Page 34

CHAPTER 33

“W hy don’t we cut the shit and get right to the point?” Tristan said, realizing that he’d never regretted anything more in his life than not locking Marty’s ass up and keeping her out of this.

She was frightened, but instead of admitting that, she was doing her best to hide it, determined not to miss a single syllable of this bullshit. She didn’t need to be here. This was his problem and he would take care of it. He knew that she wanted answers and he would give them to her, but he didn’t want to do it like this.

He didn’t know what these men wanted or what they were going to say, and he didn’t want one of them scaring her again. She was doing her best to hide it, but he could feel the slight trembling of her arm. The death grip that she had on his leg also clued him into the fact that Marty wasn’t taking this whole thing as calmly as she would like them to believe.

“Why don’t we start from the beginning?” Liam suggested, sounding as though he wasn’t sure that was a good idea.

Tristan looked around the room, his fingers lightly caressing Marty’s arm, and took in the stoic expressions on the other men’s face. When his gaze landed on Shayne, he wasn’t surprised to find him standing there, trying to hide his worry behind a forced smile that told him everything that he needed to know.

He was truly fucked.

“We were all born in-” Liam began, but Tristan cut him off, refusing to allow one more second to pass without finding out about the only thing that mattered to him.

“Are you here to harm my wife?” he demanded, ignoring Marty’s startled gasp and the few muttered curses that exploded around the room, keeping his eyes locked on the man that he’d already determined to be the leader of this group.

“No,” Liam said, sighing heavily as he shifted back in the chair. “We’re here to protect her and the boy.”

“What boy?” Marty asked, moving to sit up, but a gentle touch from Tristan had her lying back down. There was no doubt in his mind that if she tried to sit up right now that she would either pass out or make herself sick. She was ghostly white, her skin was cool to the touch and she couldn’t seem to stop trembling even with the thick blanket tucked in around her.

Biting back a grimace of pain, Tristan leaned over and grabbed the blanket folded on the back of the couch and pulled it over Marty. She sent him an annoyed look even as she grabbed the edge of the extra blanket and pulled it up to her chin. He was grateful when several of the men suddenly appeared around the couch and started fussing over Marty, adding a third blanket and tucking her in. When they were done, they disappeared just as quickly as they had appeared and returned to their respective spots around the room.

“We’re here to ensure that ye and yer son get the chance to live a long and happy life, Macha,” Liam explained softly.

Marty’s grip on his leg tightened past the point of pain, which was a blessing since it took his attention away from the agonizing pain shooting down his arm and the back of his head. “What about Tristan?” she asked, even though she probably already knew the answer. He knew Marty well enough to know that she needed to hear it before she could accept it.

After a slight pause, Liam confirmed his suspicions. “He can’t stay, Macha.”

“Stop calling me that!” Marty snapped, her voice cracking and this time when he tried to stop her from sitting up, she shoved his hand away.

“Marty, relax,” Tristan said, putting his good arm around her and pulled her against him. She tried to fight him, but she was too tired to do anything more than shove weakly at him. Once he had her tucked into his side, she gave up and simply curled up against him, her head on his shoulder as she laid her hand across his chest, careful of his old wound.

“They’re not taking you,” Marty said stubbornly, her voice breaking as she tried to stay calm, but this was too much for her.

“I’m taking you upstairs,” Tristan said, fully expecting her to put up a fight so when she merely nodded against his shoulder, he was a little surprised, but apparently the other men in the room weren’t.

“Ye can’t escape, lass,” Quinn said with a shrug.

“There’s no use in trying, lass. We’ll just find ye,” Finn added softly.

“If ye leave without our protection, ye won’t last another night, Lass,” Declean explained.

“I-I wasn’t going to try and run,” Marty said, but Tristan knew her well enough to know that she was lying her beautiful ass off.

“Every time we have this talk, ye always try to escape,” Connall pointed out.

“And it never works out well, lass. So, do us all a favor and just let Liam tell ye what ye need to know,” Quinn said, gesturing lazily to the man.

“How do you know that it’s a boy?” Marty asked, changing the subject, but not letting it go. There was no doubt in his mind that she was even at this moment trying to figure out how they were going to get away from these men.

They weren’t.

Well, at least, he wasn’t. The first opportunity that he got, he was sending her away and Shayne, the betraying bastard, was going to take care of her. He didn’t know how he was going to do it yet, but he’d figure something out.

“I think that it would be for the best if we started from the beginning,” Liam said in a hard tone that let them know the time for questions was over. Knowing that they didn’t have much of a choice and needing time to figure out a way to sneak Marty out of the house, Tristan nodded.

“As I’m sure ye’ve figured out, we’re all brothers,” Liam began and Tristan didn’t need any clarification to know that Liam included him, but he added it anyway. “All of us are yer brothers, Tadgh.”

“We were all born in Ireland a long time ago,” Liam continued only to be interrupted by Marty.

“How long is a long time ago?” she asked, shifting until she was snuggled up tightly against his side. She sounded calm, but the slight trembling of her voice gave her away. She was terrified and it killed him that there was absolutely nothing that he could do about it.

