Ildaria actually felt the scowl Lucian turned on her. “Of course, you are not going to be executed. You are to hear what Juanhas to say. There are things about the past that you do not know, and should.”
“You thought you had been summoned for execution?” Juan exclaimed, sounding upset. “Madre de Dios,” he muttered and then paused and said with wonder, “And yet you still came. You are brave, mi amor.”
Ildaria stiffened at the term of endearment, but it was Lucian who responded.
“I told you she thought you had been hunting her all these years to punish her for biting off your—”
“Basta!” Juan interrupted with a wince before Lucian could state exactly what she’d bit off. He then shook his head and dropped tosit on the sofa across from Ildaria. Juan scrubbed his face briefly with frustration, and then raised haunted eyes to herand breathed in Spanish, “I have been searching for you for two hundred years, Angelina. But not to punish you. Never to punishyou. I was searching for you because you are my life mate.”
Fifteen
“What?” Ildaria gasped, jumping to her feet.
“Let me go!” G.G. snapped, and Ildaria turned dazed eyes his way to see that he was trying to rise from the couch and cometo her. But Robert was holding him in his seat, a grim expression on his face that made her think the immortal understoodSpanish.
“What did he say? Did he threaten you? Why are you upset?” G.G. asked her, still trying to break loose of his father’s irongrip. Strong as G.G. was, he was still a mortal. His immortal father had no problem keeping him in his place.
“He just told her that she is his life mate,” Lucian said with exasperation.
“What?” G.G. gasped in the same shocked tone she had used just moments ago, and then rage slid over his face and he beganto struggle again. “The hell he is. I—”
“Silence,” Lucian growled. “And be still, or you will be removed.”
G.G. glowered. “Then make him tell his lies in English.”
“I will translate if he does not,” Robert assured him, and then added apologetically, “I only hesitated about that first partbecause I knew what he had said would upset you, son.”
G.G. grunted at this and stopped fighting, but his expression was rebellious.
“Angelina.”
Ildaria turned reluctantly to stare at Juan, not sure she wanted to hear anything else he had to say. He had to be lying.They weren’t life mates. He’d been hunting her to punish her. He just knew Lucian wouldn’t have let him punish her and washoping he could convince them all that she was his life mate, so that he could try to get her to turn from G.G. and go withhim. She was positive if she had been that foolish, he would have taken her away and then punished her. That made more sensethan the nonsense he was spouting. Life mates?
“I can read his mind, Angelina,” Lucian said quietly.
“So can I,” Mary murmured, and then added softly, “And he is not lying.”
Ildaria turned sharply to look at the woman. An immortal as young as Mary would not be able to read one as old as Juan . . . unless he had met his life mate. The newly mated were often easily read no matter their age. But that usually only lasted a couple of years, and then they mastered control of themselves and their thoughts again. How could he be easily read two hundred years after encountering her and supposedly discovering she was his life mate?
“We regain control of our thoughts once we adjust to the whirlwind of emotion and need that the nanos cause in new life mates,”Scotty said, speaking for the first time. “Juan has never been allowed to do that. He was never able to claim you. Seeingyou again today has the same impact for him as it did two centuries ago.”
He allowed a moment for that to sink in, and then added, “His thoughts and feelings are clear as a bell to any immortal withinshouting distance no matter how new they are. Except for you,” he added even as she thought it.
She could not hear his thoughts, and she had been immortal nearly two centuries longer than Mary.
Apparently picking up her thoughts, Scotty nodded and said, “And that is another reason why we know he is not lying. It isalso why we had to bring you here. You need to know. You have been running from your life mate, not a monster bent on killingyou.”
Her knees suddenly weak, Ildaria sank back onto the couch and turned to stare at Juan Villaverde. Bewilderment whirled aroundin her head as she tried to merge the monster of the last two hundred years with the man who claimed to be her life mate.“But you attacked me.”
Juan sighed miserably, and ran a hand wearily through his thick hair. “Lo siento, mi amor. I’m sorry,” he added grimly when Robert translated for G.G., his low voice a distracting murmur from the end of the room. Continuing in English now, he said, “I never meant to. I had planned never to touch you until you were older and ready. But that night—” He shook his head. “Let me start at the beginning.”
When he paused, waiting, she gave a slight nod. The beginning was always a good place to start.
“I first saw you in my daughter’s kitchen,” Juan said quietly. “I had come to visit Ana, but she was still above stairs. Dressing,the maid said. She suggested I wait in the salon and she would let her know I was there. I started into the salon, but thesound of laughter caught my ear. It was like the angels singing. So clear and beautiful, without the artifice other womenemploy
