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Much closer.

I could sense her determination and the steady concentration she always displayed when she was preparing to use her bow.

The woman had actually come to Nottingham.

Of course she had.

I'd mated the most stubborn outlaw in England, and she'd given me plenty of warning about what that meant.

My immediate concern was for her safety.

Fitzwalter had thirty-one unfamiliar soldiers stationed throughout the castle, along with men who knew exactly what Robin looked like. He wanted her captured alive, and I doubted he'd hesitate to hurt anyone who stood between him and his prize.

But I also knew my mate.

Robin rarely acted without a plan, and she'd never been foolish enough to enter an enemy stronghold without someone watching her back.

I moved closer to the cell door.

Footsteps approached.

A figure wearing a Nottingham guard's cloak appeared at the far end of the corridor, the hood pulled low enough to conceal most of the face.

I recognized her walk before she came within twenty feet of my cell.

I'd spent too many years watching that woman move through Sherwood to mistake her for anyone else.

"You shouldn't be here," I whispered.

She pushed back her hood. "That's a lovely way to greet your mate."

"Robin…”

"Guy…”

"Do you have any idea what Fitzwalter will do if he catches you?"

"Probably something unpleasant. Hold still."

She approached the cell with a ring of keys and began trying them in the lock.

"Third cell," she muttered. "He said third cell, and for once in his life, a man managed to give me accurate information."

"Where did you get those keys?"

"Borrowed them."

"From whom?"

"A man who wasn't using them."

"Robin."

"Would you rather stay in there?"

I pushed my wrists through the bars. "Get these damned things off."

She grinned. "That's more like it."