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Simon nodded a greeting, walked past, then backed up the stairs to stop them. "Are you bleeding?"
Simon indicated the tear in Sin's surcoat.
"It would appear so," Sin answered sarcastically.
"Good Lord, what happened?"
Sin shrugged. "Apparently someone doesn't want me here. No doubt you, either, so guard your back,
little brother. The last thing I want to do is tell Draven you're dead."
"Have no fear. The last thing I want you to do is tell him I'm dead." Simon paused and looked back
toward his room. "I'm thinking perhaps I should return to my room and don my armor before I go eat."
"Not a bad plan."
Callie interrupted them. "Gentlemen, please, I need to see to this wound lest he bleed to death from it."
Sin dismissed her worry. "It missed the artery. I assure you, I won't bleed to death from this."
Callie frowned at her husband and his calm acceptance of everything. It was as if he expected nothing
more than to be insulted and wounded. "Then humor me, please."
Without further voiced complaints, he followed her to their room, though the look in his eyes told her
that many an unspoken complaint circled in his mind.
Callie helped him pull his surcoat off. She frowned as she studied the hole where the arrow had pierced
him. "Strange. You can barely see the blood on the cloth, and yet I feel it." There was a lot of blood on
the cloth, actually.
Sin looked up from his inspection of his wound.
"The black is tinted with red dye to mask any injuries I might have. In battle, it confuses and scares my
enemies who know they have injured me and yet can't see the blood."
"Hence the invincible devil epitaph they have applied to you?"
He nodded as he took a seat on the edge of her bed and held a clean cloth to his shoulder.
Callie prepared her needle and thread and did her best not to notice just how delectable her husband's
body was when bared. The dim light in the room caught against the rich, tawny flesh, making it even more
mouthwatering. Och, but the man was handsome.
" 'Tis an interesting trick. Where did you learn it?" she asked, trying to distract herself.
She didn't really expect an answer, so when she got one, it surprised her.
"While I lived with the Saracens. It was one of the lessons they taught me."
Now she understood the strange tactics he'd used to defeat her clansmen. "The fighting you used
below they taught you that as well?"
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"Aye."
How strange, for him to be so revealing. Callie took the cloth from his hand and inspected the ravaged
skin. Her stomach clenched at the new wound that lanced across skin already scarred from previous
injuries. She ran her fingers over him, aching at the thought of what he had already lived through. His hard
skin was so warm and his hair brushed against her hand as she prepared his shoulder by cleansing it with
a wine-drenched cloth.
Her poor husband.
"How long did you live there?" she asked, trying to distract herself from his lush, muscled skin and the
desire she had to kiss it and him.
"Almost five years."
Callie paused. Five years. It was a long time to live among one's enemies. She tried to imagine what it
would have been like for her to live in London for that long while yearning to be home. No wonder he
had told her he understood her need to return to her family.
Of all men, he knew it on a level she couldn't even begin to fathom.
"Why did you live with them for so long?" she asked as she drew the first stitch.
He tensed only the tiniest bit before he spoke. "I had no choice. I was their slave. Every time I tried to
escape, they brought me back."
Her heart lurched at his words. By the ragged note in his voice she could tell they had made him suffer
greatly for those attempts at freedom. Her gaze dropped to the long, jagged scars across his back and
she wondered how many beatings he must have suffered at their hands.
And he had been just a lad. No older than Dermot. She swallowed as it dawned on her that he would
have been evenyounger than Dermot.
She carefully made another stitch. "How did you finally get away?"
"Henry. They sent me to kill him, and as I was sneaking through his camp, I had a thought that if ever I
was to have freedom again, Henry would be the only one who could help me. So instead of cutting his
throat, I bargained with him."
She tied off her thread and cut it. "I'm still surprised he helped you."
"As was I. I honestly expected him to kill me once I let him up. But I figured either way I would be free."
The horror of it. She couldn't imagine trying to make such a decision. "How old were you?"
"Ten-and-eight."
"You were just a child."
"I was never a child."
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Nay, he wasn't. And that was the worst part about all of this. He'd spent the whole of his life as an
outsider. Here, in England and in Outremer. She couldn't imagine living like that.
Callie silently stitched the wound on his chest, then looked at his forearms where her sword had cut him.
"I'm so sorry for hurting you."
Sin looked up at her words. The sincerity scorched him. "You didn't hurt me."
She alone had never hurt him. Not yet anyway.
He stared at the tendrils of her red curls falling over her shoulders, the gentleness in her green eyes. He
felt her unwillingness to hurt him as she touched his skin. It made his entire body burn ferociously,
demanding he take her in his arms and ease the ache in both his heart and his loins.
She was so incredible. And he wanted her with a passion so fierce, he wondered if it would destroy him.
She dipped her head down to his, and just as he opened his lips to taste her, a loud commotion filled the
air.
People shouted as a group of horses came into the courtyard below.
Callie pulled away instantly, leaving him to curse the interruption while she went to the window to see
what was going on. He joined her there and looked out over her shoulder.
In the courtyard below were three riders. Her clansmen and servants were rushing about to welcome
them like long-lost family as Aster and Dermot left the castle and offered up a greeting to their guests.
"The MacAllisters are here," Callie said with a note of reverence in her voice.
Sin forced himself not to smile. She had no idea what was in store for her now.
His brother Braden rode his fierce stallion Deamhan, who pawed and stamped at the ground in
aggravation at having to stop. The horse and man had much the same temperament.
Braden's long, black hair was tangled by the ride and his dark green and black plaid was worn as
haphazardly as ever.
Ewan rode next to him on the back of a roan, while the fair-haired Lochlan swung his leg over his
dapple-gray and slid masterfully to the ground.
It was good to see them again.
Callie turned to face him, her cheeks bright. He arched a brow at her exuberance, somewhat stung by it.
She seemed happier to see them than she did to be with him.
"I'll go make sure they have food and drink. You dress and I will meet you below."
Sin frowned as she rushed from the room with a light step. He looked back out the window at the
cheerful crowd below that warmly welcomed his brothers. Their shouts of greeting rang in his ears as
Aster clapped Lochlan on the back like a father welcoming home his beloved son and Dermot laughed
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with Braden.
He supposed some things never changed.
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