Chapter Eighteen #3
He shushed her softly, putting a gentle finger over her lips to keep her from chattering nervously.
“Listen to me, please,” he murmured. “I went to Norham Castle on my way home from Falkirk those months ago. It is the stronghold of de Longley, the Earl of Teviot, and a more fortified place I have never seen. I asked for your father but it was your mother who met me. You look a lot like her, actually. I also met your brother’s children.
Your mother was minding them. Your brother, Corbin, lives at Norham, too, although he was not at the castle the day I was there. ”
The expression of fear on Diamantha’s face was increasing. “Cortez,” she said, her throat tight with tears. “What about my father?”
He sighed heavily, bringing her hands to his lips and kissing them tenderly.
“I informed your mother of Rob’s death and told her my business,” he explained.
“Because of Rob’s passing, she did not want me to tell you what had happened.
About your father. She thought it would be too much for you to take in addition to the death of your husband and I promised her that I would not tell you, at least not right away.
But I find I can no longer keep it from you, not when you are asking me direct questions about your father.
I will not lie to you. Sweetheart, your father passed away a week before Robert met his death at Falkirk.
Your mother said he died in his sleep and that it was very peaceful. He did not suffer.”
Diamantha stared at him. As he watched, her eyes grew wider and wider and suddenly she gasped as if she had been struck in the gut. Her hands flew to her mouth to hold back the scream of anguish.
“Nay!” she shrieked. “It cannot be!”
Cortez felt so very badly for her. He put his arms around her, trying to pull her close.
“I am so very sorry, my love,” he consoled.
“I am so sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings. Your mother assured me that your father had spoken of you very recently, musing over the granddaughter he had not yet seen. She wanted you to be comforted in the fact that your father loved you dearly and that he is now at peace.”
Diamantha broke into gut-busting sobs, her face buried in her hands as she wept her grief. Over by the animal cage, Sophie heard her mother crying and she stood up with a kitten in her arms, looking at her mother with great concern.
“My Papa,” Diamantha wept. “I want my Papa.”
Cortez could feel a lump in his throat as he rocked her gently, his eyes on Sophie as the little girl padded over to the bed, her attention on her weeping mother. Sophie tugged on her mother’s skirt.
“Mama?” she asked. “Are you sad?”
Diamantha was nearly hysterical. She pulled away from Cortez, sharply, and swept her daughter into her arms, weeping all over the girl. Her grief was a palpable thing, bleeding over onto everything she touched.
“My papa is dead,” she sobbed. “Just like your papa is dead, Sophie. Now we are the same. Neither of us has a father.”
She sailed into gales of sobs and Cortez stood up, pulling Sophie from her arms. At this point, Sophie was more confused than anything. As Diamantha threw herself on the bed and wept her heart out, Sophie turned her confused little face to Cortez.
“Papa is dead?” she asked, cocking her head.
Cortez was in damage control mode at this point.
He could feel everything tumbling down around him and he was struggling to stop it.
He knew that Diamantha had not told her daughter of Robert’s passing but in her grief, she had confessed his death to her bewildered daughter.
Sophie was trying to understand all of it. He tried to sound comforting.
“Do you remember when I told you that your father was with the angels?” he asked calmly. “I told you that he was in a place of light and if you are a very good girl, you will get to see him someday. We all go to live with the angels when we die. It is a wonderful place.”
Sophie remembered that conversation. She was a very sharp little girl.
She continued to stare at him with her big, bottomless eyes for a few moments before squirming in his arms, trying to get down.
Cortez put her on her feet, gently, and the child toddled over to her mother, who was sobbing on the bed.
Sophie may have only been three years old, but she was remarkably intuitive.
She knew something was very wrong with her mother and only marginally understood what it was.
It had something to with living with the angels, with people they could no longer see or speak with.
She reached out and put a hand on her mother’s trembling head.
“Mama?” she asked softly. “Mama, do not cry. Papa is living with the angels and if you are a very good girl, you can see him again someday.”
Diamantha’s eyes popped open at the sweet, comforting words coming from her child.
Sophie was trying to ease her pain the only way she knew how.
