Once Upon a Knight Read Online Free Page A

any number of unsuspecting females. The unsettled feeling she’d been harboring since meeting him knotted into a ball in her belly and started pounding with the annoyance of it. He was obnoxious and completely unaware of what fate was about to deal him.
    “A challenge?”
    “Last one standing…wins,” she told him.
    “Nae,” he answered. “I have a better challenge.”
    “There is naught better,” she replied in disbelief.
    “Then I’ll use my words for it. First one on their back…loses.”
    The way he said the last words had an angry tremor traveling from the bottom of her spine, up over her head, across her nose, and flitting from there right to each nipple, making them hard and sensitive and horribly aroused right in front of him. And he knew it! She watched him look there and smile. A slow, seductive smile, so practiced he was probably known by it as well.
    Sybil had never felt an emotion so akin to hate, but suspected that what was happening to her was close to it. She’d never felt such anger and malice. She was very near to shaking with it.
    “Agreed,” she replied.
    “What?” He moved his gaze from contemplation of her breasts and met her eyes again.
    “I agree to this contest of yours.”
    “Contest?”
    Not only was he a wretch, but he couldn’t think, either? “Aye. Contest. Of wits. Now stand aside. I have chores. They will na’ get done if I stand in a hall being bothered by you.”
    “You admit to being bothered, do you?”
    She swallowed. “I admit nothing. Here.”
    He was watching as she pulled a ball of twine from an inner fold of her cloak. She always carried a small ball of it. Such a thing was of many uses when gathering, checking, and securing things. “Help me.”
    “What is it you’re about?” he asked.
    “Measuring.”
    “Measuring,” he replied in the same even tone she was using.
    “Work is being done on this tower. I have the chore of overseeing it and putting it into place. I need measurements for such a thing. If you waylay me, at least make yourself useful.”
    “How long am I to hold it?”
    “Dinna’ fash, toad prince. I’ll return when I’ve made the measure. Can you do this?”
    “Hold one end of a ball of string?” he asked in an incredulous tone. This time both of his eyebrows were lifted.
    “We’ll move to more difficult chores once I see how well you handle this one. So. Can you?”
    In answer, he plucked the ball from her hand, pulled the end free, and handed the twine back to her. Sybil held it loosely in her palm, allowing it to unwind as she went down the spiral of stairs, trying very hard not to skip. She didn’t look back. She was afraid she’d giggle.

Chapter Three
    This wench was going to be the toughest yet. Ever.
    No wonder his cousin had offered such a sum of gold to gain her heart—and then do what he did best once he had it. Walk away. He should have expected such a wench when Myles Magnus Donal had broken through the side wall of Lord Shrewsbury’s dungeon in order to free Vincent. He really should have suspected such a trick when he got the challenge that came along with his freedom. Find the littlest Eschon lady, make her thrill for love of him, and then make certain she suffered heartburning. He was to leave. They’d pay him all the gold he could carry if he did so. Which was stupid. That’s what he always did. Exactly like he always did. And then Myles had made the task even more intriguing with the formidable qualification that Vincent had to do it without physical means.
    They wished him to get a wench to fall in love with him without benefit of touch? Good thing Vincent knew exactly the scope of his talents. Any other man would have thanked them for the freedom, turned down the challenge, and walked away. Not him. They’d made it illicit, intriguing, and irresistible.
    Now he realized he’d been shammed. Completely. He should have known Myles hadn’t changed. The Donal laird always won at any contest. Vincent should