funny story, laird.” Having visibly relaxed when she saw Barr, Brigit ducked her head shyly.
Barr reached out and ruffled the girl’s hair while giving Sabrine a quizzical look. “Was she now?”
The young girl lifted her eyes, an expression of pure hero-worship and adoration making them shine, and nodded.
“Perhaps she’ll have to tell me the story later.” Again, he spoke to the child, but his gaze fixed on Sabrine.
The heat there reached out to her like fire jumping from the hearth. And she felt burned in places no man had ever touched.
Sabrine didn’t think she’d be telling that particular story, ever. It had been about her knife training. Even a wooden blade hurt if you stabbed yourself hard enough. All she said though was, “Perhaps.”
“Come, Brigit, it is past time I returned you to your mother.” Verica picked up her basket and curtsied before scooting around Barr to reach the door.
She paused there and turned back to face him. “Wake Sabrine several times throughout the night. She is not showing any signs that need concern us, but the memory loss cannot be ignored.”
His glance flicked between Verica and Sabrine, the expression in his storm-cloud eyes unreadable. “The memories must be coming back, if she can remember stories to tell.”
“Our minds are not so easy to understand, laird. Sabrine remembers patches, but the blanket of her thoughts is still missing those important pieces about how she came to be in the forest. Some memories she may never regain.”
Barr frowned, but nodded. “I will watch over her this night.”
And much more if Sabrine was not careful. Though she would not have believed it possible, his scent grew more potent upon increased familiarity. She had no idea what she would do when he dropped his guard and his scent hit her senses with full impact again. She rarely drank the wine her people were so good at making, but simply being in the same room with him made her feel like she’d imbibed an entire bottle on her own.
According to the heady fragrance of arousal rolling off of him, his reaction to her was every bit as powerful. And that was more than a little worrisome. Bad enough she had to fight her own desires, but standing against his could well prove her downfall.
There was a reason she did not drink wine or even ale. Sabrine did not like the vulnerability of having her senses hampered by the effects of spirits, but this was worse. So much worse. This would not go away with an hour’s rest, or by taking to the air.
This reaction he elicited in her would not submit to even her control, hardened by her years protecting her people.
He moved further into the room and heat suffused her body, the pulse in her neck fluttering as her mouth went dry. Her hand jerked to her neck of its own volition, covering that betraying flutter.
“See that you do.” Verica’s bold words showed that she trusted this laird far more than she did Rowland. She trusted him enough not to fear him.
Barr inclined his head to her and then Brigit. “Good night then.”
“Wait!” Sabrine called out before Verica could leave.
The other woman gave her a sympathetic look, as if she knew what Sabrine was going to ask and what her laird’s response was going to be.
“Wouldn’t it be more seemly for Verica to sit with me through the night?” She hated asking it of the other woman, particularly since it wasn’t necessary because Sabrine had not actually suffered any memory loss, but the alternative was growing more untenable by the moment.
There was no sympathy in Barr’s eyes, just more of that burning heat. “’Twould be more unseemly for her to remain the night in my room.”
“Then allow me to go to her room.” Vexation tinged her words. He was Chrechte. He knew exactly what effect he had on her and probably liked it. Darn it.
“Nay, I’ll not give my bed up for the comforts of her floor.”
“Are you being deliberately obtuse?”
The sparkle in his gray eyes said he was, but his squared jaw was set stubbornly as well. She was not going anywhere.
It was not in her nature to give in easily though. “Be reasonable. Would you have me branded as no better than a camp follower by your clan?”
“Sleeping in my room is paltry beside the fact you were found naked and alone in the forest.”
“I do not think so.” But truly? No doubt he was right.
Humans had different standards for women