Page 3 of My Hero
She knotted her fingers together, afraid to touch the spots that pulsed with fiery pain.
“I’m wounded,” she said in a strangled whisper.
One corner of Garth’s mouth twitched. “Well, it’s not so grave as that.” He shook his head in amusement, and his green eyes softened to the color of pine boughs.
For a moment she was pacified.
Until he drew his dagger.
Then she gasped and clapped a hand to her mouth.
“Come,” he urged, ignoring her gasp and grasping her by the wrist. “Let me see.”
“Nay.” She tugged back in resistance, drawing an uneasy breath. Why couldn’t her mother have come? This barbarian was after her with a knife!
“What ails you, lass?” he challenged, raising a brow. “You aren’t afraid, are you?”
Her gaze lingered on the gleaming silver blade. Aye, she was afraid. She was petrified.
Then she looked into Garth’s eyes. They were thoroughly gentle now, the hue of mist over the spring heath. A hint of humor glimmered in them. But so did compassion.
Garth de Ware wouldn’t harm her. She was as sure of it as she was that the sun would rise each morn. No one with eyes that kind could inflict hurt.
She lifted her chin a notch. “I’m not afraid.”
He chuckled. Then he tenderly brushed aside her unruly mop of hair, frowning down at her neck. She wondered what ghastly boil had formed there. As he raised his dagger, she willed herself not to tremble.
“The honeybees must have thought you were some rare new flower,” he murmured cheerfully, “with that bright hair of yours.” He laid the sharp blade flat along her neck. It was still warm from the sheath.
She held her breath and shut her eyes as he lightly scraped across her throat with the honed edge of the knife.
“That’s one,” he said in triumph, showing her a tiny black barb finer than a piece of silk thread.
She blinked in surprise. How insignificant the stinger looked. And yet it had caused far more pain than Garth’s great dagger.
He then turned her toward the sunlight, tipping her head to one side to locate the second wound lower on her neck. Her fear began to ease under his ministrations. His fingers, trailing across her throat, felt as gentle as her mother’s. And despite his scowl of concentration, tender wisdom shone in his eyes. Maybe he wasn’t quite as knavish as his brothers.
Young Cynthia was staring at him, unsure whether to give him her trust. Though the lass put on a brave face, she was quivering like a snared dove beneath his hands.
“I’ll wager you’ve never seen a shrub like that before,” he murmured, hoping to ease her fears with conversation.
Her eyes flicked briefly over the bush. “The jasmine?”
He coaxed the tiny black barb between his thumbnail and his dagger. Slowly, he drew the stinger out. “You know its name?”
He stopped his ministrations and turned to her. Their heads were inches apart. She was really rather comely despite her strange coloring, he decided. Her large, pale blue eyes were luminous against her sun-kissed skin. And her orange hair was…intriguing.
“My…my mother taught me the flowers’ names,” she faltered, turning a pretty shade of pink.
Garth nodded and returned to his labor. A faint grin lurked at the corners of his mouth. She’d blushed. Actually, all the little girls he knew did that when he looked at them. His mother said it was the de Ware curse. She said Garth would break many hearts on the road to manhood. Whatever that meant.
He placed his hand lightly on the embroidered neckline of her surcoat. “Forgive my coarse touch, my lady,” he said with an apologetic smile. He’d heard his brother Duncan use those words with wenches many a time. He wasn’t entirely sure of their meaning either, but the ladies seemed to like hearing them.
Cynthia gulped. Garth’s touch was anything but coarse. His fingers felt like warm silk against her flesh as he slipped her surcoat and underdress the tiniest bit off her shoulder, making her skin tingle.
“Do you know that fruit?” he asked, nodding to a white blossomed tree.
She blinked languidly at the tree, then shook her head.
