you move away from me, as if you’re afraid I will devour you at any moment.”
“And will you?”
Her heart thudded as she waited for his answer. And which answer, precisely, did she want him to give?
“Likely, aye. Which is why you should go to sleep.”
He closed his eyes, his face so much softer when he did so. In repose, the warrior almost looked like a regular man.
He was anything but.
Clara turned away again, attempting to breathe normally. It was simply impossible. She would never be able to sleep like this.
She was sleeping.
Alex could hear the change in her breathing, and he was glad for it. At least one of them would be well-rested. This trip had surely been a folly. . . it was hard enough to ignore her draw during the day, and now he was just inches away from her. Surely he was strong enough to keep from touching her, but he likely wouldn’t get a moment of sleep.
He’d simply been too long without a woman. When they arrived at Kenshire, he’d find a willing maid and sate the lust that had overtaken his good sense.
They just had to make it there. And back.
That is, if she would agree to return with him. The woman was as skittish as a stag who sensed the bow and arrow aimed at his heart. Even so, he was determined to protect her—now and in the future—even more so after hearing part of her story.
She shifted and Alex turned away. Better not to tempt himself unnecessarily. He forced his eyes closed, listening for the unlikely intruder. He knew this area well and had never seen travellers this far off the path. But he lay with one hand on his sword nonetheless.
Alex had just begun to drift off when a sound forced him to sit up, sword in hand. He listened carefully, chastising himself for thinking they were safe here. Nowhere was truly safe along the border. Only when he was fully awake did he realize the sound came from Clara.
She turned her head and moaned. Not the type of low, lustful moan he would have loved to hear from her, but a pained one. He listened, trying to make sense of her words, but when her cries became louder, he shook her shoulder gently.
“Clara,” he whispered.
She continued to mumble.
“Clara, wake up.”
He spun her toward him, shaking her a bit more forcefully.
Her eyes flew open, and he thought for a moment that she might strike him. But when she realized who he was, where she was, her features softened.
“Alex.”
“Aye.”
He lay back down and pulled her toward him. Placing her head in the crook of his arm,
he reached down and covered her with the blanket she’d lost in her dream. She wiggled at his side, and Alex tried, unsuccessfully, to ignore the breasts that pressed, unwrapped, against him.
She sighed, murmured something, and promptly fell back to sleep.
The terror on her face in the moments before she’d fully awakened had been very real. A nightmare from the night Gilbert had been taken? From watching her father’s murder? Alex closed his eyes and listened to Clara’s even breathing.
Surprised he was able to sleep so well on the hard ground with an Englishwoman sleeping in his arms, Alex woke with the bright light of the early morn. He listened for noise outside the tent but heard nothing save the regular breathing of Clara, who was still tucked inside the crook of his arm. He tried to lift her gently, not wanting to wake her just yet, but as soon as he moved, she stirred.
“What. . . why am I. . .”
She clearly had no memory of the night before.
“You dreamed. . . called out,” he said simply.
She sat, her hair tousled about her shoulders. Unbound and uncovered, she looked nothing like the squire who’d trained with his men at Brockburg.
“Did I say. . . anything?”
Alex crossed his arms behind his head as Clara moved away from him. She tugged on the covering Lady Juliette had begged him to take, one much thicker and warmer than he was accustomed to travelling with, and pulled it around her shoulders. His own tunic was heavy and warm, but Clara’s was better suited to a bed than a tent in the middle of the Scottish marches.
“Nothing that could be understood.”
She reached behind her head and smoothed out her hair. Alex reached up and pulled aside an errant strand.
“Do you remember the dream?”
He knew by her expression that she did. But she