“What is the matter with you?” he said aloud. Feeling sorry for the crafty little spy. Bah! Hadn't he told her he was going to starve her? He never made promises he didn't keep.

Still, she was a skinny little thing, and those eyes of hers … he kept seeing them in his mind. They were huge, so clear they practically glowed, and if he saw them right now, Blake thought with a mixture of irritation and remorse, they'd probably look hungry.

“Damn,” he muttered, standing up so fast he knocked his chair backward. He might as well give her a dinner roll. There had to be better ways to get her to give him the information he needed than to starve her. Perhaps if he doled out the food in a miserly fashion, she'd grow so grateful for what he gave her, she'd start to feel beholden to him. He'd heard of situations where captives had begun to look upon their captors as heroes. He wouldn't mind seeing those blue-green eyes looking at him with a touch of hero worship.

Blake took a small roll from the tray on the table, then put it back in favor of a larger one. And maybe a little butter. It certainly couldn't hurt. And jam … no, he drew the line at jam. She was a spy, after all.

Caroline was sitting on her bed, going cross-eyed watching a candle flame, when she heard him at the door. One lock snapped open, then another, then he was there, filling the doorway.

How was it that every time she saw him he seemed even more handsome than before? It really wasn't fair. All that beauty wasted on a man. And a rather annoying one at that.

“I brought you a piece of bread,” he said gruffly, holding something out to her.

Caroline's stomach let out a loud rumble as she took the roll from his hand. Thank you, she mouthed.

He perched at the end of the bed as she wolfed down the roll with little thought to manners or decorum. “You're welcome. Oh, I almost forgot,” he said. “I brought you butter as well.”

She looked ruefully at the scrap of bread left in her hand and sighed.

“Do you still want it?”

She nodded, took the little crock, and dunked her last bite in the butter. She popped it in her mouth and chewed slowly, savoring every morsel. Heaven!

I thought you were going to starve me, she mouthed.

He shook his head in incomprehension. “Thank you, I can manage, but that was quite beyond me. Unless you've your speaking voice back and would like to actually say that sentence aloud …”

She shook her head, which wasn't technically a lie. Caroline hadn't tested her voice since he'd left. She didn't want to know if it was back or not. It somehow seemed better to remain ignorant on the matter.

“Pity,” he murmured.

She rolled her eyes in reply, then patted her stomach and looked hopefully at his hands.