Read Online The More I See You by Lynn Kurland - Free Book Online Page A

short. As if he would trouble himself to question her! Yet he found the thought of it almost irresistible. After all, he would have the keeping of her for almost a month. There was little sense in not having a bit of diversion after he had labored long and hard during the day.
    He lowered himself to sit on the ground next to her. She trembled still. With a sigh, Richard gave her the blanket he’d reserved for himself. He could do without the warmth. He’d slept many a night without a cloak in his youth for reasons he didn’t care to think about overmuch. Just the memory of his father’s pit was enough to make him shiver.
    Or at least the memory had been in the past. The pit had been filled and his father’s hall reduced to rubble. Nothing awaited him on the seashore but his own partially completed keep. Whatever memories he would have would be ones he made himself. His father had no more power over him.
    He unclenched his fists when he realized his blunt nails were nigh to drawing blood from his palms.

5
    Jessica stared at the broad back of the knight who rode in front of her. She had all the stains on his heavy woolen cloak memorized. Forcing herself to do so was what had kept her from becoming hysterical the day before. Today, life was better. She was only mildly interested in how his coat had become so soiled. She had too many other things to worry about—namely, trying to keep herself from falling headfirst into a black depression. There was a particular reason for her fear of that, one she didn’t have to think about too hard to remember.
    It was the fact that despite her high hopes of finding herself back in her comfortable bed at Henry’s estate, she had woken between two people who belonged in those musty books in the medieval history stack at the public library.
    Things had not improved from there.
    There hadn’t been any more pay phones lining the road today than there had been yesterday. She hadn’t seen anything even remotely resembling a town either. A few gatherings of crude huts here and there, but nothing that would boast something as ordinary as a phone. Too bad. She’d had such plans to lay into Henry for having somehowthrown her into such an amazing reenactment of medieval times.
    Crying had seemed such an inadequate way to express her distress that she’d settled on shivering violently. That had only earned her a lecture from Richard de Galtres on the frailties of women in general. He’d also thrown another blanket around her. She wasn’t sure which she preferred less: when he was ignoring her or when he was treating her like a recalcitrant child. What she really wished was that he’d treat her to a one-way ticket back home.
    To the twentieth century, that is, because as much as she wanted to hope differently, she knew she couldn’t deny the truth much longer. The facts were all around her.
    She was stuck.
    In medieval England.
    With a man who wasn’t exactly what she’d always wished for in a Prince Charming.
    Her mother would be frantic. Jessica could just see the scene at home when she was supposed to have been back in New York, calling for her weekly check-in. Her grandmother would be in the kitchen, either cooking or stitching. Her mother would be puttering around the house, periodically dropping in to look at the phone, as if by her very will alone she could make it ring.
    But it never would.
    Unless Henry had already called and broken the news of Jessica’s disappearance.
    Jessica closed her eyes and said a small prayer that somehow time worked differently in different centuries and she would be home before her mother had to get that phone call.
    “Merciful saints above!”
    Jessica opened her eyes in time to find that the company had halted. She reined her horse reflexively and looked at Warren, who rode to her left.
    “What is it?”
    Warren looked faintly puzzled. “Home. I think. I don’t remember the outer wall being this far from the keep,though. And ’tis far taller