Free Dark Torment by Karen Robards Page A

doubt. She crouched beside him, her eyes meeting
his with concern.
    “Are you in pain?”
    One corner of Gallagher’s mouth twisted up wryly. “No
more than usual. I think I’ll just lie here for a while. I have a sinking
suspicion that moving is going to hurt like the devil.” He paused,
shifting a shoulder experimentally, then grimaced. “I suppose our friend
is long gone?”
    Sarah looked around the copse, devoutly hoping that the man was
indeed gone. With Gallagher out of commission, she didn’t fancy her
chances of dealing with him. But there was no sign of him. All about them the
greenery continued undisturbed, and as if to settle the matter a pair of
rosellas chose that moment to settle into a nearby tree fern. Besides the
flutter of their wings, the only sound was the gurgle of the spring not far
away.
    “I think so.” She hadn’t intended to sound so
hopeful. He smiled again, eying her. “Don’t worry. If he comes
back, I think I can undertake to defend you.”
    “Why should you?” Sarah didn’t mean to say it
aloud, but the words escaped before she could stop them. His hand lifted
automatically to the gash she had made in his cheek. She winced at the gesture.
    “Why did I, do you mean?” He fingered the cut, which
had formed a narrow crust. “I don’t know. I came after you meaning
to pay you back for this with interest, and then head out for the bush country.
I can only suppose my innate chivalry overcame my good sense.” This last
sentence was laced with self-mockery. Then, softly, “Or maybe I just
wanted to make us even.”
    “Even?”
    He inclined his head. “You saved me that day on the
Septimus;
now I’ve saved you. We’re quits.” There was a curious
satisfaction in his words.
    Sarah’s brows knitted as she looked at him. He had moved so
that he was lying more on his side now than his belly, and she had a
three-quarter view of his face. She hadn’t been mistaken about the
satisfaction in his words, she saw; it was there in his face as well. But, try
as she would, she could not understand why it should please him so enormously
to know that he no longer had to feel himself under any obligation to her. To
her knowledge, it had not affected his behavior in the least. No one could
accuse him of having been so much as commonly civil to her.
    “Well, whatever your reason, I thank you,” Sarah said
formally. “I shudder to think what that man might have done to me if you
hadn’t come when you did.”
    He very slowly levered himself into a sitting position, wincing
and flexing his shoulders as he moved. Sitting in the bracken with his knees
bent and his bare forearms resting on his knees, his white shirt unbuttoned so
that Sarah could not help but notice the soft whorls of black chest hair at the
base of his throat, he exuded so much sheer masculinity that Sarah
involuntarily drew back. She was still crouching beside him, but it suddenly
occurred to her that now that he was sitting up, he was far too close. She
stood up abruptly, making a little business of brushing off her skirt with one
hand while the other self-consciously clasped together the ripped edges of her
shirtwaist.
    “Oh, I doubt that he would have done anything much to
you,” Gallagher said, regarding her with a grin. Sarah was piqued to
notice that her nearness seemed not to have bothered him at all, if he had even
been aware of it. But of course, she was plain, while he was far, far too
attractive. Gallagher continued, “He was most likely after your
horse.”
    Sarah could not stop herself from feeling, and looking, she had no
doubt, affronted. “Well, thank you very much,” she said before she
could stop the words. Gallagher looked up at her, frowning, then as the reason
for her obvious indignation occurred to him he laughed.
    “Wounded vanity, Miss Sarah?” he jeered softly, rising
to his feet with a lithe movement that gave no quarter to the pain she guessed
he