To Kiss in the Shadows Read Free Page A

safe,” he promised with a wink. He stretched out his long legs. “Who are you?” he asked. “And where are your fellows?”
    â€œLianna of Grasleigh,” she answered promptly, then realized that perhaps giving an unknown man her name wasn’t wise. “And the ladies are coming back immediately,” she added hastily.
    â€œOff hunting, are they?” he asked.
    â€œHunting?”
    â€œAye,” he said easily. “I know their kind. Always after some poor fool or other.”
    â€œThe poor fool for the afternoon is Kendrick of Artane,” she said with a scowl. “The handsome, wealthy, apparently infinitely desirable Kendrick of Artane.”
    â€œYou seem to know much of him.”
    â€œI’ve been forced to listen to a listing of his virtues for the past se’nnight.”
    â€œBut surely you must believe the reports,” he said.
    â€œHow could one man be so perfect?” she asked. “I daresay the tales are magnified far beyond the truth.” She listened to herself and was surprised to find that her courage was magnified far beyond its usual bounds. Speaking so freely to anyone not of her family wasn’t her habit. Perhaps her tongue had reached its limit in patience.
    â€œAnd what are those tales?” he asked, looking quite interested. “I’ve always a ready ear for ladies’ gossip.”
    Lianna jabbed her needle into the cloth with vigor. Why not? If he had nothing better to do than listen, she had little better to do than talk. Besides, he wasn’t laughing at her, nor was he insulting her. For that alone he deserved to be indulged. Perhaps he, too, sought only a respite before the torture of supper.
    She let her needle fall and watched as the thread untwisted. “They say,” she said, picking the needle back up, “that he has a visage to rival any angel’s and a smile to set an abbess swooning into his arms.”
    â€œSounds unlikely.”
    â€œAye,” she agreed. “Of course, that is but the beginning. They say he has seduced so many women to his bed that he’s lost count and skewered so many of their lords on his sword that the blade won’t surrender the blood-stains.”
    â€œPoetic,” he said with a sigh. “Truly.”
    â€œThat he has bedded so many?” she asked sharply. “Or that he has slain so many?”
    â€œThe latter, surely, but the first is more interesting.”
    â€œHow so?”
    He shrugged. “A man does what he must in matters of love.”
    â€œBetter that he had denied himself now and again.”
    The man lifted one eyebrow. “The pleasures of a woman’s bed? Think you?”
    â€œIf he has no control over his passions before he weds, how will he have any after he weds? Should he manage to distract some daft wench long enough to drag her before a priest, that is.”
    The man laughed. “You’ve given his bride much thought, I see.”
    â€œAye, poor girl.” She pursed her lips. “Surely she would expect more from him than so many indiscretions.”
    The man looked at her thoughtfully for a moment or two, then shrugged. “For all you know, tales of his prowess are false.”
    â€œAre they?” she asked skeptically.
    â€œTell me the tales, then let me judge. There are more reports of his antics, aren’t there?” he asked hopefully.
    â€œAye. Enough to nauseate you for days.”
    â€œTell on, then. I can hardly wait to hear them.”
    Who was she to deny this poor fool his little pleasures? She picked out the last handful of stitches she’d put in awry, then carried on with the gossip she’d heard over the past handful of days.
    â€œ ’Tis said,” she continued, “that he consorts with all manner of odd folk, from faeries to warlocks. He has unholy skill with his blade. He escapes from impossible perils and emerges from all battles