by Carmen Caine
Heat began inching up the back of his neck.
Blessedly, nary a trace of it slid across his loins. His best piece remained at ease. Unlike in days of old when the mere thought of the enticements of Bran’s hall flamed his blood and sent him hastening to sift himself into the midst of his long-time friend’s continuous joy fests.
Unfortunately, he was almost certain his newfound loss of interest in Bran’s beauties had something to do with Cilla Swanner.
He risked a glance at her but jerked his gaze away almost as quickly.
By Thor’s bluidy hammer, she was kneeling on the floor!
No longer standing about frowning, she’d dropped to all fours, her well-rounded buttocks lifted in the air. Plump and delectable, they pointed right at him, bobbing temptingly as if she were offering herself to him.
And in a boldly erotic manner few red-blooded men could resist.
Ghostly or otherwise.
Hardwick clenched his hands on his shield and bit back a curse as the heat at the back of his neck flashed through him, spreading everywhere.
Including just where he didn’t need it.
It took all his strength to keep himself from running full rock-granite hard.
He’d known modern day women could be brazen, but ne’er would have believed this one would resort to such a siren’s trick to win his attention.
And in full view of her aunt and uncle.
Not to mention Dunroamin’s residents.
“She’s no’ trying to tempt you.” Bran’s amused voice drawled from the window bay. “She’s petting the wee dog. Leo’s his name, I’m thinking?”
The heat sweeping Hardwick chilled at once.
His racing pulse slowed.
“That I ken,” he lied, glancing back at her.
She was sitting now. A vision on one of the tartan rugs, her legs crossed, as she rubbed the belly of the squirming, waggy little dog.
“Ach, to be sure you did.” Bran pushed to his feet, mirth all over him.
Hardwick stood frozen. Embarrassment flooded him as never before.
How could he have missed the wee beastie?
“I didn’t see the dog right away either,” Bran said, making Hardwick wonder if, unlike him, being a ghost had made his friend a mind reader.
“But” – Bran smoothed his plaid and dusted his sleeve – “having seen your lass’s better bits bouncing about like that, I’m of a mind to leave you now.”
“She isn’t my lass.” Hardwick couldn’t let that go.
She wasn’t his and never could be.
Bran threw back his head and laughed. “Whate’er you say, my friend.”
“I say you all speed back to Barra.” It was the best the scoundrel would get out of him. “My felicitations to-”
“I’m no’ heading to Barra. No’ just yet, anyway.”
“Then where?”
“Ach, see you….” Bran threw a meaningful glance across the room. “I’ve a sudden hankering for a big-bosomed, broad-hipped Norse lassie. Your flaxen haired lovely is taken and” – he winked – “truth be told, she isn’t plump enough for my taste. So it’s Lerwick town for me.”
Hardwick’s brows lifted. “Shetland?”
“So I said, aye.” Grinning broadly, the Hebridean chieftain cut a shapely female form in the air. “Where better to find such a delight?
“Where else, indeed,” Hardwick agreed, some annoyingly sentimental part of him wishing his friend would stay.
He glanced out the window again, not at all pleased with the day.
Something told him there truly was trouble brewing at Dunroamin and he had a feeling he’d soon find himself in the thick of it.
Especially since Cilla’s arrival.
If Vikings really were rampaging across Mac MacGhee’s peat fields at night, they might just seize the lass if they caught sight of her.
Norsemen were notorious wenchers.
Even if he’d once borne that title himself, he was also known for his chivalry.
A credo that wouldn’t allow him to stand idle and watch harm come to Cilla.
Or anyone else at Dunroamin.
He’d grown fond of the lot of them.
Just as he felt a companionable affection for Bran of Barra and wouldn’t mind him at his side if such a need arose.
But when he turned to tell him so, his friend was gone.
Only the faint warmth of his smile remained. The fast-fading echo of his laughter. Then those remnants vanished, as well, leaving Hardwick alone.
