Page 26 of Kiss of Wrath

“Are you planning to sweep up the mud with that broom, or attempt to spear me, or are you a witch about to mount your broom and ride away? What about these neglected children?” he asked without giving her a chance to answer.

“We’re not neglected,” Ben tried to say.

“Neg-neglected?” she sputtered out. How dare he make such an accusation? She launched herself at him, broom first.

He stepped aside at the last moment. As she slid forward on the mud, dropping the broom, and almost landing face first in the mess, he caught her with an arm around her waist. Then, holding her up by both forearms, her feet dangling off the ground, he glared at her and said, “These children are a menace, and you are the biggest menace of all. For shame! Off gambling and drinking and whoring whilst your children nigh kill themselves?”

“Whass a har?” Linda wanted to know.

“Whass a man-ass?” Larry asked with a grin. “Hey, us guys are man-asses,” he told his brothers. Now they were all grinning. Their fears seeming to have disappeared.

She brought her attention back to the Viking man. “Are you crazy?” she spat out. Not a word her profession approved of ordinarily, but this was a situation that called for the out-of-ordinary. “I’m a psychologist in a town with more gambling addicts than blades of grass. The last thing I would do is gamble myself. As for drinking, my beverage of choice is diet soda. And I won’t even dignify that remark about whoring.”

Despite her indignation and anger, Miranda noticed the most compelling scent coming from this man. A mixture of sandalwood and limes and fresh air.

Huh?

“Are you aware that these children were about to start a cook fire using gasoline?” he asked her.

“What?” Alarmed, she turned to the boys, who all hung their heads with guilt.

“I hid the gasoline,” Maggie told her, “but I asked this nice man to help me just in case they found the can.”

“Are you serious?” Even dangling from this stranger’s arms, she managed to narrow her eyes at the boys. “Now you have gone too far. I swear, you will be grounded for life.”

“Grounding? Is that a new kind of punishment? I think a swift whack on a bare arse would suffice,” the Viking commented.

“I do not believe in physical violence,” she replied.

“Pfff! Mayhap that’s why this nation is so soft.”

This was an absolutely ridiculous conversation. “Put me down. At once. I swear I am going to sue your pants off for trespassing and . . . and . . . scaring little children.”

“We’re not scared,” Sam interjected.

“What’s a har?” Linda repeated.

The man ignored the children and spoke directly to her. “Foolish woman! You are in no position to make threats. Mayhap you should just ground me, whatever that is.”

Instead of putting her down, he raised her even higher, as if to emphasize how high off the ground she was. How tall was this guy anyhow? And strong? He could probably bench press a bus with all those muscles.

“Besides, those bratlings scare me. Not the other way around. Place a battle-axe in those boys’ hands and they’d make good Huns.”

“Hunz? What’s a Hunz? Oh, you mean Huns. Never mind,” she said as she recalled the Viking series once again.

“You have a battle-axe, too?” one of the boys asked, hopefully. Boys!

“Are you trying to say my boys are bad?” It was one thing for her to call them bad boys, which they were not, at heart, just mischievous, but it was quite another for a stranger to malign them.

“Nay, they are boys being boys, but, you, m’lady, have much to answer for.” His unusual blue, sad eyes iced over with condemnation of her.

She gritted out, “And assault. I’m going to have you arrested for assault. How dare you glower at me like that?”

He cocked his head to the side. “Assault by glowering?”

“And abuse . . . I’m going to have you arrested for child abuse, too. What did you do to make them listen to you? They never stand still like that. If you hit them, I am going to personally strangle you with those pretty braids of yours, then stuff them down your throat.”

He didn’t stop glowering, but his lips did twitch at her words. “You think I am pretty?”