Chapter Thirteen

W hen Morwenna returned, she was holding hands with a small girl in a grubby floral smock. Without making the conscious decision to stand, Robert found himself on his feet. His heart pounded with anticipation. Anticipation that included a good dollop of fear. As he’d said to Morwenna, his experience of children was limited. And this child was his daughter, so he desperately wanted her to like him.

Morwenna leveled that thoughtful blue stare upon him, and he straightened as he drank in her silent support. Morwenna who loved him. Who had always loved him.

If she loved him, he couldn’t fail.

The little girl huddled close to her mother’s green skirts. Huge black eyes, so like the eyes that he saw reflected in his mirror, focused on him.

He read shyness, but no fear. That pleased him. He didn’t want his daughter frightened of anything, let alone meeting her father for the first time.

Her father...

Since he’d found out about Kerenza, he’d struggled to comprehend becoming a father. But now he saw his child, he finally started to understand. An ocean of reactions surged inside him. Pride. Curiosity. Awe.

And swift and astounding and immediate, love.

“Kerenza, I promised you a surprise,” Morwenna said softly. “Do you know who this is?”

Kerenza surveyed him with searching intelligence, then the black eyes rounded. “I think it’s my papa.”

“It is.” Emotion thickened Morwenna’s voice.

“You said he had to go away forever.” Kerenza still studied him the way Silas studied his botanical specimens. Or in fact, the way Robert pored over a chart to plot a ship’s course.

He’d never realized how powerful it would be to see himself reflected in another being. His avid gaze ate up every detail of those quirky, vivid features. She was beautiful. She’d be beautiful to him forever.

His daughter!

“When I found out I was mistaken, it was a lovely surprise for me, too.” Morwenna’s eyes were bright with tears, although he saw how she fought to contain them for Kerenza’s sake.

“Hello, Kerenza,” he said, his voice husky. His hands opened and closed at his sides as he fought the urge to grab her close.

That considering gaze remained on his face as if she gathered all her thoughts together before she reached her conclusion. He had no idea what most four-year-old girls were like, but he’d lay a large wager this one was unusually advanced.

“Hello, Papa,” she said slowly. “You don’t look like your picture.”

His lips twisted as he recalled the romantic figure Lawrence had made of him. Even at twenty, he hadn’t been that dashing.

“I’ve had some adventures since then. Would you like to hear about them?” He caught Morwenna’s glance, then looked back at Kerenza.

She nodded. “Yes, please. Are you going to live with us now?”

He swallowed to ease the constriction in his throat. “Yes. Will you like that?”

She frowned as she pondered her answer, and for a moment looked so much like his sister Helena that his heart somersaulted. He hadn’t expected her to seem so familiar so quickly, but she already felt like the blood of his blood, bone of his bone.

“Yes, I will. I always hoped you’d come home.”

“So did I,” Morwenna said fervently, wiping away a surreptitious tear that escaped her ferocious control. “Now go and give your papa a kiss like a good girl.”

Pride swelled Robert’s heart to bursting when Kerenza left her mother’s side without further urging and stepped forward. Of all the qualities he admired, courage was the greatest. And his girl was clearly brave to the bootstraps.

Careful not to betray quite how overcome he was, he held out his hand, but let Kerenza decide whether to take it.

When her small hand curled around his, his heart performed another of those dizzying cartwheels. She was a champion, his Kerenza, and he pledged himself to her service as long as he lived.

“Please bend down, Papa,” she said, as imperious as a princess.

And why not? By God, he’d like to find a princess to match her.

“With pleasure.” He went one better. He crouched until his face was level with hers. This close, he saw details he’d missed when she stood beside her mother.

The thick black lashes. The tumble of hair, thick and unruly, just like his. The slightly aquiline nose that would lend her features character when she grew into them. A few freckles scattered across her cheekbones.

For a long time, they stared at each other. He remained unmoving as that bright, black gaze roved across his face. As if she did her best to memorize every feature.

A dirty hand already showing promise of adult elegance rose to touch the scar on his face. “Who did that?”

“A pirate,” he said, wondering if he should lie. He looked up at Morwenna to check for disapproval. He met eyes shining with what he now dared to call love.

“The pirates took you away from us.”

“Yes.”

“But you escaped from them.”

“Indeed I did.”

A pleased smile curved her lips. “I’m so glad you beat them.”

“So am I, sweetheart.” Emotion crammed his chest to the brim. “And now I’m home, I’ll never go away again.”

“That makes me happy,” Kerenza said solemnly.

He had to swallow before he could speak. “So do I get my kiss?”

She nodded again, still with that serious air. He found her solemnity charming. Hell, he found every little bit of her completely perfect.

Slowly Robert tipped his head forward. There was a vibrant, expectant pause before, soft as the brush of a sparrow’s feathers or a butterfly’s wings, Kerenza glanced her lips across his scar.

The breath jammed in his lungs. The moment was so piercing, it hurt. He closed his eyes against the urge to weep.

The kiss was over in seconds, but it changed his world forever.

“Thank you, Kerenza,” he said gruffly.

She smiled with a sunny openness that cast light into the closed, dark corners of his soul.

“Papa?” she asked, watching him steadily. She seemed as fascinated with him as he was with her.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“Can I have a puppy?”

The sheer, astonishing ordinariness of the question struck him with the force of a swinging boom in a high sea. Then something strong and joyful and indestructible surged up from out of his belly, and he fell back on his haunches and started to laugh.

The sound took him completely by surprise. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed just from sheer happiness. A certain black humor had helped him survive his imprisonment, but he hadn’t laughed like this in years.

Before he could stop himself, he caught Kerenza up and kissed her on the nose. For a moment, he held the light little body too tight. Then when she wriggled, he let her go.

She regarded him with disapproval, but didn’t retreat. “Papa, you’re very silly.”

“Undoubtedly.” He caught his breath and rubbed one unsteady hand over his face. Damn, that had felt good. “Can you put up with a silly papa?”

She frowned, considering the question. “Yes.” Then she returned to the most important subject. “So does that mean I can have a puppy?”

“I don’t see why not.” He smiled and brushed his hand over her untidy mop of hair. It was warm and silky under his touch. “What does your mother say?”

“She says we move around too much.”

“Ah, but that was before I came home.”

An expression of unfiltered elation brightened that intense face. “So I can?”

“Morwenna?”

“How on earth can I stand up to both of you?” Morwenna’s blue eyes glowed misty like the Cornish sea at dawn. She met his searching glance, then looked down at Kerenza with a long-suffering expression. “All right, you little monster, you win. You can have a puppy.”

“Oh, splendid.” Kerenza performed a happy skip, then launched herself forward to hug him. As those childish arms encircled his neck and she pressed a sloppy kiss to his cheek, he thought his heart must break with love.

“Thank you, Papa. Now let’s go. I’ll show you my pony.”

As the child took his hand, he tilted an eyebrow at Morwenna. “Coming?”

With a tremulous smile, she shook her head. “No, you go. I want to check on our room.”

“Come on, Papa,” Kerenza said with a princess’s impatience.

Completely besotted, Robert went.