“I’m sure we’re no,” he agreed, shutting the door and turning to lean his back against it. “You ken now why I felt the need to warn you about my family?”
She did indeed.
“I have no idea how to answer their questions. As soon as they began to ask, I realized I don’t know enough about you not to trip myself up in any story I might invent.”
He shook his head as if it was of little importance. “Leave that to me. We’ve bigger concerns at the moment.”
“Like what?” She could hardly imagine anything more pressing than the two women he’d just evicted from their chamber.
“For one thing, Moreland has asked Ran’s permission to camp his men here for a while.”
Not good. Not good at all.
The longer she was around Moreland, the more likely she felt it was he might discover the truth of her identity. Besides, his actions made no sense to her at all. If he were on some great quest to track down rebels, why on earth would he delay his men by staying here?
“A while,” she repeated. “How long do you suppose that is, exactly? And if he’s already assured himself the men he seeks aren’t here, why would he want to stay here and delay his quest?”
“I canna say for fact, but my gut tells me he’s staying because of you.”
“Me?” she squeaked.
That couldn’t be a good thing. Drew himself admitted it was only conjecture. But if he were right . . .
“Why would he do that?” She asked the question, though she feared she already knew the answer.
She hadn’t managed to convince him she wasn’t the woman he sought.
“An excellent question, indeed. But only one of many questions I’m pondering this day.” He walked past her and sat on the edge of the enormous bed, patting a spot beside him in invitation. “Perhaps you’d like to have a seat.”
Without a doubt she’d like that. But she wasn’t going to.
Unbidden, the memory of his lips on hers as they’d knelt next to the loch crept into her thoughts and heat flamed across her face.
Not next to him. And not on a bed. That wouldn’t be proper. Not proper and certainly not prudent. Not at all. She’d already done an excellent job of proving just how little self-control she had around the man.
Instead she sank to the floor in front of the fireplace, holding out her hands as if she wanted to warm them. What she really wanted was to stop them from shaking, but since that didn’t seem like something she could change at the moment she dropped them to her lap and clasped them tightly together.
“The time has come and passed for us to keep secrets from each other. I need yer honesty now, Leah.”
“Honesty?” Her voice cracked on the word, giving her away as surely as if she’d had a giant neon LIAR tattooed on her forehead.
“I ken what you are,” he said, his voice little more than a rough whisper, his eyes boring into her as if he could read the secrets in her soul.
How had he figured out she was the runaway Moreland hunted? If he turned her over to the knight now, all would be lost. She’d have failed the MacQuarries when they needed her the most. Please not now. Not when she was so close to reaching the people who would help her. Could help her. Might help her.
Might toss her out on her butt.
The doubts zinged around inside her head like that little orb of metal in the pinball machines she used to love, each new thought stoking her panic.
“It’s not what you think.”
“No? Then best you tell me what it is I should think, eh?” He got up off the bed and walked to where she sat, dropping down at her side, facing her, his body so close she could feel the heat rolling off his skin.
Or was that simply the fire behind her?
She couldn’t be sure of that any more than she could drag her eyes from his.
“Okay. You’re right. No more secrets. I admit it. I’m the one Moreland is hunting for. But it’s not as though my family wanted me to marry. I told you about my uncle coming back from England and taking over my grandparents’ home, tossing my grandfather into the tower under lock and guard.” She stopped to take a breath, puzzled by his look of confusion. “My grandparents support my decision not to wed. It’s Richard who arranged this marriage to seal some alliance with Lord Moreland. He wants me out of the way because my grandfather intended that I should be heir to MacQuarrie Keep, not him.”
Confusion hardened into anger on Drew’s face and she fought the need to put distance between the two of them. What had he expected her to tell him? He’d said he already knew.
“I dinna care about Moreland or the lord he serves. That yer the one he seeks was no really in question to me from the moment he described his quest and spoke of yer matching the description of the woman he sought. From the way he watches yer every move, I’ve little doubt that he suspects you to be the one he’s after, as well. I’m thinking that’s why he’s arranged to stay on here. No.” He leaned closer, his voice taking on the same intensity reflected in his eyes as he continued. “I want yer honesty about this.” He turned his arm toward her, pulling the torn cloth from the spot on his bicep that had borne the cut of the blackthorn hours earlier.
The cut that even now stung her own flesh.
“Oh, crapola.”
How could she have allowed this to happen in the first place? She was always so careful never to touch any wound, never to lay her hands on any person with an illness or an injury. Always.
Not always. Proof of that confronted her now.
When his lips had touched hers, strong and warm, she’d lost the ability to clearly think of anything. She hadn’t even tried to think . . . just allowed herself to be swallowed up by the feel of him. It was a feeling so all-consuming, so completely foreign to her, she had nothing for comparison.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen.” Even to her ears her words sounded ridiculously lame.
“I’m sure it wasn’t. But it did. My skin is as unmarked as the day I was born. How? How did you do it?”
