Free The Return of Black Douglas by Elaine Coffman Page A

backside, bleeding and aching all over, in the middle of nowhere having a staring contest with an ill-tempered lout of Celtic blood, who gave her no hint as to his intent.
    She shouldn’t keep staring, but something about him was oddly familiar. What was it that held her transfixed? His hard, lean body? The chiseled angles of his face? The sexy burr of his speech? The daring of his ride? Or, was it the raw, almost primitive masculinity that seemed to radiate from him.
    “Are you going to just sit there and stare, or are you going to offer some assistance? We have a damsel in distress here, in case you haven’t noticed.”
    She couldn’t be certain, but she did think she saw the corners of his mouth twitch briefly—before he dismounted with a creaking of leather and a ring of rowels—as he approached her. “Get up, lass, unless ye plan to sleep here tonight and fend off nocturnal visitors by yerself.”
    “Do I look comfortable sitting on these hard, lumpy rocks? It’s my ankle.”
    He raked her over with a gaze that took its own sweet time, pausing for an uncomfortably long time to give her breasts a good going-over. Apparently he had already formed a remarkably accurate picture of how she would look without a stitch on.
    “I would advise ye to pay more attention to what ye are aboot. Ye are in a dangerous position, and ye have no one to protect ye. That places ye completely at my mercy.”
    “I am indebted to you for risking your life to ride down here, when you could have ridden off and left me to die. I am appreciative of any assistance you can give me, for I am in desperate need of help and completely dependent upon your charity.”
    Her eyes connected with his ever so briefly before she looked away. “I can’t stand. I think my ankle is sprained, or perhaps I have a fracture,” she said, then adding the Latin word, fractura , in case he did not understand fracture.
    His brows rose, and the expression in his eyes was one of interested surprise. “Fracture? You speak French?”
    So much for getting it down to his level. She nodded. “A little, but I have studied Latin, and the Latin word is fractura .”
    “’Tis the same word—fracture or fractura ,” he said.
    “Either way, it hurts. I tried hopping to the burn to soak it in cold water, but I kept falling because of the loose stones. So here I am, waiting for another option to present itself. Could that be you?”
    He muttered something in Gaelic, too soft and too rapidly spoken for her to catch, but the tone and the hard set to his features told her readily enough that she was already labeled a nuisance. However, she was alive, which was promising.
    As he hunkered down beside her, his face was so near that she could feel the warmth of his breath brush against her cheek. She tilted her head back to watch him as he picked up her foot. She yelped with pain, which he ignored.
    “’Tis swelling like a turkey cock—’tis no’ broken.”
    “It will be if you don’t stop twisting it.” She yanked her foot back and tugged at her shorts.
    He studied her with the sharpness of an eagle, and his stare seemed to penetrate the fabric of her scanty clothing. The way he was looking at her—a dunce could see that he wanted her—and the effect of it made her stomach tighten with desire, which was the last thing she needed right now. She exhaled with a breathy little moan that made her pray he had not heard it.
    One glance told her she was out of luck in that department, for he was undressing her with his eyes as surely as God made little apples. She tugged at her shorts again.
    “Yer fighting a losing battle, lass.” His hand was still on her ankle, and his gaze traveled slowly up her legs. The look couldn’t have been more suggestive if it had been his hand. She was trapped in his gaze, and the way he was looking her—lord, it made her feel like the only sitting duck in the pond when duck season opened. Mustering as much huffiness as she could, she said,