Bodyguards by Kallysten Page B

see were those ‘shields’ a small distance away, maybe a hundred
yards, like a blurry curtain. How could Vivien have walked beyond them by
accident?
    Shaking her head, she turned away
from the window, and tried not to frown at Aedan, who was standing against the
wall.
    Now dressed in a black shirt and
pants like the previous day, he had watched her finish her breakfast, answering
only with a cool “I do not know what that is, Dame Vivien” when she had
inquired about coffee. The same question to Brad moments later had produced no
more than an apology. Apparently this place did not know coffee, or caffeine.
One more reason for Vivien to go back home as soon as possible.
    “Shouldn’t you be doing
something?” she snapped at Aedan when he followed her out of the kitchen, two
steps behind her and not a sound to mark his passage.
    He gave her a puzzled look. “I am
doing something. I am guarding you, Dame Vivien.”
    She let out a grunt of annoyance.
“Stop calling me that. And stop following me around. We came back here to free
Anabel, so why don’t you do something about her?”
    “Bradan went to find information
as well as food,” he said in an even voice. “It is my duty to follow you and
keep you safe. And it would not be proper for me to call you anything other
than Dame Vivien.”
    “Proper?” Her voice rose, and her
eyes widened. What was it with these two and being ‘proper’? She straightened
her back to stand at her full height and glared at Aedan. “And was it proper
for you to kill people in the middle of the woods with no warning, without giving
them a chance to bow out of the fight? Was it proper for you to practically
kidnap me and take me to this place? Is it proper for you to stalk me when Brad
said no one but us can even enter this house?”
    His nostrils flared, and a muscle
twitched in his jaw. By a trick of the light, his pale eyes seemed to gleam
like metal catching sunlight. Some instinct deep inside Vivien clamored for her
to pull back and retreat, but she refused to back down. Brad had intervened
last night, but she didn’t need help to put Aedan in his place. Let him dare to
raise his voice against her, and she’d show him a thing or two about being
proper.
    Except... Aedan didn’t raise his
voice. He even took half a step back, standing there with his feet slightly
apart and his hands behind his back. He looked at something behind her shoulder
as he answered her questions in a completely toneless voice.
    “They would not have bowed out.
They had sworn their lives to Rhuinn, like I have sworn mine to you. The
alternative to bringing you here was letting Rhuinn have you, and I trust you
would not have found his hospitality very pleasant. And as no shield is
entirely safe, it is my duty to guard you even here.”
    “Duty!” She all but spat the word.
“You keep saying that, but I didn’t ask anything from you. I don’t need your
help. I don’t want your help.”
    She turned on her heel before he
could answer and stalked down the hallway. Without thinking, she went to the
only other room she knew on this floor: the library. She started to shut the
door behind her, but Aedan’s hand closed around the edge and blocked it.
    “Let go!” she demanded, imperious.
    Aedan’s fingers flexed on the wood
as though hesitant, but he didn’t release the door. “The last time you hid
behind a closed door, you ran out on me through a window. I will not let that
happen again.”
    Gritting her teeth, Vivien pushed
the door, but it didn’t budge.
    “I already promised Brad I
wouldn’t go outside,” she said, biting out each word. “What do you want me to
do? Promise again?”
    She had not expected him to
incline his head or say, “If you promise me not to leave this room through a
window, I will let you close the door.”
    It felt a lot like blackmail, and
she’d still be technically under his watch, but at least she wouldn’t have to
see him.
    “Deal. I promise.”
    He inclined his