Luckily – or perhaps not – Bran also left him with a plan.
Claiming the spot Bran had vacated on the window seat, Hardwick settled his shield across his knees and started to think.
There was, after all, much to consider.
Not that it mattered. Bran’s blather about Shetland and the upsetting discourse still going on across the library gave him little choice but to prepare.
Frowning, he snatched an ale cup of his own from the air.
He drained it in one gulp.
What he meant to do wasn’t exactly how he’d planned to spend his time here.
But laying in wait for marauding Norsemen was a good deal better than moping about waiting for Cilla to tempt him again.
A good deal better, indeed.
Chapter Five
Several hours, a haggis-stuffed chicken breast, and way too many cups of tea later, Cilla stood in the middle of her room’s spacious, splendidly appointed bathroom and took back everything she’d thought earlier about the lavish amenities being all twenty-first century.
The claw-foot bathtub hailed from the Dark Ages.
The shower was demonic.
Most annoying of all, she’d stubbed her toe when she’d spent at least ten minutes stumbling about, trying to figure out how to turn on the bathroom lights.
Her toe still hurt.
She might even have broken it.
Refusing to acknowledge the pain pulsing up her leg, she gritted her teeth and clutched the edge of the fancy marble sink.
Soon, the hot throbbing would lessen.
She hoped.
“Geez Louise, Uncle Mac….” She tightened her grip on the sink and flashed a glare at the culprit, the oh-so-innocuous main power switch.
Who would’ve thought it’d be hidden inside an innocent-looking Victorian vanity?
Honoria, at least, could have warned her.
Certainly Aunt Birdie.
She knew American bathrooms. Even ones in cheapo apartment complexes like Cilla’s Colonial Arms in Yardley boasted bathrooms that worked.
Especially the lights.
She frowned and allowed herself a tiny whimper.
Her toe did hurt.
Her scowl deepened. She’d known Scots prided themselves on being thrifty. It was a talent she certainly wouldn’t argue with, given her own dire financial straits. But was it really necessary to have a secret power switch to flick in order to make the light panel work?
Worse yet, to then hide that all-important lever in a place no one would dream to look?
It was almost too much to fathom.
Now that she had light, she couldn’t get the shower to work right.
It, too, appeared to be controlled by a box.
No such thing as just turning it on and stepping into the too-tall claw-foot tub, pulling the curtain tight, and enjoying a cascade of steamy, pounding water.
Oh, no.
First you had to fiddle with a maze of buttons and switches that apparently heated and regulated a stream of water best described as a trickle or a blast, with nothing whatsoever between.
And – heaven help her – the temperature choices were only two: scalding hot or iceberg cold.
Cilla gritted her teeth and glared at the icy droplets dripping from the shower head.
She turned the knob a fraction of a hair’s breadth and nearly scorched herself on the geyser-like rush of boiling water that burst forth to scald her.
“Owwww!”
She leapt back, shaking her arm against the stinging heat and slamming her hip into the protruding edge of the hard marbled sink.
She glared at the shower, not at all surprised when it dwindled to nothing again. She didn’t have to thrust her hand under the dribbles to know they’d be frigid.
“Sheesh.” Shaking her head, she rubbed her hip. It pulsed in time with the throbbing in her toe.
If this was Scotland, she wanted nothing to do with the place.
A daily shower was a necessity, after all.
Determined to have hers, she threw down the towel she’d wrapped around herself and climbed into the slippery high-sided tub.
Surely, she’d been doing something wrong.
But the instant she touched the shower dial and it made a weird spluttering, hissing noise, she knew better than to try her luck.
It took her all of two seconds to wrench the dial back to the off position and scramble out of the tub before disaster struck.
Her mood now ruined, she yanked a fresh towel off the pleasantly warmed towel bar – thankful for that small luxury – and opted for a cat bath at the sink.
Unfortunately, the two sink faucets proved as diabolical as the shower. While the one marked cold dutifully produced an adequate stream of clear, chilly water, a steaming torrent shot out of the other.
