Where's My Hero? Read online

  He’d become so comfortable with Kenna that he’d let his common sense slip and his careful guard down. He had confided things to her that he had told no one. Over the course of the last year, he had laid bare his thoughts and his heart to her.

  And she had returned the courtesy.

  Simon sighed. “Have no fear, as soon as she comes here, I shall set things aright.”

  “Then you’d best be about it, since I saw her right before I came seeking you.”

  Simon’s heart pounded at the words as happiness flooded him. “Kenna is here?”

  Stryder nodded.

  His food forgotten, Simon started for the door. “Where is she?”

  “She was with Sin MacAllister last I saw.”

  Simon faltered at the name of his childhood friend. “Sin brought her here?”

  “I would assume so.”

  Simon clenched his teeth at that. Things had just become twice as complicated. Not that it mattered.

  Kenna was here.

  She was the most important thing to him, and now he would be able to see her again. To touch her. Hear the sound of her voice…

  After all these nights of struggling to remember her precious face and beautiful smile, he could see her again. Feel the warmth of her physical touch. Smell the light lavender scent of her skin.

  It would be heaven.

  He left Stryder in the hall and went to find the woman whose amusing insights and anecdotes had stolen his heart.

  It didn’t take long to ascertain her whereabouts. He found the king’s steward and learned that she’d come to the castle the night before, after Simon had retired to his tent.

  Lord Drexton had given her, Sin and Caledonia rooms in the castle.

  Simon made for the area posthaste. He ran up the stone spiral steps, desperately seeking the woman he loved. Ignoring the maid who gasped and hurried from his path, he sprinted down the hallway to the last door.

  The room that held her…

  He knocked on the door without hesitation.

  “Enter.”

  Simon closed his eyes and savored the lilting brogue that single word betrayed. She was here! By all the saints in heaven, she had come at his request.

  As he reached for the handle, his courage faltered.

  Kenna didn’t know him at all.

  All this time she’d made the assumption she was writing to Stryder. Even though he’d meant to tell her the truth about who he was, he’d never had the heart.

  At first it had all seemed harmless enough. Just a few notes back and forth on nothing of any import. Until last Christmastide. In a moment of weakness, he had shared his mother’s death with her.

  She’d responded with such precious words of comfort that he hadn’t had the courage after that to let her know his real identity.

  If she ever learned the truth…

  She will think I betrayed her.

  Fear sliced through him at that thought. He would never do such a thing, and yet she would believe it. Most likely, she’d never forgive him for it.

  She would hate him eternally.

  Nay, he couldn’t bear that.

  What was he to do?

  He heard her approaching the door.

  His heart hammering, Simon did something he’d never done before.

  He fled.

  Rushing away from the room, he found a shadowy alcove where he could hide himself. He’d barely crammed himself into it before the door swung open.

  Her silken voice assailed his body with pleasure. “Hello? Is anyone out here?”

  From the shadows, he saw her. She was far more beautiful than he remembered. Her cheeks were flush, her eyes bright. She wore a deep scarlet kirtle that made her pale skin glisten.

  He hardened instantly at the sight of her. How he yearned to go to her, take her in his arms and taste her full, moist lips. To sample the full bounty of her soft curves and pale skin.

  He wanted her in a way he’d never wanted anything.

  It took all his will not to leave the shadows and touch her. To yield to the burning ache in his loins that demanded he claim her for his own.

  But he didn’t dare.

  He had no right to this woman who had spilled her heart out to him while thinking he was someone else.

  By all rights, he—who knew everything about her—should know nothing at all.

  Damn him for his foolish stupidity.

  She looked around the corridor, then stepped back into the room and shut the door.

  Simon still didn’t move.

  He was torn between the desire to go to that door, kick it open and take what he wanted and the need to run for cover lest Kenna learn of his trickery.

  But was it trickery when he hadn’t meant it that way? He’d never really lied to her. He’d only failed to correct her misinterpretation.

  Every word he’d written to her had been the truth. Every feeling real and honest.

  “Simon?”

  He started at the familiar voice that came from the opposite end of the hallway.

  Stepping out of the shadows, he saw the MacNeely lairdess. She was even more beautiful now than when he’d left Scotland. Her long, red hair was braided down the side of her face, and she wore a deep blue kirtle that accentuated the perfection of her body.

  “Callie,” he greeted.

  A warm smile curved her lips as she pulled him into a sisterly hug of affection. “Whatever are you doing here, and hiding in the shadows, no less?”

  Simon stepped back. “Like the others, I have come for the show of arms.”

  She nodded. “Is your brother, Draven, with you?”

  “Nay. He didn’t want to travel without Emily and the boys, and he felt it was too far for the youngest to journey.”

  Caledonia took his arm in hers and led him toward the room where Kenna was.

  His heart pounded more with every step that took him closer to his doom.

  Perspiration broke out on his forehead.

  Unaware of his panic, Callie continued. “Then I shall just have to stop at Ravenswood on my way home and make sure to see them and Dermot. And speaking of my errant brother, have you seen him recently?”

