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A familiar warmth settled across his shoulders. Comforting words whispered in his ear.
He spun to catch her before she disappeared, but the room was empty. Just the feeling of Ysbel stayed. Laughed at his fear.
He pulled the ring from his pocket. “I’ve kept it. Never let it out of my sight—” Amended his words. “Well, except once or twice. And if you knew Ellery, you’d understand what I was up against.”
He sensed that Ysbel listened and was highly amused. “What do you think of her?” He smiled as words took shape in his mind. Highly expressive words with a few idiots thrown in for emphasis. “You’re right. I should have told her a long time ago.” There was another long pause when he felt the soft-spoken iron will that had marked his sister in life, felt it telling him what he must do. And because Ysbel asked it of him, and because he knew—as usual—she was right, he would.
He stood at the water’s edge, skimming pebbles across the wave tops. The bandage wound tight across his ribs hampered his distance, but his aim remained true. He picked another from the rocky strand, flipped it in his palm before letting it fly out across the water. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Before it sank.
“Not bad,” came a voice as familiar to him as his own. Ellery rounded the point, wind whipping her skirts, her dark hair blowing free of its bonnet. “But I’ve been practicing while you’ve been laid up.”
“Then you should be the world’s best stone-skipper. You’ve had plenty of time to train.”
She wrinkled her nose at him, her spray of freckles hidden in her sun-browned face. “You don’t sound convinced.”
He bent to gather a handful. “Let’s say, I’m skeptical.” Dropping half in her open palm, he stood back. “Challengers first.”
She stepped up to the edge of the waves, her light summer gown a tease of veiled curves and exposed flesh. His whole body throbbed with suppressed desire. It had been much, much too long.
“Ready?” she asked over her shoulder, shocking him back from the imagined indecent scene tightening his groin.
He cleared his throat, changed position. “Proceed.” Whipping her arm out, the pebble shot out across the water. Bounced five times then sank.
“Damn,” she muttered.
He smiled at the easy profanity. So Ellery. Mother had told him of at least two proper matrons who’d been scandalized already by Ellery’s lack of airs. But one had been Mrs. Bushy who’d lost a potential husband for her daughters so she didn’t really count.
She stalked back up the shingle, her hem soaked and dripping. “Your turn, but I get another chance. The wind was wrong. And the stone was too light. And I slipped during my release.”
He laughed. “Excuses. Excuses.”
Taking his place at the water’s edge, he planted his feet in the prints left by her shoes. “No advantage. I’ll toss from the same spot.”
June storm clouds gathered to the southwest. His gaze was drawn to their soft, feathered underbellies. To the misty rain already falling out across the water. And he knew now was the time.
He dropped the pebbles. Dug into his pocket. Pulled out Ysbel’s
ring.
“What have you got there?” Ellery shouted.
He held it up, rolling it between thumb and forefinger, his eye moving steadily between the rain showers, the ring, and the sea.
“Conor.” She started toward him, the gravel crunching loud beneath her feet. His focus never wavered. “What are you doing?”
Her steps came faster as his arm drew back. She was almost running by the time he flung the ring out over the waves. Grabbed him before it had even hit the water.
“What the hell are you doing? That was Ysbel’s.” He tore his gaze from the spot where the ring had disappeared. Settled it on Ellery. “She doesn’t need it anymore.” He took a deep breath. For the first time since Ysbel’s death, it felt easy. Sweet. Without shame or guilt to sour every lungful of air. “I don’t need it anymore.”
Ellery remained staring at him as if he’d lost his mind. He offered her a lopsided smile. “She asked me to let her go. Told me I had too much to live for to stay tied to a ghost.”
Twisting his wrist in a clever move, he put his hand to her ear. Brought it back down with another wolf-head ring rolled between his fingers.
She shook her head. “You didn’t throw it.”
He moved the ring so the sapphire eyes gleamed bright in the fading sun. “I’d not lie to you.”
She gave a quick, stunned gasp.
