Now they walked by the light of the moon and the stars. Under other circumstances it would have been magically beautiful, but she had little time or thought for beauty.
The tramp of their feet and the panting of the dog were the only sounds to break the mountain stillness. They set a fast pace and when they paused at the top of a slope to catch their breath Teresa tore a piece of bread from the loaf in her basket, handing it without a word to Emma. She nodded her thanks and ripped at it with her teeth as they continued walking.
The dog had resumed his patrol of the path on all sides of them. Just as they swallowed the last of the bread, he suddenly froze two paces ahead. He stood immobile, only his ears betraying him with a slight twitch every few seconds. Emma’s palms instantly turned sweaty, and her heart began to pound. She put out a hand to Teresa to halt the girl’s steps behind her.
Strange how silence could sometimes convey greater menace than the most violent noise. She peered into the gloom, trying to see what Mickey had seen, to hear what he had heard. Was it an animal that had set Mickey to quivering? Or the Blackshirts? Or Giovanni?
“Buona sera, signorine.”
The whisper came from behind and above. Emma twisted around so fast that she wrenched her sore ankle and grabbed at Teresa to stop herself from falling. She looked up slowly, the taste of fear metallic in her mouth, sapping logical thought. Perhaps if she’d had any mental capacity left, she would have felt astonished that he was here. As it was, his presence simply seemed inevitable.
Marco leaned against a large rock balanced above the path, feet crossed, a rifle dangling from one hand, the other hand shoved into his pocket, his long body dappled by the shadows cast by the starlight. A lingering ray from the sliver of moon highlighted several days’ worth of whiskers that darkened his face, emphasizing the strong planes and angles of his cheekbones and jaw. A straight lock of dark hair fell over his brow, hiding his eyes, making her want to push it away.
If it were not for the fact that the rifle pointed so steadily at them, he would have been the picture of careless indolence. But she didn’t make the mistake of confusing appearance with reality. He would never be careless around her again.
He was only a few feet away. He didn’t smile, wasn’t near enough to touch her, but she felt his presence in every cell of her body. Mickey growled in his throat and immediately the rifle shifted slightly to cover the animal. Emma moved to step in front of the dog, but sank to the ground at the stabbing pain in her ankle. She could not prevent a sob. The dog shoved a wet nose against her neck and she pushed him gently away.
Marco moved loosely down to a lower ledge. The rifle did not waver. He was close enough now that she looked directly into the black, malevolent hole of the barrel.
“A dog and two people who should not be here,” he said in a low murmur. He glanced at Teresa. “What is the meaning of this?”
Teresa moved forward and spoke in rapid Italian. Short, fast questions and answers fired between them, and Emma heard the name of Giovanni. Marco handed the gun to Teresa and turned back to Emma. He knelt down beside her and took her ankle in his warm, hard hands. The dog shifted nervously, but did not warn him off with a growl this time.
“It’s all right, Mickey,” she murmured. She looked up at Marco, tears blurring her eyes. They came from an equal mixture of relief at seeing him, and the pain in her throbbing ankle.
He held her gaze for a long moment. “Giovanni returned to us with his story,” he said simply. “He is on patrol.”
Her heart sank. She could imagine the pack of lies Giovanni had told. She shook her head. “He’s making his way to the Blackshirts to betray you.”
Quickly she told him what his cousin had said. His lips grew thin and tight, and the color drained from around his mouth. He shook his head in denial.
“If you don’t believe me,” Emma said, “find Giovanni. If you do, call him back from patrol and let me confront him.” She caught hold of his arm. “What did he tell you?” She scanned his face and let out her breath. “I can imagine what he said. Did he say I seduced him?”
“Yes.” His tone was flat, without emotion.
Anger sparked. “Not true. He meant to rape me. I was terrified for my life. I hit him before he could do more than kiss me.” She dropped her voice. “Even that was too much.”
“He tried to rape you?”
She saw the raw fury in his eyes and touched his shoulder. “He didn’t succeed. I swear it. I fought him. When he came after me, I nearly bit his ear off.”
She gazed at him anxiously, unable to tell what he was thinking from the expression on his face. The pain in her heart at the thought he might not believe her was greater than the pain in her twisted ankle.
She wanted to scream at him that he was supposed to trust her, that she had given him enough proof of her worthiness, but she knew he had to think his way through the news she had brought. Giovanni was his cousin, his own blood, who had worked with him for years.
By contrast she was a piece of flotsam thrown up by the sea, who had been only too willing to lie with a man she barely knew. How could she make him realize the danger he was in? What would it take for him to believe in her once more?
He lowered his eyes to her leg again and pressed the swelling flesh of her leg with expert hands. “Nothing broken,” he said. “Can you stand?”
“Of course I can.”
She pulled herself to her feet by holding his arms, but she never made it fully upright.
She remained still, clinging to him, not from choice, but because she knew she was incapable of taking a step. Her head spun from the pain, from weariness, from all the emotions she had lived through. Dizziness preempted any protest when his arms came around her, holding her.
Everything swirled around her, whirling faster and faster until her legs crumpled under her. Somehow she’d lost the ability to make them bear her weight. She needed the strength of his arms or she would topple over.
Marco felt her sag against him. With a word to Teresa to make sure she kept the gun at the ready, he swung Emma into his arms. She gave a tiny sigh as he settled her head on his chest. A combination of nervous exhaustion and pain had drained the last remaining dregs of color from her face, leaving her deathly pale. A faint blue tinge ringed her mouth and her eyes were closed. He felt the beat of his heart thudding against her cheek and knew she must feel it too. The intimacy was wonderfully familiar.
He wanted to believe her account of what had happened with Giovanni. Although he did not want his cousin to be proved a traitor, neither did he want to believe Emma could seduce another man. She owned such a large portion of his heart that he had been torn apart at the thought.
He’d tasted the black despair caused by her supposed faithlessness, but his reaction to Giovanni’s story had been the pure instinct of a wounded animal. Now there was another witness. Teresa had explained how Emma had walked back to the caves to find him. Her story made sense. The hours he had spent with his bella donna, the knowledge he had of her nature, assured him that she did not lie. Emma was still his. Despite what this meant about Giovanni, he wanted to throw his head back and crow his relief and delight into the dark night.
Unable to help himself, he brushed her forehead with his lips. Her eyelids fluttered and opened. Dio, but she had beautiful eyes. They drew him into their depths like a thirsty man seeking water. Every glance bewitched him and lured him more surely under her spell. For the past few hours she had never been far from his thoughts, although he’d tried to bury his feelings for her under layers of activity and anger. Confronted with the reality of her body in his arms, those layers were proving fragile and insubstantial.