Before she could jump away, the hot water hit the sides of the sink and splashed back up to spray her with a shower of scalding mist.
“Aaaggghhhh!” She flung up her arms, sending the towel sailing. Her feet slid out from under her on the slick tiles of the wet floor.
“Oh, no!” she cried, catching a glimpse of him in the mirror just as she was about to slam into the edge of the tall, iron tub.
“Och, aye.” Strong hands seized her, hefting her in the air only to plunk her back onto her feet. But not before she’d felt the warm curve of his hands near her breasts, the tips of his fingers brushing her skin.
She raised her own hands, splaying them across her nakedness. His sandalwood scent filled the bathroom, swirling around her and tingeing each indrawn breath. She shivered, unable to move. Real or not, he looked rock-solid. He towered over her, his stare so heated the air between them seemed to catch fire.
Cilla knew women back home who’d kill to have such a gorgeous Highlander look at them so hotly. They’d see his otherworldliness as secondary to his nationality and burr. Of no consequence at all, she was sure.
They’d just want a piece of him.
She swallowed, her heart thundering.
He let his gaze dip to her breasts and lower, his slow, intense perusal scorching her in a much more dangerous way than the scalding shower.
“You!” She stared at him, every wicked, brazen thought she’d had about him in a bed of heather whooshing back to make her cheeks burn.
Knowing they must be glowing, she stiffened. “How dare you appear here, in my-”
“Ach, lass. You’d be surprised at what I’d dare.” He leaned close, his deep voice soft against her ear. “There isn’t aught I-”
A weird gurgling came from the shower. High-pitched and screechy. She would’ve mistaken it for the teeter of a sniggering old woman if she hadn’t known of the bathroom’s peculiarities.
Sir Hotness shot a glance at the curtained bathtub, his brows snapping together. “I appear where and when it suits me. Be glad it was me here to save you, again.”
Cilla’s eyes widened. “Are you saying there are other ghosts who could have?”
“There are aye discarnates about, everywhere.” He looked at her, his gaze locking on hers. His mouth compressed into a tight, hard line as he folded his arms, unwilling to say more.
Cilla bit her lip, not liking the implication. Nor could she deny that he’d come to her aid not once, but twice. Or that, all things considered, he was the embodiment of her deepest, most heated fantasies, and that if she needed rescuing she’d much rather have him appear than whatever was putting such a frown on his face.
Even so…
She raised her chin. “You could have cracked my ribs, grabbing me as you did.”
“I warned you I’d no’ be gentle a second time.”
“You shouldn’t be here at all.”
His face darkened even more. “Had I known you’d be unclothed, I wouldn’t be.”
“People don’t usually stay dressed to take a shower.” She grabbed a towel, whipping it around her. “Do you?”
“I-” He turned a disdainful glance on the claw-foot tub and its wacky boiler. “I can think of better ways to keep clean.”
Cilla curled her fingers into the towel, clutching it to her breasts. “Such as?”
He jerked his head toward the doorway into her bedroom, where large wooden tub stood in the shadows.
A tub that hadn’t been there when she’d entered the bathroom.
Lined with what appeared to be a length of fine medieval-y white linen, the tub brimmed with steaming rose-scented water she suspected would prove bath-oil smooth and just the right temperature.
If the tub were real.
Which, of course, it wasn’t.
She frowned and decided to pretend she didn’t see it.
His gaze went again to the pesky boiler contraption on the bathroom wall. “Aye, much better,” he declared in that silky-deep burr. “My style of bathing is more reliable.”
He stood proud, looking sure of it.
She couldn’t forget that she was almost naked. Her towel didn’t hide much. Something told her Scots tried to save on toweling cloth along with electricity and hot water. The way this Scot slid his dark gaze over her, lingering especially on the swells of her breasts and the curve of her hips, revealed that he thoroughly approved of that thriftiness. At least regarding the size of bath towels.
