Page 5 of An Outlaw’s Desire

“Are you dying?” Pitt did not glance in Sherborne’s direction.

“Nay, but—”

“Is your life in danger?”

“Nay.”

“Then be quiet.”

“I like to know—”

Pitt growled low in his throat.

Sherborne sighed. Chains clanked in a steady rhythm; he was tapping his foot on the dirt floor. “’Tis tedious, being in this cell.”

“You should have considered the consequences, then, before committing murder.”

“Is that what you were told? That I was arrested for murder?” His lordship’s mocking tone implied Pitt had been fed falsehoods.

If Sherborne was hoping to manipulate him, mayhap convince him to help plan an escape, he wouldn’t succeed. “I was told all I need to know,” Pitt said firmly, his right hand settling on the pommel of his sword. His sire had given Pitt the weapon before he’d left for Crusade. The blade had been his father’s, and before that, his grandfather’s. At least Pitt owned some small part of his family’s noble legacy.

Sherborne laughed. Mockery, again.

Pitt tried not to give in to the urge to glare.

“Tell me, do you always do as you’re told?” Sherborne asked.

Pitt’s gaze narrowed.

“When we were squires, you were always among the first to obey orders. So conscientious.”

When in hellfire was the other guard going to return?

“I do what my superiors require of me, aye,” Pitt ground out.

“Ah. An obedient lackey.”

What was Sherborne suggesting? That Pitt had been trained like a hound to obey whatever command he was given?

“Your loyalty has served you well, then?”

Pitt’s fingers tightened on his sword.

“You returned from Crusade to the life you expected?”

A knot, hard as a stone, lodged in Pitt’s throat. He’d heard long ago that Sherborne and Lord Ashton Blakeley, another squire from Millenstowe Keep, had gone to London together to join King Richard’s Crusade. Pitt must have journeyed to the East at a different time for he hadn’t encountered either man while abroad.

How, though, had his lordship known Pitt had been on Crusade? Had the other guard talked about him?

His gaze hard, he glanced at Sherborne. “I did not tell you I had fought in the East.”

His lordship shrugged; ripped cloth shifted at his shoulders.

“Who told you?”

“Does not matter. I guessed, anyway.”

Pitt’s scowl deepened.