A Rip in the Veil Read Online Free PDF Page A

standing some feet from the opening, relieving himself in a steaming, hissing stream. Matthew threw her a look, shook himself, ordered his breeches, and gave her a small smile.
    “Hungry?”
    She nodded eagerly. For the last half-hour she’d been thinking fried eggs with tomatoes, sausages and crispy bacon – or toast, just heaps of toast with butter and jam. She swallowed back on the rushing saliva flow in her mouth. He grinned and used his bare toe to indicate what looked like a heap of feathers.
    “Fledglings. I’ll roast them.”
    Not exactly bacon. She stared when he proceeded to cake the dead birds in mud before putting them into the low burning fire.
    “Mud?”
    He gave her a surprised look. “Otherwise they burn to cinders before they’re cooked.”
    Oh, she nodded, looking at the little dirtballs with certain wariness. What about the feathers? And all the lice and stuff that lived on them?
    “They burn off,” Matthew said.
    Great; sounded fantastic.
    By the time the birds were done, Alex was so hungry she no longer cared. Bones, innards and meat, it all went down.
    “You want the last one?” Matthew held it out to her. Alex eyed it longingly, but after a quick assessment of their relative sizes, shook her head.
    “No, you go ahead.”
    She stretched out on the ground, pillowing her head on her arms. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend everything was as it always was – for like five seconds. She heard him move, and turned her head in his direction. He flushed and looked away when she intercepted his stare.
    Alex took the opportunity to do some inspecting of her own; long legs, dark brows and a nose that looked very nice in half profile. And the eyes…she had a thing about eyes, and this man had hazel eyes fringed with thick dark lashes most women would kill for. He was close to six feet two, she reckoned, which must make him a very big man in the here and now, half a foot or so taller than she herself was. She closed her eyes, nostrils flaring as she tried to catch his scent. He did smell ripe, but more of sweat than of actual grime. She sniffed at her own shirt and made a face; not only sweat, but blood and dirt and…ugh, she needed to wash.
    “There’s water there, right?” She pointed at the copse of trees that stood down by the crossroads.
    Matthew inclined his head in affirmation. “It’s a small spring, and the water is considered very good.”
    “It is? Why?”
    “I’m not sure, mayhap because it’s Scottish?” He said it lightly, almost disparagingly, but she could hear he meant it. Alex smiled at his archaic patriotism. But then, she wasn’t Scottish. She was nothing, a mongrel of Swedish and Spanish ancestry raised respectively in Seville, Milwaukee, Stockholm and Edinburgh, their polyglot home full of strays from all over, the occasional Spanish visitor, and a substantially higher amount of Swedish cousins.
    “I’ll just go down and wash, okay?”
    He nodded and Alex turned to him, inundated by a wave of gut clawing panic.
    “You won’t go, will you? I mean, you won’t just leave me here.”
    Matthew studied her for a moment before giving his head a slight shake. “Nay, lass, I’ll not leave you behind.”
    He ended up having to help Alex down the hill, supporting her as she limped towards the burbling sound. She shivered in her jacket – the wind had a cooler edge today than yesterday. Yesterday? It couldn’t be yesterday, could it? Shit, she didn’t even exist yet, but a quick run of hands down her body assured her that she did.
    It was good water; Alex drank, washed hands and face and was doing a rudimentary tooth brushing when a hand closed over her nape, squeezed hard into her flesh. She reared back, ignoring the way her ribs squealed in protest.
    “Agh! Let go!” It came out rather muted, given the pressure on her neck. Psychopath! No goat farmer, no monk, this Matthew guy was a raving beast, and now…
    “Alexandra Lind, right?” the man holding her