Page 61 of Forbidden

“Are you certain the lad can read?”

“Better than he can write, according to Cassandra.”

“Does he write?” Duncan asked, surprised.

“Badly. Erik despairs of ever making him skilled enough to tally a keep’s crops, animals, and taxes.”

“Then why doesn’t he send the boy back to his father?”

“Egbert has none,” Amber said. “Erik found him by a cart road. His father had been killed by a falling tree.”

“Does Erik make it a habit to pick up and care for stray people?”

“If they can’t care for themselves, someone must.”

“Is that why you cared for me?” Duncan asked. “Duty and compassion?”

“Nay.”

Amber remembered what it had felt like when she first touched Duncan, a pleasure so great it shocked her into snatching her hand back. Then she had touched him again.

And lost her heart.

“It was different with you,” Amber said in a low voice. “Touching you pleased me.”

“Does it please you still?”

A telltale wash of color across her cheeks silently answered Duncan’s question.

“I’m glad,” he said. “Very, very glad.”

With subtle pressures of his arms, Duncan gathered Amber even closer to his body. The hunger for her that was never far beneath his thoughts flooded his body with anticipation, even as his conscience railed him.

He shouldn’t seduce her until he had more answers to the dark questions from his past.

Unknown vows haunted him.

And yet…and yet.

It was surpassingly sweet to ride through an autumn land with slanting yellow sunlight warming his face and an amber fairy relaxed within the circle of his arms.

“The sun,” Amber murmured. “What an unexpected glory.”

She lifted her arms and pushed the wool cowl from her head. The indigo cloth fell in folds over her nape and shoulders, allowing the gentle golden warmth of the sun to bathe her.

“Aye,” Duncan said. “It is indeed glorious.”

But it was Amber rather than the sunlight that Duncan praised.

“Your hair,” he murmured. “’Tis a thousand shades of golden light. I’ve seen nothing more beautiful.”

Amber’s breath caught as a fine shiver went over her body. The hunger in Duncan summoned her. She wanted nothing more than to pull his strength around her like a living mantle, shutting out the world, giving herself to him in a secret silence that no other person could violate.

Yet she must not give herself to him.

Heart and body and soul.

“Amber,” Duncan whispered.