Page 32 of The Herald's Heart
In the next instant, he had twisted again. She landed with a thump on his hard body. She tried to inhale but found the effort severely restricted. Talon’s arms banded around her ribs and back in a crushing embrace.
“Let me loose, oaf. I cannot breathe.” She used precious air to protest, hoping to gain her release faster.
When no immediate response came, she wiggled a hand free and slapped wildly at his upper arms, shoulders, and chest in order to force him to let go.
She felt his arms slide from her back. She continued to hit at him, releasing all the pent-up fury that his teasing over the past days had caused.
How dare he crush her so? No doubt he sought to taunt her for refusing his attentions. “Beast, arrogant mule, bastard.”
Cold water sluiced over her.
Larkin sputtered and shook her head. She opened her eyes and took in Talon’s frozen glare.
“What?”
Hands pulled her from his soggy embrace and stood her upright.
“I’ve got ’er, sir. She’ll not escape now.” Cleve’s voice sounded weary with disappointment.
Attempting to cover her chest, she struggled against Cleve, who held her by the neck of her long tunic. “I was not trying to escape.”
“Were you not, Mistress Larkin? ’Twas a terrible thing ye done, lying to me and making me think I could trust ye.”
“But I did not ...”
“Thank ye, Sir Talon, for checking on her. I’d have failed in me duty for certain had you not. I’ll know better than to believe her again.”
Talon sat in the mud puddle and grinned.
Larkin hated that grin so much she made to kick him.
He simply rocked back and let go a laugh that echoed throughout the complex of caves.
Cleve peered over her shoulder at the giddy knight. “What have ye done to him to make him as mad as yerself?”
Larkin sputtered. They were fools, both of them.
Talon sat up once more. Tear tracks decorated the dirt on his face. “Fear not, Cleve. Mistress Larkin has done nothing to me that she has not done to other men in Hawking Sedge.”
“Ye mean she kicked you in the balls, sir?”
At Cleve’s question, Talon howled with laughter again. He clutched his middle and nodded. “Aye,” he choked out. “You could say that.”
“Well, sir, I’m not saying ye’re not within ye’re rights to have a tumble with ’er, but ye shouldn’t set a guard on her if that’s what ye want.”
Larkin could stand no more. She refused to be discussed like a piece of cold mackerel by men who wouldn’t know a fish if they caught one. Jackasses, both of them. She stomped on Cleve’s foot.
He loosed one arm.
She jabbed her newly freed elbow into his ribs, stepped neatly aside, and pushed him down the small distance separating her from Talon, straight into the mud where the knight sat, grinning.
“I’ll have you know, Cleve, that I wouldn’t bed that man if he were the last knave on earth. As for this stinking passageway, clean it yourself, Sir Talon.” She pivoted and marched up the stairs headed straight for the solar and a bath. She’d wash the mud from her body and the knight from her mind before she did aught else this day.
• • •
He found her in the kitchen several days later. She’d been avoiding him. Possibly, his constant humming whenever she was near was finally having some effect, and she avoided the reminder of the pleasure she denied herself. When he did see her, more often than not, she graced him with frowns. Today sniffles and small groans greeted him even though she had her back to him.
Not until every other woman stopped her work to stare at him leaning in the kitchen doorway did she turn toward him.
