Kenna wassurprised when the man turned from her, so sure he had been about to reach out and touch her. Even more surprising was her disappointment.
“Weel, I see she’s an obedient woman and removed herself from harm’s way.” The warrior taunted, gesturing toward the window.
The giant laughed.
Kenna’s hackles instantly rose. He spoke around her as Agatha had. Nevermind that his voice was deeper than she expected, the brogue sweet and stirring.
When the giant’s hoarse laugh died away, she sneered. “I fear you are mistaken. Obedience has quite recently been removed from my character.”
He turned back and again looked her up and down as if only now noticing her existence. She wondered at the sudden warmth of the room and wanted to glance around to see if anyone else was affected by it, but she couldn’t seem to pull her gaze from his.
When she blinked, her eyes could move again, and she looked the length ofhim. There was a spattering of red dots across his forehead and smears of blood on the right shoulder of his chain mail. Crimson dripped from his gloved hands, and the only evidence of his exertion came when he rested the tip of his broadsword on the floor next to his muddied boots.
Red drops merged and thickened as they meandered down a path from his glove onto the sword to mingle with brown crustysmears already drying on the blade. She could all but taste the combination of metal and blood. Could smell it too. Or was that the warrior’s armor mixed with sweat? There was a smell in the air—no, a taste—that made her stomach growl.
She imagined how he would react if she climbed on a small trunk and licked that smooth patch of cheek between his rough beard and his eyes.
The warrior frowned and turned away, striding quickly to the window. Had he forgotten she was there again? His fingers roamed the stone until they found the scratches where the large hook had caught, then he leaned out.
“Gowry placed too much faith in his reputation if he was foolish enough to put windows in his keep.” he growled to no one.
Kenna knew the moment when he must have spotted the chamber pot because his booming laughter spread that melting feeling to her every extremity. Dear Lord, but her body had become a caldron of churning fluids and thoughts she hadn’t known were in her, and this man seemed to be holding the ladle.
Fia shifted and Kenna shot a quelling look at both men before turning her back on them to pull her maid to her feet. She was grateful for the distraction. Most of her life had been lived beyond the sound of men’s voices, and she was unaccustomed to the deep vibrating tones.
There, that explains it. I’ve just never been around men. It has nothing to do with his face. Any man would likely affect me so.
The warrior returned from the window and faced her. “She has changed her clothes, Rabbie, but these are the clothes of a widow in mournin’.” For a moment she paused, savoring that warm rumble in his speech.
The way he watched her made it clear he waited for some response, but she hated to give him the satisfaction. Not after speaking around her again.
“Nay.” Kenna cleared her throat but wasn’t able to say anything more.
“Why would she be in Struan Gowry’s chambers if not his widow?”
The nearly forgotten giant spoke, but she did not understand a word, the sound no doubt made strange by that bulbous obstruction in his neck. His voice was much deeper than that of the warrior/god’s, but surprisingly sent vibrations only through her ears.
“Get out,” she demanded. “If I am so beneath your notice, why do you care who I am? Get out.” The last she said with a flourish of gestures toward the door. And for the longest moment, she thought they might obey her.
The warrior started toward the door, but as he passed her, he spun around to grasp her arms and held them behind her, all in a fluid movement that left her mouth agape. She closed her eyes and waited for the pain of injury, but she felt only the gentlest of pressure around her arms and the nearness of his body as he held her a pulse away from his bloody chest. Impossible, but the man could have been made of fire considering the heat she felt through the fabric.
“Were you his widow in truth?” he asked softly, finally speaking to her, his breath brushing over her eyelids.
The past tense of the question gave her pause, but like a coward she kept her eyes shut.
“Have you killed me, then, and I cannot feel it? I’ve heard that betimes the slice of a knife can go unnoticed, especially if the blade is sharp.”
He laughed and released her but did not step back. Surely, he wouldn’t have laughed if she were dying.
“All right, then. I am not Gowry’s widow. You have rudely interrupted the ceremony, sir.”
Kenna opened her eyes and inhaled slowly, but the air solidified in her lungs, and she could not get it out. She had no idea he was so tall, towering easily a head above her.
A very large head above her.
But when he’d stood next to the giant, he’d seemed so average. And now he stared at her lips…
He reached up and dragged the mafors from her head, making her gasp. Her wayward hair sprang free and he smiled.