Never had a man looked at her with such burning hunger in his eyes.
Or set off such a hot tingling between her legs with nothing more than a glance.
She was as bad as every Scotland-loving, crazy-about-Highlanders, kilt-chasing female back home. Just being close to so much exquisite Scottish maleness was making it hard for her to breathe. Awareness prickled across her skin and her pulse hitched, quickening. She couldn’t deny that he excited her.
She swallowed, sure he knew.
“Do you mind?” Her face flaming, she tugged the towel higher up her breasts. “Mister…”
“Sir,” he corrected, his sensual lips curving oh so slightly. “Sir Hardwin de Studley of Seagrave.”
“De what?” Cilla’s jaw slipped. She resisted the urge to poke her fingers in her ears and wriggle them.
She couldn’t have heard correctly.
Either that or she’d eaten too much of the haggis filling in her chicken ecosse.
“Tell me again.” She eyed him, sure it was the haggis. “Who did you say you are?”
“Sir Hardwin de Studley,” he repeated, his deep burr rolling. “‘Tis a good Norman Scots name. You won’t hear it much nowadays.”
“I wouldn’t think so.”
His smile turned wicked, as if he hoped to unsettle her. “Friends call me Hardwick.”
That’s even worse! Cilla almost blurted, but before she could, he flicked a finger at the wooden tub and it disappeared, his little sleight of ghostly hand making the words lodge in her throat.
“Since you chose no’ to avail yourself of it.” Sounding as if that were a great shame, he leaned back against the doorjamb, his long legs crossed at the ankles.
Cilla stared at him.
He looked much too comfortable lounging so casually in her bathroom doorway.
She couldn’t let him stay there.
Especially not when he continued his tricks, this time making a quick flipping motion with his wrist, and his shield appeared in his hand. Holding it loosely at his side, he gave her another smile, this time an even darker, more dangerous one.
A curl-a-girl’s-toes kind of smile she knew better than to let get to her.
He was all smoke an
d mirrors.
Walking temptation, and she wasn’t even going to think about how his mere presence excited her.
His accent alone could stir a woman to climax.
She’d been hovering on the edge of one ever since his fingers had slid across her breasts. Heaven help her if those long, skilled-looking fingers came anywhere near more sensitive areas. Ripples of sensation already poured through her, electric and powerful. She’d almost believe he exuded some kind of irresistible panty-melting force field. She did know he was much too gorgeous and virile.
Worst of all, he was way too Scottish.
Highlanders were irresistible to women.
This one was a greater threat than most because he wasn’t real, however strong her awareness of him. She’d gone off men and she wasn’t about to fall for a ghost.
“Look here, Sir Hard-whoever-you-are, I’ve already told you that your shield trick doesn’t impress me.” She tossed her hair behind her shoulder. “As for beaming yourself in here when I’m trying to shower, that’s just rude.”
***
“Rude?” Hardwick blinked, the fire in her eyes spearing him.
It wasn’t the kind of heat he was accustomed to stirring in women.
Annoyed, he pushed away from the door and drew himself to his full height. “You, lass, have no idea what it cost me to be here.”
“Then why are you?”
“No’ to see you naked.” The words escaped before he could stop them.
“Oh!” Her cheeks bloomed red. “I don’t believe this!” she cried, scooting past him out the bathroom door.
Hardwick scowled after her.
Good, if he'd vexed her into leaving.
That was his aim, after all.
Unfortunately, he hadn’t meant to do it thusly. Watching her dart across the polished – slippery - floor, grab a robe off the bed and don it in all haste didn’t feel like the triumph it should.
It felt rather lousy.
Never had he seen a lass dress so swiftly. And rarely had he felt such an urge to bite off his tongue. He’d burned to see more of her nakedness. Ever since glimpsing her full, round breasts the possibility had consumed him, unwise as such yearnings were. Most disturbing of all, he could see them bare-arsed and sweaty, rolling in the heather, their lust unquenchable.