Isabella jumped. "How did you get in here?" she asked, panting short, quick breaths while her heart raced.

Robin stared coolly at her. The question he asked himself was not how he'd managed to sneak into her castle room, but why. Getting in was easy, even if he couldn't truly "walk through walls," the way his enemies claimed. But why had he come?

He didn't want to admit he had felt irresistibly drawn to her. Just like Much, he had confused her with Marian when he'd seen her from a distance standing with the sheriff and Gisbourne outside the castle, a dark-haired, blue-eyed beauty with a regal carriage and an air of not wanting to be there. But now, standing just a few feet from her, he found her nothing like Marian.

She was older, more worldly, with something behind her eyes as treacherous as the mustard bomb she'd hidden on her tempting thigh. Her body, while perfect, was smaller, less luscious than Marian's. Marian had been tempting without meaning to be...Isabella worked hard to exude sensuality. Marian was entirely earnest...Isabella was acting a role.

"Gisbourne's sister," Robin sneered, cockily, his chin in the air. "And you told me you were a lady's maid. So, were you really running from your husband, or was that a lie, too?"

Isabella couldn't slow her heart. Fear mingled with desire. The man was utterly gorgeous, brimming over with sexual magnetism so strong it stole her breath away. And here they were, alone in her new bedchamber. Never had Isabella wanted a man as much as she wanted this one...now. But what did he want?

Better not let him know. Play it safe. Play the damsel in distress. If everything she'd heard about Robin Hood was true, he wouldn't hurt a woman. Especially not a helpless one.

Too bad. She would like to be crushed by him. But she didn't want to give up control, either.

"I was running from my husband, who did unspeakable things to me," she said, speaking the truth but acting more frightened and helpless than she felt. "But I couldn't let you know who I was. Would you have helped me, if you'd known I was Guy of Gisbourne's sister?"

"That all depends. How close are you to your brother?"

"I hate him. He's the reason I lived in hell for seventeen years!"

Isabella saw Robin Hood's tension be replaced with concern. Men were too easy. And she didn't even need to lie.

"Guy sold me to my husband when I was just a thirteen-year-old girl," she said, not caring that he knew she was thirty. He looked just a few years younger, she judged, guessing correctly that he was nearly twenty-seven. "You have no idea what tortures I've survived, married to that brute! I had no where else to turn! But I live in fear that Guy will send me back!"

"You don't need to fear," he told her, compassionately. "I won't let that happen."

"What can you do?"

She watched a quick grin light up his handsome face. His arrogance was adorable! So sexy! She just wanted to shove him over her bed and rip the clothes right off him!

"I've been known to manage a rescue or two," he answered, winking at her, as if he wasn't sexy enough already. Then, turning serious, he added, "I never turn my back on someone truly in need."

She thought it best not to speak with words, not while her eyes could promise him things he didn't yet know he wanted. She would make him want them, however. She was expert at it.

Robin felt his heart beat quicker, just as it had the first time his eyes had met this woman's intense gaze. Marian, he was thinking, while images of his love blended with Isabella's face. This room...wasn't it the one where Marian had stayed, before being forced to live in the castle? He remembered running from the guards and leaping under the bedclothes to hide, surprising Marian, breathtakingly beautiful with her hair loose and her shoulders bare, not losing a fraction of her dignity and composure, even while holding the covers to her chin to hide her nakedness. He, excited by being alone with her when she was unclothed in bed, had teased her, but she had challenged him, as only she could, proving she still cared. Challenged him about...what? Feeling, that was it.

"If you do not feel, how can you be a real man?"

"Oh, I feel."

"Tell me."

And he had...opened up to her about how bitter he felt about his men, hungry, being hunted down like animals, and how people were turning against him. He didn't like to admit such feelings...it made them real, and he thought it made it harder just to go on when life had become so hard. But it hadn't. It had helped to tell someone. It had helped to tell Her, the only person he could unburden his heart to. Just like it had helped him later with his nightmares, when she insisted he talk to her about them.

Robin's heart felt as if it was being squeezed. He had to stop thinking. He needed to forget. He had to forget, or he couldn't go on. And he'd promised Her he wouldn't stop fighting.

Instantly, his mind returned him to the present. He was almost surprised to find himself face to face with Gisbourne's sister, Isabella, who was gazing up at him most appealingly, all mystery replaced by a look of innocence.

Could he trust her? He doubted it. Yet, what if he could? What if she would agree to work for him, and feed him information about the sheriff's schemes, the way... No. It was dangerous. But more than that, she wasn't Marian.

He needed to get back to camp...to his men.

"If you need me," he began.

"I'll whistle," she furnished, not knowing she stopped his heart with another memory of Marian whistling for him in the forest.

"Goodbye...Isabella," he said, before turning and seeming to disappear before her startled eyes.

Isabella dropped her act, smiled knowingly while licking her lips. "Goodbye, Robin Hood." She imagined she could taste him, and she liked what she tasted.