With Her Kiss (Swords of Passion) Read Online Free PDF

nuns fluttered their lashes, sparkling at the offer of money and spirits.
    The abbess smiled, her yellowed teeth a ghoulish sight. “You are most kind to compensate us.”
    Geoff tossed her a gold piece from his purse. “A token of my appreciation.”
    She caught it with agility and bit the precious metal to test its validity.
    “Fetch what we need,” Geoff demanded. “We require fresh water for one of my men who needs a wound cleaned. For the rest, we want a bath. Near your hearth. Be quick about it, will you?”
    The old abbess could not get enough of admiring the coin. “Of course.”
    “Your name, righteous lady? I shall be pleased to tell our King how kind you were to aid us in our hour of need.”
    “Thank you, Dom. I am Sister Ursula.”
    “Lead on, kind Sister,” he urged her and they followed behind her and her companion, assessing the size of the nunnery, the path to the front entry and that side entrance accessed by stone steps to the cellar.
    “What crops do you grow in your little yard?” he asked with a congenial curiosity.
    The abbess glanced back at him, her good nature now ensured with the purchase. “Vegetables and herbs. Whatever we might get the soil to yield, which is not much.”
    “You grow no vines for grapes?”
    “We have tried. Alas, it is too cold in these climes.”
    “Pity. Wine fetches good coin.”
    Her companion glanced back at him, her round face alight with her response. “We have four cows. Milk is our sustenance.”
    How wonderful to learn. He smiled at her, building a friendship that he would use to his own ends. Within the hour, when the women took to their beds, Geoff would milk those cows and feed the lady whom these witches kept in chains.

    “Put two men to stand guard at the door of the cloister, two at the porter’s gate and two with the horses,” Geoff told Reg and James in a whisper. He led his band towards the main door. To a third young man, he was particular. “Matthew, do not spill that milk. We’ll need every drop.”
    Geoff exited the front door of the abbey, Reginald, James and Matthew close behind. His skin crawled with anxiety. He had hastened, fought all the elements of weather and distance to find her, and now, if she had left this earth before he could claim her? What then? He pushed away the horror of it.
    He ran across the cloister garden. Clouds obscured the light of the moon and the soil was a sodden mess, sucking at their boots. At the door to the cellars, Geoff tried to open it. As he had prayed, the door had no lock. Yet it was swollen shut by the recent rains, a more effective means to lock a portal than any iron lock might be. The thick rough-hewn wood would not give. But Geoff saw the ill-fitting bars sat in a frame that was rotten and would dislodge with pressure.
    “Get me two horses and have them pull out the bars,” he ordered Reg and Matthew.
    He waited, the time interminable. Yet his men were efficient and just as useful, quiet.
    The horses were neither and yet their efforts brought results. As the wall gave way along with the bars, Geoff rejoiced, stepped over the rubble to the inside. “Light your braziers now. This is a hell-dark hole.”
    “My lord,” Reg offered, “let me lead. We know not what awaits us here.”
    “She knows you not, Reg. I go first. Besides, no guards are posted in this miserable place,” Geoff told him, a lump in his throat for the loathsome creatures they would find here, biting and crawling and swimming in this mire.
    He stepped inside, his boots slopping in water to the ankles. Kat, dear God, do you sit in this? I swear from now on you will sit before a blazing fire every day of your life. Just live. Live and I will treasure you.
    He marched forward, sloshing in the muck, the floor surprisingly even until he stumbled down a stone step. “Careful here. We descend.” Like walking into hell. Blind in the barren depths, he felt his way along, one hand to the slimy wall, down more stairs, hearing