Page 30 of Thus with a Kiss I Die
He gave that bark of a laugh, then lifted my hand to his lips and kissed it. “We progress.”
“About time,” Elder’s voice chimed.
Way to spoil the moment.Exasperated, I asked, “Would you go away?”
“Until justice is done, I fear we’re stuck with each other,” Elder said.
Cal glanced around. “My father again, I presume? How long has he been here?”
Elder clarified, “I merely observed briefly.”
“Because I must say,” Cal told me, “knowing my father can linger through any intimate moment lends our encounters an element of horror I haven’t felt since my adolescence.”
Elder barked a laugh that was more full-bodied than Cal’s, more openly amused, but still so similar as to send a chill up my spine. “I’ll be in the dining room.” He made that ridiculous little pop-out sound and disappeared.
“He’s gone.” I tightened my grip on Cal’s hand, a practical grasp that vanquished all sense of dalliance, and pulled him to his feet. Releasing him, I said, “Let us return to reassure my family you now comprehend the reasons we must linger at the church door for yet a while.”
“Yes, let us do so.” He straightened his doublet, then stalked ahead down the corridor. “But I don’t like it.”
CHAPTER17
Icaught up with Cal. “You have no relatives whom we must invite to the wedding?”
He slowed. “Uncle Yago and his wife, Lugrezia.”
“Right.” I glanced around the great walk as if expecting them to materialize. “Don’t they live in Verona? Shouldn’t they be here? Now? At your table awaiting their dinner?”
“They were invited. So yes. They were quite surly about my marriage to my Chiarretta. It seems history repeats itself.”
“‘Surly’? That makes no sense. If you remove from this world without heirs, your uncle will inherit the role of podestà, will he not?”
“He flatters himself so. He certainly intended it when my father was murdered, and my aunt vociferously urged him on, but he faltered at the last moment.”
“‘Faltered’? Why?” I viewed the still, smooth countenance that, now that I knew how, gave clarity to the subject. “Not out of loyalty and kindness to you, I assume?”
“Uncle Yago’s greatest concern is his health, which he laments daily.”
At once, I recalled Elder’s belief that he’d stabbed the assassin with the tip of his knife, and I asked, “What issue has he?”
“At the same time my father was dispatched by so cowardly a villain, my uncle had been celebrating with friends the Leonardi triumph over the Acquasassos. On his way home, sabotage delayed his sedan chair. He barely fended off an attack by armed knaves. The wound to his abdomen has never healed—or so he claims. My uncle has always been a man of many vapors and ill humors, much disgruntlement and discontent.”
“Hm.” Had Uncle Yago drugged Elder and worn the assassin’s devil’s mask?
“When he dies, I swear his tombstone will say, ‘See, I told you I was sick.’ ”
Startled from my grim concentrations, I burst into laughter hearty enough to bring tears to my eyes.
Cal stopped to view me as if the burst of unreserved merriment unnerved him.
Had I offended?I promptly brought myself under control and glanced around. “Is it inappropriate for me to laugh here?”
“No. Not at all! Don’t stop. Your laughter is delightful.”
“Why do you stare at me in such astonishment?”
He spoke with painful slowness. “I can’t remember the last time someone laughed out loud in this palace. I can’t remember if anyone has ever laughed so restrainedly at some small witticism I said.”
Without a thought to my “don’t touch” policy, I tucked my hand into his arm. “That was no small witticism. I don’t know your uncle, but that was funny.” Now that I knew I could, I grinned.
