Fiona Brand - Blade's Lady

“Someone hit you?” he demanded softly.

He didn’t move from his semirelaxed position, but Anna was aware of the change in him. His gaze on her had sharpened, and the relaxed pose was no longer indolent.

“No! I—that is, I was…accident-prone as a child.”

The intensity of his regard didn’t lessen. “What kind of accidents?”

The killing kind.

Anna closed her eyes briefly against the throbbing pain that thought elicited. “I had a couple of nasty falls that ended in concussions.”

She rose to her feet, setting the now melting icepack down on the table, forestalling any further questions, hoping he would take the hint and leave. Her head didn’t spin, and her legs no longer felt like limp noodles. The rest and the ice had helped, and soon the pills would ease the pain even further.

Blade took the hint, but in order to get to the door, he had to pass right by her. He stopped, one hand on the door handle, close enough that she had to reluctantly tilt her head to meet his gaze. Close enough that she realised with a sense of shock that he was more than just damp, he was wet through; that all the time he had cared for her, his clothes had been clinging to his skin. Even as she watched, a droplet of water trailed down his temple, but he ignored it.

“I’m glad you don’t have a boyfriend,” he said bluntly, “but I don’t like it that you’re alone tonight. I’ll leave now, because you’re out on your feet. You need to rest. But I’ll be back tomorrow to check on you. Do you work during the day?”

Anna thought that was a slightly unusual way to phrase the question. Most people worked during the day. “Yes,” she said, not supplying him with any details.

The omission didn’t seem to bother him. “I’ll take you out for dinner, then.”

Anna blinked at the flat statement, wondering if she’d heard wrong. Now she was completely confused. Dinner? That sounded like a date.

Again, her lack of reply didn’t seem to bother him. He lifted a hand, brushed a strand of hair back from her forehead and stared critically at the bump. She drew a breath at the strange tingling heat of his touch, that odd internal jolt, but forced herself to stay very still when he transferred his attention to her eyes, staring intently into first one, then the other.

“Your pupils look fine,” he murmured. “No uneven dilation. How’s the headache?”

“I recognise the beat.”

His mouth kicked up at one corner in a slow smile that did bad things to her heart rate. “I’ve heard it a time or two myself.”

He left in a swirl of damp air, his dark form merging so perfectly with the night that he seemed to dissolve into darkness rather than simply walk through it. Anna shut the door firmly behind him. Her fingers shook so badly, it took several attempts to hook the chain and drive the bolt home.

Too late, she thought blankly. Way too late on more than one count. She should have refused to let him inside.

He had seen through her. When he had questioned her, she’d been as transparent as glass, reeling from the twin blows of the incident at the park and her rescue by someone she knew.

Not to mention her state of disorientation. Usually she had no problems making judgments about people, but her instincts seemed to have gone completely hay-wire. Maybe that was so because Blade’s uncanny resemblance to the man in her dreams had somehow triggered the wild fantasy, so that for a time she had become hopelessly tangled between dreams and reality. The strange burst of heat, the charge of awareness whenever he had touched her, had kept her off balance. She had never felt anything like it—not even in dreams.

Leaning against the door, she pressed the heels of her hands into both eyes, trying to alleviate the gritty sting, the hot ache buried at both temples. The silence of the room slowly sank in, easing some of her tension. She had survived the attack, and she was still in one piece…more or less.

Reaction hit with the suddenness of a locomotive smashing into a concrete abutment. A low sound tore from her throat, and she wound her arms around her middle, hanging on tight as shudders jerked through her.

She had been found!

This time it had taken months and, unlike all the other times, there had been no warning, no quick word from a neighbour or co-worker telling her that someone was asking after her, or watching her flat. And this time someone had come to her rescue.

The memory of her childish pleas to an imaginary knight to rescue her surfaced, and she stiffened, pushing herself away from the support of the door.

“Get real,” she muttered into the quiet emptiness of her room.

Blade Lombard might resemble the knight of her dreams, he might even act like him, but there had been a seasoned edge of danger evident in those cool, black, marauder’s eyes. In ancient times he might well have been a knight, but he would have disdained spending his time hanging around at court or even participating in tourneys. He would have gained his experience in the heat of battle.

He’d said he had worked for the military, and she believed him. She was willing to bet he’d spent his time in the special forces. It would fit that ruthless competence, the easy way he’d taken charge.

He had helped her out, but if he’d been in Ambrose Park merely by chance, any interest he had in her could only be motivated by his sense of responsibility toward the lone female he had rescued, nothing more. She couldn’t question his chivalry or his manners—they were self evident—but that didn’t change what he was. Trouble.

Any woman who spent time with Blade Lombard would automatically attract attention to herself simply by being in his company. She couldn’t afford to be noticed, and she definitely couldn’t afford to have her photo published in any papers or magazines.

Gingerly, Anna stripped off her damp clothing, trying not to move her head any more than she had to. Her coat had kept off the worst of the rain and mud, but her jeans were soaked to the knees, and her sweatshirt was damp in places where her coat had let the water in. After slipping on a pair of baggy sweatpants and a sweater, she sat on the edge of the bed and bent forward to pull on fleecy socks. The motion made her head pound harder, and she straightened up, holding still, waiting out the ache.

Abruptly she was overcome by a barrage of images: the attack on the sidewalk, the outline of her assailant falling, cold light sliding along the length of a gun barrel. She began to shake again, despite the warm clothing, every muscle in her body rigid with tension.

She should be crawling into bed, pulling the covers over her head and sleeping, but she couldn’t afford to do that yet. She had to think, had to move. The man who had attacked her was still out there. He had been limping, which was probably why he had given up the search. He would be back, and it wouldn’t take him long to discover where she lived.

She would have to pack before she went to bed; make decisions about which of her meagre possessions she would take with her. That wouldn’t take long. She could only take what she could carry or load into the large pack she kept beneath the bed.

The following afternoon, Blade turned from the slice of Auckland’s bustling seaport that was visible from his office window to catch the eye of the man seated across from his desk. “You’re telling me she doesn’t exist?”

Jack McKenna, one of Lombards’ most senior executives and more family than employee, shook his head. “Nope. I’m telling you that legally she doesn’t exist. No birth certificate, passport or driver’s licence. No records of insurance, mortgages or bank accounts. No criminal record. Not even a parking ticket. Nada. Nothing.”

“So, Anna Johnson is a false name.”