“He had it coming,”she said in no uncertain terms. “Marie got Desta, and I was left with nothing. Worse, it was all taken from me. The king had it coming, and so does the rest of his family for what they did to mine.”
Warm kisses trail along my forehead and cheek, and myeyes slowly open. I blink and move at the same time, and it’s a horrible mistake. A pained gasp rips from my throat, and I still.
“Fuck. I’m sorry! Hold on.” He moves and pulls up a remote with a button on it. “Here.” He clicks the button. “Give that a minute, it’ll help.”
Slowly, I relax, sinking back into the bed. It is helping, and my eyes close as I release the breath I was holding. Rowan sits up, twisting his back and neck to work out stiffness. I can’t believe he slept in my hospital bed with me. That couldn’t have been comfortable.
A piece of my dream flickers back through my memory, and I twist my head to him. “You asked me about Marie. I never told you.”
He stands and runs his hands over his head, tousling his already sleep-mussed hair more. He picks some sleep out of his eyes and drops into the chair beside the bed. “How do you know about her? How do you know her name and that she took Desta?” he asks instead of answering my questions.
“Because she’s Antonia’s half-sister. I’ve met her.”
All the color drains from his face, and his hands fall limply in front of him as he gapes at me. “You’vemether? When?”
I’m so confused right now. “Um…I don’t remember exactly. The last time I saw her was two years ago, maybe.”
He blinks at me and shoots to his feet, his hands interlocking behind his head, and he breathes hard as he paces my room.
“Marcella…” he starts, then stops. “Fuck. Two years ago? Are you sure?”
“Yes. Why? What is this?”
“Was Desta with her?”
“No.”
He spins and stares me down. “Do you know what happened to my sister? Is she alive?”
Now it’s my turn to blink, utterly at a loss for words. “I don’tknow. All that was ever said about her to me was that Marie took her and Antonia hated her. Twisted. Antonia kept saying everything got twisted up.”
“What does that mean?”
I close my eyes as I think back. “I don’t know. They screamed at each other, and Marie made a lot of threats at Antonia that Antonia threw back in her face. It wasn’t anything specific. That was it.”
He gulps, looking wrecked.
“Rowan…” I don’t know what to say.
“I’m sorry. It’s just shocking to me that I’ve been searching for the woman who killed my father and took my sister, and you’ve met her.”
My eyebrows take a nosedive, and I tilt my head, my confusion growing. “Marie didn’t kill your father. Antonia did.”
“What?” he bellows, startling me.
The door flings open, and a nurse walks in, her gaze casting back and forth between us. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes,” I tell her. “Everything’s fine.” Except the look on Rowan’s face tells me that everything is not fine.
“Okay.” She looks nervously at Rowan, then back at me. “I’ll return with your breakfast soon and to examine you. We’d like to get you up and get that catheter out of you.”
“Wonderful. I’d like that too.” Because peeing into a bag isn’t my favorite thing. “Thank you.”
“Press the button if you need anything.” Her tone is pointed, but Rowan isn’t going to hurt me.
The nurse leaves us, and Rowan comes straight over to me and holds my face in his hands, his eyes directly in front of mine. “Repeat what you just said to me.”
“Antonia killed your father.”