Page 20 of Robin and Marian
He turned silent. Instead of her words deflating him, they seemed to do the opposite. She detected a glimmer of hope rush through his features. “Stop fighting it, then,” he said suddenly. “Don’t you remember? You’remyMaid Marian.”
“You’re not allowed to call me that.”
“I am…” He stepped closer. “I won a wager.”
A tapping against a microphone interrupted their argument, and they both looked up to see Richard on the elevated stage. The conversations in the crowd faded and heads turned. The hype of the evening could very well be culminating to this moment if he chose to announce his successor. It would either be Scarlett or Guy.
Richard smiled gently, his back bowed as he shifted his weight. “Now, don’t get too excited,” he said in his usual gruff tone. “I’m not naming who’s inheriting this evening. I’ll save that for the end of our festivities next week.” An audible groan followed the announcement, and he held up his hands. “No, I wanted to take this moment to…” He cleared his throat, then cleared it again. He was getting emotional. “I need to apologize, I think. There are those in my life who will be given all that I have. They will always be with me, but there is someone else here with us. He’s our own prodigal son, so to speak. He was dead to me, but now he’s alive again. I let him wallow in the bowels of prison for a while without a word from me, but I believe I was… wrong to do that. The years have changed him. And now, it’s time to kill the fatted calf, so to speak.”
With a sinking feeling, Marian saw the glares turn on Robin with crushing force. Somewhere, Little John let out a snort. Richard shouldn’t have drawn attention to his grandson. Half of this town hated him. The other half had moved out after the hardships he’d brought on them. The only reason anyone attended Richard’s party was to lend their support to a man they’d known for years or to keep up on the latest gossip. No one here had it in them for this kind of mercy, not even his sister.
“And so, Robin…” Richard held up a ring of keys with the Porsche insignia engraved on them. “I’m giving you something that will help you outrun your troubles and start a new life.”
She felt herself stiffen. He was giving Robin a Porsche? After everything that he’d done to these people? Or was this the way things had always been? Had Robin always been this spoiled, entitled brat? No wonder he thought he could just pick up where he’d left off with her. Why hadn’t Marian seen that before? She hoped the reminder would help her get over him.
“Come!” Richard gestured Robin to him with the keys. “Come, my boy.”
Robin’s jaw turned hard like a rock and he shook his head. Marian knew that the only reason he was embarrassed was that he was getting called out on his privilege in front of everyone.
His grandfather cracked a self-conscious smile, and strangely, Robin shifted under it. “I know this can’t make up for not seeing us for four years. I did that to you. I stopped anyone from coming. I don’t know how else to make up for what I did. Please. Please accept this as my apology.”
How dare Robin think he had the right to lecture Marian when this was how disagreements were resolved at home? He’d been reckless, impetuous, and now Richard was making the problem worse, trying to bandage everything with his money, rewarding Robin when he should be punished.
“No wonder you thought there were no real consequences,” she whispered to him. Shock let the words tumble out. “Going to prison was the only time you had to pay for anything.”
He broke away from her then, pushing through the crowd to reach his grandfather. The scathing glare he’d placed on her before he did left her in no doubt as to his true feelings. He took the keys from Richard with a broken look and then a forced smile.
Chapter 7
Robin endured the pats against his back until Richard left him to himself again. He wanted out of there and didn’t care who saw him. He’d already lost Marian—he saw that now. She only saw him as what he’d been before all this—even worse, a thief. That was his fault. There was nothing for him to do but to play this act to its end, all the way to the entitled grandson. He stuffed the keys into his jacket pocket and tried to keep his eyes from going back to her.
He’d wanted to take her in his arms, not fight with her. She was gorgeous in that beautiful pink dress cinched in at her trim waist. It draped becomingly over her hips like a Grecian goddess. Maybe he’d never deserved her, but he liked to believe that she had felt something for him. Who knew the wasted time he’d spent thinking of her in prison?Every waking moment, to be exact.The thought of her had kept him alive, and she’d taken a blender to his already raw heart. The injustice of what she’d said rankled through him. This had never been about him. None of it had! He’d paid for everything he’d ever done and more.
Tuck ambled over to him, patting Robin’s chest where he’d slipped the keys into his suit pocket. “Let’s take the Porsche for a test drive!” Tuck suggested.
Making sure that he hadn’t just been pickpocketed again, Robin switched the keys to a different pocket while stumbling blindly for the arches that led out of the courtyard.
Tuck hurried to keep up with him, rearranging his doggy bags under his arms—who knew who’d provided that? He chattered the whole time. “Hey, don’t let me down. I’ve got a thousand on you.”
“What are you talking about now?” Robin noticed how hoarse his voice sounded, and he fought to regain his legendary indifference as they entered into the long hallway outside the courtyard.
“Well, the new bet is how long it’ll take for you to break parole.”
Robin wasn’t in the mood for Tuck’s shenanigans. “You mean, like right now, because you’re standing here with me?”
Tuck blinked. “Actually, I said you’d last four days.”
“You bet against me?”
He snickered. Apparently that didn’t deserve an answer.
The utility room door opened and almost whacked Tuck in the side. The worker behind it muttered an apology, pushing out a cart of towels and garbage bags. When his eyes settled on Robin, they narrowed before he hurried away, leaving the door swinging.
Robin let out an uneven breath and leaned against the wall. “They all hate me.”
Tuck pulled next to him. “If you leave now, Old Man Pete is going to collect $20.” Ol’ Man Pete? As in Peter Shelley, the old man who wouldn’t lower himself to talk to Robin, even before all this went down? It figured that Tuck had broken through his gruff reserve.
“How many bets do you have going on me?” Robin asked.
