Page 36 of Falling for the Knight

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“Is this familiar?” Tristan asked.

Hannah looked around, avoiding him. As expected, she had not slept much the night before, kept awake by worry about her sisters, and what fitful slumber she’d managed was filled with dreams of a certain handsome medieval knight.

Tristan was no longer the man who had found her lying on a beach, but the one who had kissed her, who had made his desire for her known even as she tried to deny her own feelings. Every glance, every touch—no matter how innocent or casual—was an invitation. A challenge.

And every bounce that brought her hips to meet his backside reminded her not only of her desire but of the need to arrive at Leannan Falls and sort out this mess.

“Maybe?” she said, wishing she’d paid more attention that day. She’d spent the ride to the falls chatting with her sisters about leaving Scotland and fending off their pleas for her to return home. She certainly had not been studying the landscape, which had all looked pretty much the same. “It’s hard to tell. The last time I was here, there were roads leading up to the trailhead. Houses and—”

“We’ve avoided the main roads and stayed away from villages, especially around here. I am not sure, but we may already be on Clan Sutherland land.”

Hannah could feel Tristan tense. From what he’d told her, she knew how dangerous that would be. And yet he’d chosen to accompany her anyway.

“Tristan, thank you for—”

Tristan turned, putting his finger to his lips. He pointed ahead of them and to the right. A small stone cottage with a thatched roof came into view. It appeared to be abandoned, but clearly Tristan was taking no chances. He only spoke once they were well beyond hearing distance, and even then his caution made her a bit nervous.

“If the borderlands are truly as dangerous as you say, why would anyone live here? That was no Saxford Castle back there, its defenses—”

“Do not exist. Which is likely why it was abandoned.”

They rode along, the day as cloudy and gloomy as the previous one had been bright and sunny. She refused to think of omens, but it made her anxious nonetheless.

“But even Saxford . . .” Tristan shifted, forcing Hannah to tighten her arms around his waist. “Nowhere is truly safe along the border.”

He was silent for so long, Hannah thought Tristan may have forgotten her question or decided not to answer it. When he did speak, the deep baritone of his voice touched her soul.

“It is more than a location, more than a home. Borderers are a resilient people whose loyalty is pure and whole. We would not live anywhere else, unless forced to do so, as I suspect happened back there.”

He could have been talking about Mayport Bay, and she could hear her sisters’ voices in Tristan’s words. They had such a happy childhood in a town that many came to visit year after year, some tourists making it their permanent home. They’d never understood her decision to move to Boston.

“I left my home,” she found herself saying as if it were a confession.

Tristan lifted his head, and she heard it then. A waterfall in the distance. Her pulse pounded in her veins as she looked around for familiar landmarks.

“Why?” he asked, wresting her attention away from their surroundings.

She could hear Caroline asking that same question. No matter how many times she tried to explain, neither of her sisters completely understood.

Maybe Hannah didn’t quite understand herself.

“It’s a small town. I always knew I’d leave someday. Or at least after I got into college, I knew—”

“University?”

“Aye,” she smiled to herself, realizing college and graduate school meant nothing to him. Yet for a while, it had been her entire world. The day she received her acceptance letter to Yale was one of the happiest of her life. “After growing up around my parents’ shop, I knew I wanted to start my own business. I didn’t know what I wanted to do at first, but Mayport Bay offered few opportunities. Boston, on the other hand . . .”

Hannah loved everything about Boston. Moving there had been the right move for her career.

“But you miss your home?”

“Before my parents . . .” She sighed. “I did miss it. But there’s nothing there for me now.”

“Other than your sisters,” Tristan said.

Did he sense her regret? Spending these last weeks with her sisters had only reminded her how much she missed them.