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Page 228
Chapter Fourteen
Thorn had watched over Ainsley's shoulder, forcing himself to listen to his friend, to laugh with him, as Mariah Walker flirted with that weasel-faced corporal, Maitland. She'd tossed her head more than once in a movement he had come to recognize as natural to her, so that her lovely golden hair, still unrestrained by a cap, swayed at her shoulders.
The sensual motion was not lost on Maitland, judging by the stiff set of his shoulders and the boisterous sound of his voice.
Thorn did not care what the woman did, or upon whom she bestowed her considerable favors. They did not belong to him. They never would. She was simply his employee, and that would soon end, he had no doubt.
But observing her lighthearted exchange with the corporal had pierced his gut as acutely as many other wounds that had plagued him over the last years. Wounds that did not tear his skin but his soul.
Exceptwhy did she pale so suddenly? Her mouth was agape with no sound coming out of it, and her lovely green eyes compressed in seeming agony.

 
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