Highland Protector by Hannah Howell

Author:Hannah Howell [Howell, Hannah]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Romance, General, Love Stories, Historical Fiction, Historical, Man-Woman Relationships, Scotland, Aristocracy (Social Class), Highlands (Scotland) - History, Highlands (Scotland)
ISBN: 9781420104639
Publisher: Zebra
Published: 2010-11-30T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

“Evening, Master Hepbourn.”

Simon could not completely subdue the smile he felt curving his mouth. It had been so easy to take the man. David had been ambling along through the shadowed alleys on his way back from a toss with a tavern maid and walked right into their arms. One little tap on the man’s head and it had been ridiculously simple to spirit him away to this secure room in Peter’s house.

David was now staring at him and his companions with the dazed look of the newly conscious. He also clung to the arms of the chair they had put him in as if he feared someone was about to steal it out from beneath him. Simon idly wondered how long it would take David to realize just how much danger he was in. At the moment he just sat there, stiff and wide-eyed.

Then, abruptly, his eyes cleared of the dull haze of astonishment. He leapt to his feet and tried to run. Simon was not sure where the fool thought he was going as there was only one small window high up on the rough stone wall and one door. One of Simon’s men stood guard at each. It might be a little cruel to just stand and watch as David darted from window to door and back again several times, but Simon suffered no guilt for enjoying the man’s panic. This was one of the men who did not care if an innocent woman was condemned and executed for a crime he knew she had not committed. Letting David taste a little of the helpless fear Ilsabeth had been living with was only just.

“Have ye worn yourself out yet?” he asked David, and could swear the man’s chin quivered exactly like Elen’s did when she was about to let go an ear-splitting howl. “Sit down.”

David hesitated only a moment before he stomped back to the chair and threw himself down into it. Despite the man’s childish display of anger, Simon knew David was terrified. It was there to see in his stare, which remained too widely open and showed far too much of the white of his eyes. His skin had grown very pale and Simon could see the beads of nervous sweat forming on the man’s brow.

“Why are ye detaining me?” David demanded. “This is unacceptable. Ye may be a king’s mon, Sir Simon, but that doesnae give ye the right to snatch people right off the streets.”

“Actually, it does.”

David ignored him. “Just who do ye think ye are?”

“The mon who just might be able to save ye from your own folly. At this moment ye are doomed to die a traitor’s death right alongside your vain cousin. Ye do ken what they do to traitors, dinnae ye?”

When David just stared at him, Simon continued, “First they chain ye in the deepest, darkest prison they can find and then they begin to torture ye. Ye might ken a few things they need to learn about the others or they might just feel ye need it for thinking ye had a right to kill a king.

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