the past to spill from her lips in a whisper. “No one wants me.”
Arran whipped around. “What did you say?”
“Nothing,” she said, silently cursing herself.
He walked closer to her. “You said something. What was it?” He scrunched his brow. “It sounded familiar.”
“Mumbles that’s all,” she insisted, annoyed she had once said those very same words to him.
He looked at her strangely then, as if he was actually looking at her and seeing her for the first time and her heart slammed against her chest when his face showed that he recognized her.
Arran reached for her left arm and she pulled away from him.
“Show me your left hand.”
“You should leave,” Purity said.
“Don’t make me grab your hand. Show it to me,” he demanded.
Purity shook her head. “Why? You obviously recognized me.”
“Purity?” he asked in disbelief.
Chapter 3
Purity held up her deformed hand to confirm what he had already surmised.
How could he not have recognized her? Perhaps it was because she was unrecognizable from the lass he recalled, the one with long limp hair and a plain face that never wore a smile. However, her love and partiality for animals had remained.
His next thought spilled from his lips. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why didn’t you recognize me?” she asked.
He stepped back, turning away from her for a moment. “Five years change people, Purity.”
“That they do,” she said, a touch of guilt and foolishness for not having told him who she was jabbing at her. “I didn’t recognize you right away either.”
“It is good to see a friend,” he said.
Friend? She had never thought Arran considered her a friend, an acquaintance or a neighbor perhaps, but never had he been a friend to her.
“Sit with me and talk,” he said, pointing to the oak tree.
Friend. She needed to accept him as a friend and nothing more. He would return home and she would have her life here in the woods—content with her friends, the animals. She turned to head to the tree when his hand took hold of her arm, stopping her.
“You told me you were unharmed,” he said, seeing the blood that stained the torn sleeve of her shift.
“A minor wound from the arrow that grazed my arm.”
He got annoyed for not having noticed it. It had been years of ignoring minor wounds that had him not paying it heed. Such wounds were unimportant, cleaned and wrapped by the warrior himself when given the chance, while a healer saw to the direr wounds. Not so with Purity. Her wound needed attention.
“I will tend your wound while we talk.”
Purity noticed that Arran rarely asked. He commanded, as if his words were the final say on the matter.
“I can see to it,” she said, not comfortable with him touching her bare skin. Or was it fear at what his touch would reveal?
He cast a glance around and seeing the rain barrel, said to her. “Go sit while I get what’s needed to clean your wound.”
“I’ll do that,” she said, his commanding nature at odds with the freedom she had gained living in the woods.
“You’ll go sit,” he ordered and before she could argue any further, he walked—rather rushed her to the spot under the tree—and sat her on the ground with a forceful hand. He turned and left, though not before issuing another order. “Stay there.”
He had changed. The Arran she had known would have used sweet words, a gentle touch, and a smile to get her to sit and let him tend her. She had seen many women surrender to his magnanimous, charming nature. Now he was aloof and commanding, as if his generous heart had turned cold.
It took him no time to fill a bucket from the rain barrel and find a couple of cloths Purity had recently washed. He returned to the tree with the items and sat them and himself beside her.
“Your arm,” he ordered curtly, and she held it out to him, hoping to keep contact to a minimum.
He rolled her sleeve up to nearly her shoulder, exposing the wound. Then he slipped his hand along under her arm to cradle it as his other hand got busy cleaning the wound.
His hand was warm against her bare flesh, his touch more than gentle, holding her firm as if she might get away from him. Tears almost sprang to her eyes. It was the first time a man had ever touched her bare flesh, and not any man, the man she loved. She was amazed at the sensation that ran through