Nobody's Saint Read Online Free

that sacrifice and chosen Faith’s happiness above his own, Magdalena had made him a promise—a woman meant for him alone.
    Since then, he had poured most of his energy into sailing and saving his money so that he could one day buy Magdalena from his employer, a merchant in Cartagena. He had a few casual lovers, but he had not made much effort to seek anything more permanent.
    Now, Diego grinned broadly. This voyage and another like it should fulfill the task. He would have the amount of money that Don Luis wanted for Magdalena , the ship, and then Magdalena, the saint, would deliver to him a love as pure and perfect as she. At last, his life was falling into place, and soon, he would have everything he had ever wanted.
    Somehow, he had forgotten everything else she had told him.
     
    *
     
    Mary Kate pulled her fur-lined cloak more snugly around her shoulders. Outside the carriage window it was drizzling. Again. Of course, it was nearly December. It was just as likely to be raining in Londonderry as it was here in Bristol. Still, what was dreary and bone chilling in England was fresh and invigorating in Ireland. It had nothing whatsoever to do with her; it was just one of life’s great and mysterious Truths.
    Home at last. After four long and trying years away from her father and sister, Mary Kate was going home. Leaning against the side of the carriage, she closed her eyes and thought of all her grandfather’s pompous, English suitors fleeing at the sight of her, and she permitted herself a self-satisfied grin.
    She turned and glanced at the man who occupied the carriage with her. He still kept his gray hair pulled sharply away from his thin, hawkish face. One corner of his mouth was pulled up in what might seem a perpetual sneer, except that it disappeared whenever she was not around or he had found something else to occupy his thoughts. At the moment, it seemed, he was thinking of her.
    Sir Calder swiveled his head and peered at Mary Kate from beneath his brows. “Oh, you’re a smug one today. You’ll celebrate your twenty-first birthday a proud, Irish virgin. If it leaves me with no English heir to carry on my title, what means that to a heartless wench like you?”
    “Had you any love for me save my use as breeding stock, it might mean something, that’s sure. As for your paltry title, it seems a baronetcy’s nothing so grand, after all. Not grand enough to entice one of your weak-kneed countrymen to wed me.”
    “You are a pitiful excuse for a grandchild. Were your mother not already dead I’d kill her again with my own hands,” Sir Calder snapped. “Ridiculous little strumpet!”
    “Well, she was a damn sight finer than you! That I know.”
    Sir Calder’s sneer became more pronounced. “Thank goodness where you’re going, your vile language will no longer be an issue,” he said. “Swear all you will.”
    She lifted her chin in response. “I’ll have no need of it, once I’m back among my own.”
    The thought of going home cooled her temper slightly. What cared she for her grandfather’s opinions of her family and her country? She had won. Every time her grandfather had brought some new, arrogant peacock of an Englishman to court her, she had been the epitome of the Celtic barbarism that they had all seemed to expect. She had refused to bathe or wear perfume, and she’d made sure that her bodice never matched her skirt. Her sleeves, chosen from a third and yet a fourth gown, had made her look a very clown. She’d sworn like a sailor and eaten like a pig, wiping her grimy fingers on the fine fabrics of the clothes her grandfather had purchased to snare her a proper husband. Her quick temper was real enough, but she had given it full head, flying into rages and temper tantrums over trifles. One by one, her simpering English suitors had fled in terror.
    Four years ago, Sir Calder had sworn that if he failed to find an Englishman willing to marry her by her twenty-first birthday, she would be