Amanda Scott by Knights Treasure

should not even be here. Yet I am saying things I would not normally say to anyone, and I have no idea why. If I could see, I think I would have fled immediately upon hearing you speak. I’d never have entered into this absurd conversation with you.”
    “You may certainly return to your chamber if that is what you want to do,” he said, still in that same calm, soothing tone. His voice was having an unusual effect on her, for it seemed to touch something deep inside, warming her in a way that was unusual but seemed desirable. She wanted the sensation to continue.
    “At least you do not order me to go,” she said. “Most men I know would say that I should return at once and lock my door. They would scold and insist that I ought not to stand here talking to you as if I knew you.”
    “You are perfectly safe talking to me,” he said.
    “You may say so,” she said. “But I doubt Sir Hugo would agree.”
    “Hugo’s opinion in such a case matters not one whit to me.”
    More certain than ever of his identity, and amused that he would dare to defy Hugo, she allowed herself a near smile. “I doubt you would say that to his face.”
    “Perhaps not,” he agreed, and she heard a smile in his voice.
    She was silent, and a moment later, he said, “I know about your abduction, of course. That must have been a terrifying ordeal.”
    “It was not pleasant,” she said. “He snatched me right off the kirk steps at my wedding. The priest had just asked if anyone objected to our union when four men rode out of the woods nearby. Everyone thought they were just tardy wedding guests, except they wore masks and rode right to the steps, and their leader—”
    “Waldron of Edgelaw.”
    “Aye, he rode right up to me. I thought he had a message, so I stepped forward. He just scooped me off my feet and rode off with me.”
    “Horrifying,” he murmured.
    “Aye, but he did not harm me. Nor do I believe he ever would have.”
    “I am sure you knew him better than I, my lady.”
    A certain sharpness in his tone made her stiffen. “I know only that I had no real cause to fear him,” she said, firmly suppressing the irritating memory of how much the menacing Waldron had terrified her—especially in the beginning.
    “I don’t know that I’ve heard an explanation of
why
he abducted you,” he said. “Did he ever supply a reason for such insolence?”
    “He said it was vengeance for wrongs done to him and to the Kirk,” she said. “I own, I never understood that, and I … I do not like talking about it, so if you …”
    “Forgive me,” he said as she sought words to explain. “I should not have probed into so personal a matter. ’Tis a failing of mine that I can never seem to keep my curiosity in check when something, or someone, interests me.”
    The comment stirred again that mild, twitching sense of humor. “You should meet my sister Isobel, sir. Your curiosity can be as nothing to hers. She asked so many questions that I finally lost my temper, or as near as made no difference.”
    As soon as she said them, she wished she could take back the words. He was too easy to talk to, and she did not want to admit Isobel had plagued her until she had spoken more sharply to her than to anyone else since arriving at Roslin.
    “Living with the memories must be difficult,” he said.
    A flood of memories, mixed and jumbled pictures and emotions, spewed through her mind before she said curtly, “I saw him hang a man.”
    The words leaped out before she knew she was going to say them. Others had asked what she remembered, but the memories had eluded her. Had anyone asked her what stirred her to tell him about that, of all things, she could not have said. The man’s power to make her speak seemed well nigh devilish. But one could not unsay things, as much as one would like to.
    Her words hovered between them, making her stomach clench.
    He let the silence continue until she ached to demand that he tell her what he was thinking.