  Simon shook his head. “Not since I released Dermot’s custody over to Draven, but Emily has written to say he is well.”

  “Good.”

  Simon swallowed as she reached for the door handle.

  Run!

  The command was so strong that he wasn’t sure what kept him from heeding it.

  But before his common sense could return, Caledonia opened the door.

  Simon’s gaze met Kenna’s instantly. She sat in a chair on the other side of the room, just before the open window with a small psalter in her hands. Sunlight streamed in through the window, where it lightened strands of her hair to form an angelic halo around her face.

  She was beautiful.

  Desire hit him fiercely. It was all he could do to breathe. His body was instantly hot and cold.

  He found himself unable to move. Unable to break eye contact with the one woman who had haunted him for the last year.

  The one woman he would give up his life for.

  Kenna couldn’t move as she saw the man beside her cousin. His dark auburn hair was a bit longer than was the English fashion, but he wore a small, stylish goatee that had been perfectly manicured.

  He was taller than most men, with a lean, muscular build that bespoke power and strength. Deadly grace. His blue eyes were riveting in their striking color.

  Truly, he was a most handsome man.

  And it took her a full minute before she realized who he was.

  The Wraith.

  They’d seen each other only once, but she had never forgotten the handsomeness of his features. The way his blue eyes were able to sear her with his passionate heat.

  He looked at her now like some hungry predator who had just found its next meal. The intensity of that stare made her hot and nervous. And oddly enough, it brought a strange thrill to
her.

  There was an aura of dangerous power surrounding him. One of possessiveness.

  She couldn’t fathom why, but the sensation didn’t lessen.

  “Kenna, have you met Simon? He is the friend of Sin’s who came with him to Scotland after we married. His elder brother is the one Dermot was sent to live with.”

  Kenna was completely stunned by the news.

  “You’re Simon?” she said, her face breaking out into a smile. It was all she could do not to laugh at some of the stories she had heard from Callie and Sin about this knight.

  It was hard to fathom that the dangerous predator before her could be the kind, good-natured man of whom they had spoken.

  He was far too intense for that. Far too intense ever to follow the orders of someone else. She had imagined Simon of Ravenswood as a small, gentle man, not as someone who towered over her cousin with such a steely and dangerous demeanor.

  He inclined his head toward her. “It’s good to see you again, my lady.”

  Caledonia looked back and forth between them. “You know each other?”

  “We met in France when I went to see Lord Stryder.” Kenna rose to her feet and placed her psalter in her seat.

  As she neared Simon, she tilted her head to look up at him. What was it about this man that made her knees weak? Made her burn to reach out and touch him? To brush the stray lock of hair back from his forehead and to kiss the bared skin?

  His gaze was guarded, cool.

  “You refused to tell me your name then,” she said. “Why?”

  Kenna was fascinated by the way his muscles rolled under his supertunic as he shrugged his shoulders. “You were more interested in Stryder than you were in me.”

  She had the impression that those words seemed to wound him somehow.

  “Have you heard the good news, Simon?” Callie said. “Kenna is to marry Stryder.”

  There was a very subtle tensing to his features. One that looked like pain. “Congratulations, my lady. I hope he makes you happy.”

  Callie frowned at that. “Are you all right, Simon? You seem rather reserved.”

  He cleared his throat and offered her a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Forgive me, Callie. I didn’t rest well last night.”

  “Do you still travel with Stryder?” Kenna asked him. “Or are you knight to another lord?”

  A fierce heat came into his eyes at that. Flickering. Burning. Her question had offended him, she could sense it.

  “I am always my own knight, my lady. I travel with my friends and brothers until I feel the urge to leave and go my own way.”

  “Brothers?” Callie repeated. “I thought Draven was the only one you had.”

  “Nay. I am bastard born. I fear my father was rather free with himself, and I have a large family to burden whenever the mood strikes me.”

  Kenna laughed at that. “You sound like Stryder. He once said the very same thing to me.”

  There was no mistaking the panic that flashed across his features. “I had best be going. ’Twas nice seeing you both again.”

  He was out the door before Kenna could even open her mouth to return the sentiment.

  “Well, that was certainly odd,” Callie said as she rested her hands on her hips at his hasty departure. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Simon so stiff and guarded. He’s normally much friendlier. I can’t imagine what has gotten into him.”

  Kenna barely heard the words. There was something strange here. Something very strange.

  Stryder acted as if he didn’t know her, and Simon quoted almost verbatim an anecdote that Stryder had once written to her….

  Stryder…

  Simon…

  A bad feeling settled over her.

  Nay, surely not.

  Her chest tight with apprehension, she grabbed her letters and excused herself from Callie, then went below to find one of the two men who had her perplexed.

  It was Stryder she sought first. She found him alone in the stable, readying his horse for a ride.

  “My lord?”

  He paused and turned to face her. She had the distinct feeling that he was biting his tongue to keep from cursing.

  Once again she was struck by the handsomeness of his features, by the way his black hair curled so becomingly around his face and shoulders.

