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When his shoulder connected with the hard street stones, he felt the jarring pain in every limb and his gaze narrowed into a hazy, black tunnel. The stone was cool and wet against his cheek. The movement above him was shadowy and indistinct—a man though.
The pain stopped, which Roman knew was a bad sign. Maybe he had no more fight in him. Maybe this would be his last. But it couldn’t be, could it? Now that he’d finally found her.
Blood, or maybe sweat, trickled from his forehead and down the side of his face. The sound of his heart tripped hard to the exclusion of any other sound and that, too, slowly faded to nothingness.
* * * * *
“Mi’lord?” Joaquin shook Roman awake, his eyes opening with the grit of a thousand sandstorms.
“Joaquin.” His voice croaked. “I’m still alive.” He touched his side, remembering why he was still in pain and not ensconced in a comfortable bed with his wife. And were it not for said wife, he might wish he were dead.
“The mistress is insane, mi’lord. Her worry is like the vast ocean.”
“You didn’t tell her, did you?”
“You told me not to, so I didn’t. But she saw that I was leaving the inn and she demanded to know where I was going. I lied to her, mi’lord. I’ve never lied to her before. She will kill me, and I will end up in hell.”
“Help me up.”
Joaquin took Roman’s arm and slipped his other hand to Roman’s back. “Are you sure you should sit up? The doctor might want you to sleep more. You should be dead, he said. If you die, you will kill my mistress and then what will I do?”
Roman grunted, then closed his eyes for a bit to stop the world from spinning. “Joaquin?” he said, his teeth gritted.
“Mi’lord?”
“Please stop talking.” He took a deep breath and dared to open his eyes a second time. “Did you bring my clothes?”
“Oh,sí. All that you asked for,” Joaquin said, pointing to the valise he’d dropped on the floor.
Roman nodded. It had been three days since he’d been stabbed. This wasn’t the first time he experienced such a gruesome injury. He hoped it would be the last, because one of these days such an injury would kill him.
Since he’d opened his eyes, jostled by the men who had carried him to safety, only one thing had tormented him: Shelene.
He had promised so much.
Shelene would not forgive him for what he was about to do. But such were the decisions he had to make every day, and this one might be the most important of his life.
Protecting her was all that mattered. Somehow, he’d convinced himself that his vocation, now in its final throes, had become less dangerous. How wrong he was.
He reached for the two letters. “Take these. Deliver them directly and wait for a response. Come back here as soon as you can.”
Now that Jamichele was dead, he had to reach out to other confidants to aid him. It would be weeks before he’d regain his full strength. He needed help until then.
“Joaquin, will your mother be able to manage without you? For several months?”
He laughed. “My mother? Mi’lord, I am the youngest of six boys. She does not need me. She only wants to make sure I avoid sin with pretty women.” He lowered his voice. “Orbonita putas.”
“That’s not a bad thing, boy. When you return, I have a proposal for you. One your mother may find objectionable.”
“But not your lady?”
“Go.”
Shelene would object most of all.
Joaquin grabbed the letters and disappeared from Roman’s room. The door slammed behind him.
Roman braced his hands against the mattress, wincing at the pain of his wound and the overall abuse his body had taken. He had to see Shelene today. Of course, he had sent her a note the moment he’d opened his eyes, but he had not seen her nor had he told her what had happened, only that he had been unavoidably detained—a common way to say something without it being an actual lie.