Cortez had given her words of hope and she, in turn, was giving them to her troubled mother.
Though no longer openly weeping, tears still poured from Diamantha’s eyes as she reached out and stroked her child’s cheek.
“Shall I tell you about my papa?” she asked, sniffling. “You have never met him, but he was a wonderful man. He was very tall, the tallest man you have ever seen and he was a very great knight. He was a great knight like your papa and like Cortez.”
Sophie grinned and she started jumping up and down with the kitten in her arms flapping about. “My papa is very tall,” she said, holding up her arm to emphasize her point. “He is as tall as the clouds.”
Diamantha couldn’t help but grin through her tears.
She reached out and took the kitten out of Sophie’s grip because it was getting whiplash the way her daughter was jerking it around.
The kitten immediately cuddled up next to Diamantha as the woman lay down on her side, reaching out to toy with her daughter’s hair as the little girl stood next to the bed.
“Aye, your papa was very tall,” she murmured, tears still spilling from her eyes. “But my papa was even taller. He was your grandfather. He loved you very much even though he had never seen you. God, he would have loved to have known you.”
She closed her eyes and the tears fell with a vengeance. Cortez, who had stood by silently through the exchanged, moved forward to pick Sophie up. He gave her a gentle hug as he took her back to her pets.
“Play with your animals for a while,” he told her. “I will go and get them some food, and you can stay here with your mother.”
Sophie reached into the cage and pulled the puppy out, who immediately started licking her face. “I want to go and get food, too,” she told him.
Cortez shook his head. “Not this time, sweetheart,” he said. “You have no shoes on. Stay and play with your animals and I will return shortly.”
Sophie didn’t argue with him. She was happy remaining with her animals. Cortez moved away from the child and returned to the bed where Diamantha lay, weeping softly. He knelt down beside the bed and clutched one of her hands.
“I will just be a minute, I swear,” he said. “I want to make sure that food and bath are being sent up. I will bring you some wine myself. Will you be well enough until I return?”
Diamantha’s eyes were closed as she squeezed his hand.
A sob bubbled up from her chest but was quickly silenced.
It was clear that she was fighting to stay lucid, fighting off the pangs of grief.
Hysteria was not normally in her nature but she had been through much where it pertained to the death of loved ones.
She was pushed beyond her endurance and her emotions were brittle.
“I think my father must have been waiting for Robert when he arrived in heaven,” she whispered. “They are together now, I am sure. I wonder if my father knows how much I have missed him.”
Cortez kissed her hand. “He knows,” he confirmed. “By now, he knows everything. He knows that I did not ask him for your hand but I asked your mother instead. I wonder if he will be angry with me about it.”
Diamantha opened her eyes, a smile breaking through the tears. “More than likely, he will be angry with my mother,” she said. “But he could never stay angry at her for long. I think you are safe.”
His dark eyes glimmered at her as he kissed her hand again. “I promise that I will take you to see your mother very soon,” he said quietly. “We will make sure that Sophie meets her.”
Diamantha was back to weeping again. She clutched his hand by her face, her cheek against his flesh as the tears fell.
“God has taken Robert away and now he has taken my father,” she sobbed quietly.
“But He has given me you, and for that I am grateful. Thank you for barging into George’s solar and demanding that I marry you, Cortez.
You were so maddening but now I see God’s plan.
He meant for you to be there and to be forceful with me.
Had you not come, I would still be wallowing in grief for Robert’s loss.
I still feel grief, now more so with my father’s passing, but I thank God that you are here to comfort me.
I thank God that He has brought you into my life. ”
Cortez kissed her temple, her hands, squeezing her fingers tightly. “You are my angel,” he whispered. “You have made me feel more love than I have ever known to exist. Know that I will never leave you, not ever. You have all of me, Diamantha, forever.”
Diamantha stopped in mid-sob, lifting her head to look at him with an incredulous expression. “Love?” she breathed. “You feel love?”
He was an inch from her face, smiling sweetly into her wet, watery eyes. Gently, he stroked her silken cheek. “Of course I do,” he whispered. “I cannot remember when I have not loved you.”