Her eyes, opening wider, mesmerized him.
“Where am I?” she shrieked, pushing off him, breaking the spell. “What’s happening?”
He put aside her beauty and hardened his gaze. “You are in England. Why do you not know that?” He wanted to study her further, but she jerked way and almost fell. The terror in her eyes and in her trembling lips appeared authentic. She was a madwoman then. That’s why she wore such odd attire.
But how had she come out of the air?
“Are you…are you real?”
Poor woman. Pity really. “Aye,” he answered.
“This can’t be happening.” She lifted her cautious, shaking hand to the small slice beneath his eye.
“You’re bleeding,” she whispered on threads of disbelief and shock. “You can’t be real. That battle—”
He pulled back as if she had slapped him. “I will not have you poking at me.”
She drew her hand to her mouth. He watched it. She wore rings on six of her ten fingers and her fingernails were colored light pink!
“I don’t live in England.”
He guessed as much since she spoke with a tone and inflection he’d never heard before. It wasn’t French or Spanish, or Scottish or Middle Eastern. “Where do you live?”
“New York.”
“NewYork?”
“Please, you have to help me.”
“What is new about it?” he demanded. “And what is wrong with the York we have now?” His voice sliced sharper than any sword, but it had no effect on her.
“What…what year is it?” she asked as if her thoughts were a thousand leagues away.
His expression darkened. He didn’t like being made to look a fool. “It’s the year of our Lord, fourteen hundred and eighty-five. Who are you?” he demanded. “Where did you come from?”
“Stop the horse!”
She had grown quite hysterical. Her hands were shaking when she brought them her mouth.
Nicholas brought his mount to a halt. He didn’t need this bother in his life. He had battles to fight to keep the York name alive. When he wasn’t fighting, he had all the issues at home to deal with. Namely, his cousin Reg, Reg’s wife, Adele, Adele’s maid, Margaret, and Reg and Adele’s four children William, Eddie, Charlotte, and Andrew. They were enough to make Nicholas swear off having children if he ever married.
“Let me get off!” she shouted again. “I have to get back!”
“Back to where?” he put to her, for she looked as if she knew.
“Home.” Her eyes filled with water and appeared like the color between heaven and the sea. “I have to find a way home.”
“Where?” Why was he asking? He had duties to see to at his own home. Mayhap after that—but no! He wouldn’t keep her with him for so long. Not another person in his castle. He should have realized it on the battlefield, before he took her, but he was covered in blood and exhausted. He hadn’t been thinking straight.
“Not where,” she muttered. “When.”
He arched a brow. Should he help her dismount? “When?”
“Twenty-nineteen.”
He gave her a hard stare. “What does that mean?”
“The year of our Lord,” she corrected, wide-eyed, “Two thousand and nineteen.”