He was so close. Her heart raced and it felt as though she couldn’t pull enough air into her lungs to feed her body the oxygen she needed.
“I don’t know how. It’s like a curse I can’t control.” To her horror, her throat tightened and her eyes prickled with the threat of oncoming tears. She held her breath, opening her eyes as wide as possible but the urge was too strong to deny.
It was so ridiculous to allow him to get to her like this. There was no reason for it. No reason at all. So what if he’d seen something she couldn’t explain.
Wouldn’t explain.
Because explaining would require that she admit to the horrible creature that lurked in her ancestry and that felt too much like defeat after all these years of striving to be nothing more than a regular Mortal. After all she’d gone through, all she’d done to deny her heritage, this was beyond unfair.
She closed her eyes and dropped her head, hoping to hide the tears that filled her eyes.
But he was having none of it.
With a finger under her chin, he gently lifted her face, looking directly into her eyes.
“No tears, dearling. Dinna do this. I dinna mean for you to weep.” He lifted his hands to cup her face, gently wiping one escaping tear from her cheek. “I want only yer honesty.”
Dearling. The endearment gripped her heart, squeezing, building the pressure behind her eyes. What on earth was wrong with her? It meant nothing. It was just a word. Likely he’d simply gotten so used to their charade that he didn’t even realize what he’d called her.
Her breath hitched in her chest, forcing a hated little hiccup of a sob out against her will.
“Ah, for the love of all the saints,” he grumbled, crushing her to his chest, awkwardly patting her back as the unwelcome noises continued to bubble up unbidden.
“I don’t do this,” she hiccupped into his shoulder, too far gone to stop herself now. “I don’t ever do this. Everything has just been so horrible. That hateful Dick
showing up and Grandpa Hugh out in the tower, cold and sick and maybe dying, and that awful boat and then thinking I was going to die in that stupid river and then Moreland and, and I’m so tired and my legs hurt and, and . . .” She stopped, trying to catch her breath, fighting to stop the sobs before they consumed her completely.
He murmured to her, soft, unintelligible words of comfort, his fingers combing through her hair as he held her close.
She had been absolutely honest when she’d told those two women that he was a good man. A kind man.
And that kindness pushed her completely over the edge. Her emotions demanded their release, and, as though a dam were bursting in her soul, she utterly, completely surrendered herself to the tears.
What had he done? Leah lay against him, so delicate, so defenseless in his arms, her body shaking with great heaving sobs.
Her despair completely his responsibility.
When he’d made his way up to their room, his nephews playing and laughing at his feet, he’d thought only to confront her with what had happened at the loch this afternoon. In her hands lay the gift, the magic he’d scoured the land in search of all these years. He wanted to know only how she’d managed to heal his wound. More to the point, he wanted to know if she could heal the rest of his body.
But he’d never intended this. Never intended to cause her such pain. In his haste to find the answers he sought, he’d completely ignored all she’d gone through in recent days. He’d completely disregarded her emotional state at his own peril and now he was paying the price for that lapse of good sense.
What did you even do with a woman so distraught? It was beyond his experience.
So he let her cry. Let her wash it all from deep inside. He held her, for how long he had no idea. Murmured to her as if to a child. Stroked her head, letting her silken hair slide through his fingers. Held her until her body stilled and her sobs subsided into nothing more than shaky, watery little sighs.
Sliding one arm under her legs, the other behind her back, he rose to his feet, lifting her as he stood. Her head lay pillowed against his shoulder, one slender arm hooked loosely around his neck as if she’d exhausted herself.
Across the room he carried her, depositing her gently on the big bed before lying down next to her, her back snug up against his chest.
She fit the curve of him like the wooden carving he’d seen in the markets of Inverness. It had appeared at first glance to be a smoothly honed statue carved from a single piece of wood, until the seller had shown him how the whole split apart into two perfectly fitted halves.
Within minutes her breathing deepened and slowed as sleep took her.
He brushed a strand of hair from her face, marveling at the delicate curve of her cheek. Physical desire coursed through him, but stronger still was his overwhelming need to protect her.
She held the answer he’d sought for so long. The means to the healing he needed. He would know her secrets and they would make him a whole man. First thing tomorrow morning.
In the meantime, he would do everything in his power to spare her another breakdown like tonight’s. From devising whatever story would satisfy Sallie and her nattering mother-in-law to preventing Moreland from discovering her true identity, he would do it all.
In short, he’d do whatever was necessary to keep her safe.
He tightened his arm around her and she snuggled against him, her silken hair catching against his roughened cheek.
Of course he felt protective. She was the means to his salvation. It only made sense when he thought on it. The Fae had stolen his future from him, so it was only right that it should be a Fae who gave that future back to him.
The Fae in his arms.
Thirteen
As if she would never experience a peaceful sleep again, Leah awoke with a start, disoriented and frightened. She lay in a strange room, in a strange bed, enfolded in the arms of a strange man.
