Free Heart of Honor by Kat Martin Page A

word might best describe an opera “—a place where music was played, and we were not alone.”
    “You say he is a friend, but I think he is more.”
    She ignored the remark. Matthew had merely kissed her cheek, hardly enough to deserve recriminations, and certainly not from Leif. Instead, she walked behind the table to look at what he had been studying. She saw the letters he had written again and again, improving with each of his efforts.
    “Father is teaching you to write the alphabet. Once you know the letters you can learn to read. Do you know what that word means?”
    He nodded. “In ancient times, our people used sagas to record those things they wanted to pass from generation to generation. Then the priests came. They taught my people the written word and about your Christian God.”
    “So you are a Christian?”
    He shrugged those powerful shoulders. “On Draugr, we have our own religion. It is a mixture of your Christianity and our belief in the ancient Viking gods.”
    “I see.” She wanted to ask him more about the place he had come from, but the hour was late and she saw that Leif was watching her, his gaze burning into her in that way that so unnerved her.
    “It is getting on past midnight,” she said. “I think it is time we both went up to bed.”
    His blue eyes sharpened. “Aye, lady, if that is your wish. I would like that above all things.”
    She wasn’t prepared for the quick movement that propelled her into his arms. She gasped as his mouth came down over hers. For an instant, she was too shocked to push him away. Then the heat of his kiss, the brush of his tongue sliding over her lips, urging her to open for him, sparked a wave of heat that turned her mind completely to mush.
    Her stomach tightened and warmth floated out through her limbs. His lips felt soft yet firm as they moved over hers, and her eyes slid closed. Her heartbeat quickened, his hard body pressing into hers made her nipples tighten beneath the bodice of her gown, and her bones seemed to melt into his.
    Then his hands moved lower, down over her hips until he cupped her bottom through the layers of her gown, and her eyes flew open.
    Dear sweet God! For the first time, she realized exactly what Leif was about—that she had somehow erred in translating her simple wish to retire, and he believed she was inviting him into her bed.
    She started to struggle, pressed her palms against his granite-hard chest and tried to push him away. With obvious reluctance, Leif ended the kiss an instant before her father walked into the study.
    She was breathing a little too hard and so was he, and she could feel warm color washing into her cheeks. Her father glanced from one of them to the other and his eyebrows slowly lifted.
    “I came to check on Leif,” he said to Krista, “to tell him it was time for him to go to bed.”
    Her color deepened. “Yes, well, I was trying to tell him that same thing.” She kept her gaze carefully fixed on her father. “Unfortunately, I said it wrong and Leif misunderstood.”
    The professor’s eyebrows climbed even higher as her meaning grew clear.
    “It—it really wasn’t his fault,” she said. “I mistranslated the words and he got the wrong impression.”
    The professor flicked a glance at Leif, who stood there stoically, not understanding a word. “I see.”
    “You said yourself things are different where he comes from.” Why she was defending him she couldn’t begin to say. Perhaps it was only fair, since, in truth, she had returned his kiss, at least for a time, and found it not the least unpleasant. The thought made her face heat up again.
    Dear Lord, she was being courted by Matthew Carlton, considering the possibility of sharing a life with him. What on earth was wrong with her?
    “I would like to know what you are saying to your father.” Leif’s gaze pinned her where she stood.
    “I told him what happened, that you misunderstood what I was trying to say.”
    “That is correct,”