Page 87 of Black Heart

When Connall’s glare landed on her, she felt a chill race down her spine and when he answered his brother, she felt like her world was about to crumble down around her.

“Aye.”

CHAPTER33

“Why 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.

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