Ransom My Heart by Meg Cabot Page A

lecherous prisoner, letting her prey escape several times before finally ending the chase by sending an arrow clean through the hare’s brain. He never knew what hit him.
    After skinning him expertly with her knife, Finnula washed her hands in a nearby brook, where she also paused to fill her water flask. By the time she returned to the hayrack, half hoping she’d find that Sir Hugh had cleared out, taking his smirks and insinuations with him, she found that he’d managed to start a fire and even had a pot of something bubbling merrily over it.
    Hugo looked up from the small cauldron, from which the unmistakable odor of shallots was emanating. The sun had set, and except for the glow from the fire he’d started, the meadow was entirely in shadow. The firelight made his bone structure, which was difficult to see beneath the bristling beard, more pronounced, and Finnula realized, with a slight sinking feeling, that her prisoner was actually passably good-looking. Irrationally, this discovery annoyed her.
    â€œI see you’ve been going through my belongings in my absence,” she said coldly.
    Hugo shrugged, salting his soup with a pinch from the bag of spices Finnula kept in her saddle pouch.
    â€œGet to know one’s enemy, I’ve always said.” He smiled, supremely unconcerned by her irritation. “You’ve got quite an arsenal of cooking implements. I threw some of the turnips and shallots in here. You don’t mind, do you? I figured that by adding the rabbit’s carcass and letting the pot simmer overnight, we’d have a good, thick soup come morning.”
    Finnula tried to hide her surprise. Here was a man, a man , who knew how to cook? Why, Robert didn’t know a turnip from a parsnip. Curiosity overcame her dislike of him, and Finnula asked bemusedly, “Where did you learn how to cook?”
    â€œAh,” Hugo sighed, stirring his concoction with a stick he’d stripped of bark. “It wasn’t always safe to eat the local food in Egypt. I saw many more men fall to illness brought on by consuming rancid meat than I saw fall by the scimitar. We learned to prepare our own dinners, cooking them in our helmets, most times.” He chuckled at the memory. “Of course, that could prove dangerous as well, when one of us forgot last night’s dinner was still in his headpiece, and went to put it on without first checking inside—”
    Finnula couldn’t help laughing at his wry expression. He grinned up at her, then lowered his gaze to the hare she’d skewered on a clean branch.
    â€œAh, the main course.” Rising to his full height, the knight approached her, all of his attention focused on the rabbit she’d killed. He bent to take the skewer from her, closely examining it, then lifted his gaze to hers appraisingly.
    â€œA clean shot,” he said, the admiration in his voice evident. “You did this with that short bow?”
    Finnula fingered her weathered bow, uncommonly pleased by the compliment, small though it was. Whatever ailed her?
    â€œAye,” she said, unshouldering her quiver and showing it tohim. “’Tis all I need. A long bow is too much in the way. Besides, I’ve no need to pierce armor—”
    Hugo flexed the bow experimentally. “Finely crafted. You made it?”
    â€œYes.” Amazingly, Finnula felt her cheeks suffuse with color. His regard pleased her far more than it ought. What did she care what he thought of her? He was just a knight, and not a very chivalrous one, at that. He was nothing to her.
    Of course, it was one thing to be admired for one’s looks, which one couldn’t help, and quite another to be complimented upon one’s skills. Finnula took infinitely more pride in her hunting abilities than in her appearance.
    Speaking quickly to hide her embarrassment, Finnula pointed out a notch she’d carved into each one of her arrows, a notch she claimed