Not threatened at all by the iron poker she still held ready to strike, he walked slowly toward her—rather, toward the warmth of the fire beside her. As he approached, the dim light of the fire chased away the shadows and finally revealed his face. A light growth of beard covered his cheeks, cuts bled at his brow.
A distant memory triggered in the far back of her mind, but it swirled away before she could latch onto it. That face. So familiar…
Or perhaps she was simply so frightened that she’d gone daft. To think she’d know a stranger who’d forced his way into her home, who even now could lunge for the g*n still resting on the settle before she could strike with the poker—madness! His large presence in her small cottage was enough to make her tremble, if she wasn’t already freezing from
