"Terry McConnel - Highlander - Scimitar" - читать интересную книгу автора (McConnel Terry)

to do murder, though the idea was very tempting. The ship rose and fell
with the long swell of the Mediterranean waves, and MacLeod's vision
swam with the fishes.

"You lie," he gasped out, his Italian thick with the burr of Scotland.
"No one could get used to this. Holy God, does it never stop moving?"

The other man laughed. "Oh, I used to be as bad as you. Now I rather
like it. You will live through it, I promise."
Alfonso d'Valenzuela never knew how close he came to death in that
moment; if he had been an Immortal, MacLeod would have taken the man's
head with his teeth. Except, of course, that the thought of swallowing
blood made hiwl retch again.

"Ah, my poor brave Duncan," came a woman's voice from behind him. "Has
the sea defeated you?"

He closed his eyes and rested his forehead on the railing. "Not yet."

It was supposed to be a growl. It came out sounding as miserable as he
felt. Eventually he managed to pull himself more or less upright to
squint wearily over the gently rolling horizon. He would not, not heave
again, he swore it. His jaw was clenched against the possibility. He
was no pulling boy, he was a man, and to be sick this way, particularly
under the eyes of a woman, was shameful. Turning to glance behind him,
he caught sight of her and smiled wanly, grateful for the distraction of
the sight of her. Yes, it was especially humiliating to be sick before
such a woman as Terezia, just sixteen, high-spirited, with a complexion
like milk, her lips like cherries ... he bolted for the rail again.

"Oh, dear." A light hand lifted his chin, and a damp cloth wiped at his
face. He looked down blearily to see Terezia herself industriously
scrubbing at his cheek and chin, her elegant eyebrows knit with
concentration. She showed not the slightest sign of distress at the
mess he'd made of himself.

It was one of the most endearing things about her, he'd decided months
ago. Even in the Doge's court Terezia d'Alessandro, under the watchful
eye of her father, her brother Gioninno, and her guardsman d'Valenzuela,
mixed freely with the merchants and ambassadors and nobility from aB the
courts of Europe and the East. She showed no more dismay at sharing a
table with a Muslim lord from the Sublime Porte in Constantinople than
she did in discussing love poetry with an English merchant-less, in
fact, but then the Englishman was a boot.

In the shadowed, perfumed halls of the Doge's palace Terezia had laughed
and flirted and captured his heart with a teasing kiss, and he had
fallen a little in love with her. She had made it clear that a kiss was
all he would have of her, a kiss and a dance and a smile.