“Did your sisters not defend ye?”
“For what?’Twas my own unwise choice.”
“’Twasn’t unwise.’Twas merciful.The lamb might have died otherwise.”
He was right.She’d never thought of it like that before.And a small part of her heart warmed at the idea that he was defending her.
But he wasn’t done.He stared at the path, shaking his head and muttering.“What kind o’ father shuts his daughter in a filthy sheep pen?”
It hadn’t been so bad.Not really.She loved the sheep.And her da’s impatience was partly due to raising a family on his own after her ma died.As far as missing church, she knew God didn’t care if a person prayed in a chapel or a sheep pen.Still, for the first time in her life, Adam was forcing her to question her father’s rigid sense of discipline.
“If I’d been there, as your brother Ronan,” he said, “I would have stayed behind and helped ye clean up.”
Her heart melted at his earnest declaration.His words made her wish shehadhad a brother around to protect her.Then she began to imagine Adam helping her clean up.Stripping off her muddy clothes.Easing her into the warm bathwater.Running a wet linen cloth gently over every filthy inch of her.
Her face grew hot.She had to change the subject before he noticed.
“What about ye?”she choked out.“Do ye have any tales o’ childhood misdeeds?”
“Misdeeds?”he scoffed.“Nay, Ronan was an angel.”
“Ronan was hardly an angel,” she decided.“As I recall, he tied the steward’s boot laces together while he was sleepin’.Put frogs in our sisters’ beds.And regularly fed the hounds under the table.”
“All that?”
“Aye, and more.”
“I fear the truth o’ my childhood is far less interestin’.”
“What is the truth then?”
“No one paid much heed to me,” he admitted.“I was quiet.Well-behaved.I broke few rules.Ruffled no feathers.”
“Indeed?”Eve supposed she was a holy terror in contrast.She wasn’t exactly ill-behaved.Just wayward and curious, adventurous and enterprising.And she had definitely done her share of ruffling feathers.“Then how did you become the sort o’ man who dares to impersonate the emissary o’ the Pope?”
“How do ye know I’mnotthe emissary o’ the Pope?”
He was jesting with her, of course.Still, she wasn’t exactly sure who he was.And she really wanted to know.
“Do ye have any brothers or sisters?”she asked.
“Just ye and our two younger sisters, Blinne and Caitilin, aye?”
“Not Ronan,” she chided.“Ye.”
“Me?A few,” he said evasively.
“Older or younger?”
“Both.”
She had imagined he was the youngest, like her.She was sure that was part of the reason she felt unseen.Perhaps being in the middle made him feel invisible as well.
It was no secret that Eve had been a disappointment to her parents, simply by virtue of her birth.The last thing a clan with no sons wanted was a fifth daughter.
But what was his story?
“Why disguise yourself?”she asked.“Are ye in trouble with the law?”
