Page 107 of The Outlaw Viking

Rain’s bleak eyes locked with his and she seemed to swallow hard before speaking. “I don’t know.” Then she seemed to force her mood to lighten and poked a finger in his chest. “But know this, you stubborn Viking, if you are alive somewhere, hiding from me, I’ll find you. Maybe even kidnap you again.”

“Nay, you would not dare do such again. I forbid it.”

“Not even if I captured you so I could have my way with your body?” she asked, slanting a look of exaggerated sultriness at him.

“Well, mayhap,” he conceded with a grin.

Just before they entered the side door of the hospitium, Rain put a hand on his sleeve to halt his progress, and said nervously, “Before we go inside, there’s a little something I need to tell you.”

He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. Whenever Rain used that tone of voice and mentioned “a little something,” it usually meant she wanted a favor, or he was not going to like what she said.

“Bernie has the hots for me,” she said, blushing.

At first, his mouth dropped open. He snapped it shut with a grunt of disgust. Truly, the wench had a knack for surprising him. “I think I can guess what ‘the hots’ are,” he remarked when he finally got his amazement under control, “but who in the name of Thor is Bernie?”

“Oh, you remember Father Bernard—the young priest we met that first day, the one with acne—zits—all over his face.”

“And you have become so familiar you call him Bernie?”

“Not familiar, really. He’s so young. I just humor his crush, but I don’t want you to get upset if you notice him putting the make on me.”

“Rain, I have no idea in the world what you just said. But if he dares to lay one finger on you, I will knock his rotten teeth down to his toes.”

She started to protest, but Selik pushed her through the doorway and gave her waist a proprietary squeeze. Unfortunately, Father Bernard was standing there, ready to greet the target of his ‘hots’, with wounded eyes riveted on Selik’s intimately placed hand. With deliberate deviltry, Selik looked the monk straight in the eye and spread his palm, moving lower to Rain’s right buttock, which he grasped suggestively.

Rain jumped and turned on him.

He told her baldly, “Begging your pardon, Brother Godwine. I was reaching for the door handle.”

Rain was not fooled one bit by his fake innocence, although Father Bernard accepted Selik’s explanation. The first chance she got, she hissed at Selik, “Door handle? Hah! How would you like it if I grabbed your handle?”

“I would like it fine,” he said with a wink. “In fact, you may pump my handle any time you like.”

“Tsk! Behave yourself, Selik, or I’ll never get anything done here today.” In her assumed husky voice, she said, “Father Bernard, you remember Brother Ethelwolf, don’t you?”

Unaware of their whispered exchange, the young priest ignored Selik and turned to Rain. “You have not been here for days,” he complained. “Father Theodric has been asking for you. Did you not promise to discuss brain fevers with him?”

“Yes, but I’ve been busy at the orphanage and couldn’t come ’til now.” Rain tried hard to keep her voice low and husky to hide her sex.

“That orphanage! Why do you waste your talents with the filthy Danes? They are naught but little heathens,” he whined, and Rain felt Selik stiffen behind her. She pinched his arm in warning.

“They are God’s children, Father,” she chastised the young priest, “no matter their origins.”

“Well, I still say ye should reside at the minster. We could always find a place for you to sleep.”

“I wager he could,” Selik whispered near her ear. “Under his scrawny body.”

She flashed Selik an admonishing look, afraid he would betray their disguises.

“Brother Godwine! Brother Godwine!” Father Rupert called out to Rain. When they approached the pallet where he knelt, she saw that the deathly ill girl was now sitting up.

Father Rupert beamed at Rain. “You were right. A change in diet was all Alise needed. Her father will be corning to take her home today.”

Rain knelt beside Father Rupert and examined the girl she’d diagnosed with Celiac disease her first day at the hospitium. Alise was still far too thin, but with care, she would recover with no ill effects. “Now you do understand, Alise, that you cannot ever, for the rest of your life, eat grains again? Even one bite of bread could set your disease off again.”

“Will I ne’er get better?” the little girl asked tearfully.

Rain shook her head. “But isn’t it a small price to pay for feeling well again?”