“We’re not entirely sure of the date,” Shayne admitted with a shrug.

“For several generations, our family managed to rule our own lands and live in relative peace without drawing the attention of our king,” Liam began as Tristan noted that all the men but one either looked down at his feet or looked away as though the action would save them from this conversation. Shayne kept his gaze locked on Tristan, looking terrified and resigned to the fate that awaited Tristan as the story continued.

“Our Da died shortly before ye were born, Tadgh, leaving it up to us to protect ye and Ma and do whatever it took to keep our lands. Things were different back then and it wasn’t unheard of for a lad to take over the job of a man.”

“By the time Da died, most of us had already been doing a man’s work and using a sword to protect our land, but we were still just lads. That attracted a lot of unwanted attention by men that would do anything to have what we had. Without that land, we would have had no way to provide for ye and for Ma, so we did what we had to do to keep it.”

Shayne smoothly cut in, taking over. “When we weren’t taking turns patrolling our land or working, we were training. Sometimes, we’d get lucky and we could barter with a trained soldier needing to cross our lands or needing a meal in exchange for more training.”

“But that wasn’t enough,” Declean explained, taking over. “We needed to keep our people loyal and that was difficult to do with only a handful of lads left to protect them, so we each took a turn selling our oaths to whichever king was willing to pay and train us to be mercenaries.”

“Three of us at a time would leave and go train while the rest would protect the land, our people, and ye and Ma. When we were done, we’d share what we learned and switch places,” Finn said, taking over and sounding as though he were reciting a well-rehearsed part in a play. “By the time that ye were becoming a man, our reputation alone protected our lands.”

“No one dared to cross us or try and take what was ours,” Connall bit out before Liam once again took over.

“We used our skills and coins to expand our lands and make sure that our people never went a day without food. We were well respected and feared throughout the lands. As long as we minded our own business, we were left alone by our king.”

Liam looked directly at him, a sad smile curving his lips slightly as he said, “But that all changed when he learned about ye, lad.”

“What did Tristan have to do with it?” Marty asked softly as he struggled to wrap his mind around what they were telling them.

“The king wanted a killing machine, someone that he could trust to put his duties and oath above all else,” Liam explained as he looked at Shayne.

“And that wasn’t us, lad,” Shayne said, his voice thick with regret. “We couldn’t be bought. Our loyalty belonged to our family and no amount of coin or promises of more land would change that and he knew it.”

“Ye were the youngest of eight men who were looking to start families of their own soon. No matter what we said or promised, Ma was afraid that ye were going to be left without any land of yer own, and back then, Tadgh, that could have easily been a death sentence,” Finn explained before Liam once again took over telling the story that was supposed to somehow explain this crazy mess.

“Ye were about eight years old when Ma went behind our backs and gave ye to the king in exchange for his protection. He made promises that ye would be well-settled when it was time for ye to start yer own family.”

“Wait a second,” Marty said, interrupting them before they could go any further, “I thought you said that he was a man by the time that you were done training.”

“Back then, he was, lass,” Declean said with a shrug. “He worked as a man and trained like a man and to us, that made him a man.”

Before Marty could ask any more questions, Liam continued. “Ma loved ye, lad, and she did what she thought was best,” he explained as though Tristan really gave a damn.

“By the time that we found out what she did, it was too late. Ye belonged to the king until yer service to him was completed.”

“How long was that?” Tristan found himself asking, having absolutely no delusions about what kind of life that would have been for a child.

“Ye were promised until ye were twenty-five,” Liam said harshly, looking pissed. “The bastard took advantage and convinced Ma to give ye what could have easily been a life sentence in his army.”

“Were you able to get him out?” Marty asked as she shifted into a more comfortable position against him, causing his injured shoulder to brush up against the couch and forcing him to ignore the black dots that danced along his vision.

“Getting him out wasn’t a choice, lass,” Shayne said softly as he gestured for Liam to continue.

“Stealing from our king would have meant that we forfeited not only our lives, but that of our mother’s and of his. We had no choice but to allow it. But we did find a way to protect him.”

“How?” Marty demanded, not sounding pleased by this story. There was no doubt in his mind that she was imagining the innocent child in her womb being forced into a fucked-up situation like that and hating every second of it. Not that she would ever have to worry about someone harming their child because he would kill anyone that even thought about trying.

“Shayne gave his oath to the king in exchange for the right to protect Tadgh during training and battle,” Liam said, gesturing to Shayne.

“It was a right that we all wanted, but Shayne won the honor,” Quinn added solemnly.

“We would have all been there to protect ye, lad, if given the choice,” Aidan explained.

“There was no doubt that Shayne would keep ye safe, lad,” Connall said without looking at them.

When Shayne suddenly looked away, Tristan knew that Shayne hadn’t been able to keep his promise.

“Tell me,” Tristan said, keeping his eyes locked on Shayne.

Sighing heavily, Shayne shifted his gaze back to Tristan so that he could glare at him.

“Ye got us sentenced to death on the first day, ye stubborn bastard!”