  Stryder of Blackmoor was a man to make any woman weak in the knees. Yet he didn’t make her warm the way Simon had.

  “My lady,” he greeted her cooly. Dispassionately.

  And it was then she knew the truth.

  This wasn’t the same man who had written to her. That man had spilled out his heart and soul to her. He had been open and funny. Warm and enchanting.

  The man before her was too guarded and closed to her. She had been tricked, she knew it.

  Now she wanted proof before she let loose her wrath on them.

  So she handed Stryder her letters. “Are you the man who wrote these to me?”

  He turned them over and looked at the Blackmoor seal. “They bear my mark.”

  “Aye, they do indeed.”

  He frowned as he handed them back to her. “Then they are from me.”

  “But you didn’t write them.”

  He moved away.

  “Please,” she begged, taking his arm to stop him. “I must know.”

  “Why?”

  “Because these are tender words,” she said, holding the letters up to him. “Poetic words. Who would dare write me such while signing your name to them? Was this some cruel game you played?”

  His eyes darkened, as if her accusation greatly offended him. “Nay, lady. I would never play with another in such a manner. I may have committed many crimes in my life, but mockery has never been one of them.”

  She pulled the top letter off and removed the red ribbon. “Read this and tell me what you see.”

  A tic started in his jaw. “I can’t read that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I can’t read. I never learned.”

  All the breath left her lungs at that. Stunned, she could do nothing but stare.

  She’d wanted the truth and now she had it. Stryder was illiterate.

  “Then who wrote this to me?”

  “I did.”

  Chapter 3

  Kenna turned to find Simon standing just behind her. His blue eyes were dark and stormy.

  “You wrote to me as Stryder?” she asked.

  He glanced to Stryder, then locked gazes with her. “Aye.”

  Pain and disbelief washed over her. Oh, she was such a fool! How could she have ever thought that a man as handsome, wealthy and well-famed as Stryder would ever settle for a plain woman such as she?

  And yet Simon had made her believe. He had fed her mind full of fallacies and lies.

  How could he?

  “I see.”

  Her throat tight, she returned the ribbon to the letter, then handed the stack over to Simon. “I hope the two of you have a good laugh over this. I’m sorry I disturbed you.”

  He captured her arm as she started past him. “Kenna, please. I…”

  She waited for him to finish.

  Instead, he just stared at her with his jaw flexed, his eyes snapping, as if he were debating with himself.

  “You what?” she asked.

  His gaze softened. “I never meant to hurt you.”

  “Then what did you mean by sending me those letters, knowing I thought they came from Stryder?”

  Stryder promptly excused himself and headed for the stable’s opening.

  Alone now, Kenna stared up at Simon, whose eyes held a deep, inner torment. “I would never hurt you,” he murmured.

  She sensed his heartfelt sincerity, not that it mattered. What he had done had been wrong. Inexcusable.

  And for what?

  For sport?

  For cruelty?

  “But you did hurt me, Simon. You have embarrassed me and made me feel—”

  He stopped her words with a hot, d
emanding kiss.

  Kenna was shocked by his actions.

  No man had ever dared such before. None. Her father would have had the heart of any man who dared handle her in such a fashion, and yet she found Simon’s bold possession scintillating and wonderfully exciting.

  Closing her eyes, she inhaled the warm, rich scent of him and moaned at his taste, at the sensation of his hot, firm lips on hers, of his tongue gently searching her mouth.

  She’d lain awake for hours at night imagining what it would be like to kiss the author of her letters.

  Only then she had imagined Stryder.

  But it was Simon who had written them. Simon who had touched her heart and made her feel beautiful and needed.

  She pulled back and looked up at him.

  “I won’t apologize for writing to you,” he whispered. “I’m only sorry that you were embarrassed.”

  Her fury snapped at that. “Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t Stryder?”

  “Would you have written to me if I had?”

  “Of course,” she said emphatically.

  She saw the raw doubt in his eyes, and it made her ache in sympathy. How could he doubt her, especially after what he had done?

  “Truly?” he asked. “Tell me, wasn’t half the appeal of me the fact that you thought I was an earl and not some landless knight? I’m not a fool, Kenna. I learned long ago that whenever I’m with Stryder, Sin or Draven, women look past me to them. Because I hold no titles or land, I’m practically invisible. My only purpose has been to help women land titled husbands while I am seen as nothing more than a friend to them.”

  He stared at her, his gaze probing as if he could see the answer he needed in her eyes. “Had you known it was plain and simple Simon you were writing to, would you have continued to do so, or would you have written me a letter telling me what good friends we are and then set your gaze to another?”

  Kenna opened her mouth, then paused.

  She didn’t want to think herself so shallow. She’d never been the kind of person to discount another because of their birth status.

  Was there any truth to his claim?

  Her gaze fell to the thin gold chain around his neck. She trailed her attention down to a small circle of gold that lay nestled between the laces of his tunic.

  Before she could stop herself, she reached up and pulled it out. A simple, unadorned gold piece, it was warm from the heat of his body.