No, not a strange man. Drew held her, his slow, steady breaths puffing over her cheek as he held her close. Relief drove out the panic that had at first threatened to crush her.
Relief that was, in and of itself, strange beyond her ability to comprehend. Never, never in a million years, would she have expected to react to any man like this.
After the trauma she’d endured at the hands of the Nuadian Fae twelve years ago, she’d decided celibacy was her only option. First, the very thought of a man touching her had made her physically ill. Second, even if she could have stomached their touch, the ones she’d met in this century viewed women as little more than brood cows, vessels to bear their children.
Considering that had been the Nuadian Fae’s plan for her, to use her to provide them with a stable of gifted half-Fae children, she’d long since determined that celibacy would work especially well for her because she never wanted to have children. She wouldn’t be used by Fae or Mortal as nothing more than a baby-maker. Not ever.
In spite of all her determination, all her big talk about avoiding men, here she was, somewhere after sunrise, cuddled up against a strong male chest as if she belonged here.
And that was perhaps the strangest piece of all. She felt exactly as if she did belong here. Right here, with Drew’s warm body curved around hers, one large arm covering her protectively as if he needed her close by.
Oh, Lord. Pretending to be this man’s wife had apparently gone straight to her head. Her imagination really was getting the best of her.
And so what if it was? It felt wonderful, no matter that it was all a fantasy. After everything she’d been through the past few days, who deserved a few moments of unfettered fantasy more than she did?
No one.
Drew was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous man she’d ever met in either century. He was kind, considerate, and brave. Almost perfect, in fact.
She turned her nose into the arm he wrapped around her and breathed in deeply. A faint scent of lemon and mint clung to his skin and his clothing. Just as she’d imagined. He even smelled good.
With a sigh of contentment, she relaxed back against him, luxuriating in his embrace as she let her imagination run free.
It took a moment for her to realize the finger stroking down the side of her cheek, gently tucking a loose curl behind her ear, was actually real and not part of the fantasy she’d allowed herself to drift into.
“Are you feeling more yerself this morning?”
His voice rumbled against her back, sending a shiver down to her toes.
That his first waking thought was concern for her set her heart beating faster until she realized she still lay in his arms, that he was gently tracing her hairline with one finger.
What he must think of her! The heat of embarrassment flowed out from her chest, flooding up to her neck and face. Should she move away or simply answer as if awakening in a man’s arms was completely normal?
“I’m fine. I guess I just needed a good rest.”
And maybe a brain adjustment. Something that would prevent her from getting herself into such an inappropriate situation again.
“Good.” His breath feathered over her ear before he pulled away to sit on the far edge of the bed. “Then you’ll have no problem now telling me what you did to heal my arm.”
Heal his arm? Her mind floundered to play catch-up. What happened to the Drew who’d held her only moments before? That Drew was worried about her, not about what had happened between them back at the loch.
She pushed herself up, kicking her feet free from the shift that had tangled around her feet while she slept. “There’s nothing to tell.” Rising from the bed, she brushed at the impossible wrinkles in her clothing, keeping her back to Drew.
“I already ken what you are. I just want to understand how you did it.” His voice, so low and quiet, rumbled around her as if she still touched him.
It was the second time he’d said that to her in as many days. The last time she’d thought he was talking about her being the woman Moreland hunted, but she’d been wrong.
<
br /> With a sinking stomach, she turned to meet his gaze head-on. “And just what is it you think you know about me?”
“Yer Faerie,” he said, rising to his feet. “And you’ve the gift of healing. A gift I fully intend to have you make use of to heal my injuries.”
“Faerie?” She felt as if she’d been slapped in the face. “I’m no such thing. And you’re crazy if you think for one minute there’s anything I can do to heal you or anyone else.”
She wasn’t one of those horrible creatures. Her father might have been Fae, but she refused to be one. She’d renounced all that too long ago to pick up that burden again.
His expression changed then, his eyes going distant and hard. Without another word, he rose to his feet and headed for the door.
“Where are you going?” How stupid had she been to yell at him? There was nothing stopping him from marching directly down the hall to Moreland’s room and telling him the woman he hunted was right here.
“If yer no even going to make at attempt at honesty, we’ve nothing further to discuss.” He spoke with his back to her. “I’ll send one of the maids up with fresh clothing and a bath.”
Then he was gone, slamming the door behind him.
Damn him! Who did he think he was? How dare he be angry with her? It was him doing the accusing, trying to make her admit to being some disgusting, vile creature. She was the one who deserved to make an angry exit from the room.
One little kiss and she’d ruined years of careful living. She’d been so wrong about him. So foolish in letting herself get carried away with what a wonder he was. He wasn’t kind or considerate or any of those things. He only wanted to use her, just like everyone else.
“Well, that’s not happening, bud!” she fumed. “Nobody’s using this girl.”
If he thought she was going to admit to being something she hated as much as she hated Faeries, he had another think coming. Just because her father had been a Faerie didn’t mean for one second that made her one. She refused to let it be so.
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