was pounding so hard that she could feel the pulse in her ears.
By the time they broke out of the wood, the eastern sky was lightening. They continued to walk, through thick scrub, the smell of the sea keen in the wind. Olivia tried biting at the scarf in order to get it away from her mouth, but to no avail. She intentionally stumbled in an attempt to slow them down, but the man simply hauled her upright and thumped her in the back with something hard.
These brutish attacks had made her back bruised and painful, and for the first time, she felt truly frightened. A battalion of French soldiers was one thing. Surely they wouldn’t injure a woman, even an English one. But what if this thug belonged to a gang of smugglers? Or pirates? Or just common criminals?
The possibilities were all unpleasant.