Though the incident had lasted only seconds, the image was forever imprinted in his mind of Abby standing there, bereft of clothing, snow drifting down around her. It took no effort to imagine the icy flakes coming to rest on her soft skin, melting together to form droplets that would roll down the heated curves and valleys he’d witnessed only moments before.
He wiped a hand over his mouth and onto his chin, more undecided than ever as to how he should proceed. Surely this was some intimate ritual he had no right to interrupt and yet he needed more.
Slowly, he lowered his barriers, allowing the magic to flood his senses. He flinched, his breath catching in his chest as the pain of hundreds of souls cried out their need all around him. Meticulously, he filtered through them, blocking them in great swaths until all that was left was Abby.
Pure and golden, her aura surrounded her, its ragged edges revealing she’d not yet bonded with her Soulmate. The relief he felt was short-lived.
“What do you think yer doing?”
Mairi’s hoarse whisper unnerved him. Intently focused on Abby’s aura, he’d completely missed her approach.
“They’ve a name for this,” she hissed over his shoulder and into his ear. “Peeping Tom is what they’d call you. And they’d arrest you for it and haul yer arse off to jail. And wouldn’t we be in a fine mess then, trying to explain who you were and where you came from? Come on with you now.”
Reluctantly, he allowed his cousin to lead him away, back down the alleyway and to her automobile, neither of them speaking again until they were seated and she’d started the engine.
“When you said you’d a need to see that woman again, I thought you meant you wanted to speak with her.” There was no missing the accusation in his cousin’s voice.
He’d thought so, too. Had, in fact, had every intention of doing just that. But he’d been wrong. As it turned out, he’d needed only to see her again, to simply reassure himself, after all the dreams, that she was real. Having seen her with his own eyes, he could leave for Wyddecol, satisfied that one day soon they would meet again.
Abby sipped from her glass before sinking down into the relaxing bubbles of the hot tub. This one feature more than any other had convinced her to come up with the extra cash to rent this place last year. Steamy wisps danced up to meet the falling snow, carrying her frustrations with them.
Maybe half an hour in here and a large glass of wine would relax her enough that she might actually get some sleep tonight. Peaceful sleep, uninterrupted by dreams. Or at the very least, uninterrupted by dreams of him.
The thought of her mysterious Highlander had her upending the goblet.
What was it about that man? As if it wasn’t bad enough she’d dragged him home with her in the first place, now her subconscious tormented her with visions of him, serving him up in one dream after another, night after night. It had gotten so bad, in fact, she was beginning to expect him to actually show up again.
Expect or hope?
Hope was more like it. Just tonight she could have sworn she’d felt him somewhere nearby. Too bad her weird ability to find things didn’t extend to people.
She lifted the glass to her lips again, only to realize she’d already emptied it.
“Damn.”
Just as well. It was already late and she needed to be at the museum early in the morning to start work on organizing the new Celtic exhibit she hoped to have up and running before she left for her summer on the dig. With barely over three months left to prepare, she hadn’t the time or the energy to waste on anything that wasn’t absolutely essential.
The exhibit this month, meeting with the organizer of the dig next month, and then training her replacement—those were her priorities. She had a million things to do before she was ready to board that plane to Scotland.
A million things, none of which included wasting time on some schoolgirl crush, moping over a gorgeous Highlander who’d walked out of her life as quickly as he’d entered, all without so much as a backward glance.
The next three months couldn’t be busy enough to suit her. The more hectic, the better. Because busy and hectic would surely push Colin MacAlister completely out of her thoughts.
Six
DENVER
MAY
PRESENT DAY
Now this was the way an evening with a potential Mr. Perfect should go. An elegant dinner in an exclusive dining establishment with a handsome, attentive man sitting across the table. A perfect evening with a perfect man. This was so much better than dragging some stranger home in a fit of drunken amnesia.
Not that this particular man was in the running for The One.
Abby set her crystal goblet back on the table without so much as a taste and smiled briefly at the perfectly handsome man in question before darting her gaze away and around the stylish restaurant. She found herself unable to meet his intense green stare for more than a second or two without the butterflies in her stomach gearing up for their Riverdance impression.
“Is the wine not to your liking?”
“No, it’s lovely, Mr. Flynn, thank you.” She hurriedly caught up her glass again and sipped, trying to back up her false claim with another smile.
Her new boss was likely paying through the nose for the bottle nestled in ice, if the waiter’s reaction to his ordering it was any measure of cost. Certainly it wasn’t Jonathan Flynn’s fault that her tastes tended more toward bottled hops than grapes.
“Jonathan,” he corrected with a smile. “No need for such formality between us, my dear.”
“Jonathan,” she murmured around another bitter sip.
Maybe he didn’t see a need for any kind of formality, but Abby wasn’t so sure.
From the long white limo that had arrived to pick her up tonight to the exquisite rose Jonathan had handed her when he’d introduced himself, the whole evening felt about as far from a work-related experience as she could imagine. It felt, in fact, much more like a first date than a meet-and-greet with her new boss.
An incredibly uncomfortable first date, at that.
“That’s better. After all, we’ll practically be living together in another month.” He flashed a brilliant smile in her direction just as their appetizer arrived.
“Mushrooms stuffed with crabmeat, lightly sprinkled with aged Romano cheese,” their waiter intoned, as if announcing that the president had just entered the room.
Wonderful. Two of Abby’s least favorite foods on the face of the planet, paired for her dining pleasure. There wasn’t enough aged Romano in the entire world to cover that up.
She picked at the food on her plate, washing each bite down with a tiny sip of the wine.
“I never miss an opportunity to visit this restaurant when I’m in Denver.” Jonathan broke the silence that had filled the space between them. “The only thing better than this appetizer is the entrée I’ve arranged. I trust you’re not displeased with my having ordered for both of us? I simply wanted to share my favorites with you.”
“No, it’s fine. Everything’s lovely. Thank you.” Very upscale. Very classy. Definitely an evening fit for the Perfect Date category if she’d ever seen one. Even though it wasn’t a date.
“Good. I take it everything is in order for your departure next week?”
“Absolutely.” This was a topic of discussion she’d have no trouble warming to. “I can hardly wait. I am so excited about the opportunity you’ve given me to be a part of this dig. It’s like a dream come true. I’m really looking forward to meeting the rest of the group.”
“I have no doubt you’ll be a valuable part our team, Abigail. Ah! Here’s our entrée.”
The waiter returned, sweeping plates off a rolling cart and onto their table, once again announcing their food like an honored guest. “Kobe tenderloins on a bed of truffle-laced mashed potatoes, ringed with beluga caviar. Cooked to a perfect one hundred and twenty degrees, just as you requested, Mr. Flynn.”
Abby forced a small smile as the plate came to rest in
front of her. She might not be a gourmet herself, but she didn’t need to be to know that the meat on that plate was what she’d consider raw. One cut confirmed her suspicion as bright red stained the potatoes under the steak.
Visions of the cereal she’d be having later tonight danced in her head with appealing clarity as she forced down her first small bite.
“I wonder, Abigail, would you mind satisfying a point of curiosity for me?” Jonathan smiled again, reaching across the table to brush his fingers across the back of her hand, his touch soft and smooth against her skin.
“If I can.” At least it would keep her from having to take another bite for a little while.
“One of the professors who submitted a letter of recommendation for you to join our team, a Dr. Oldham, indicated that you had an uncanny ability to find whatever you searched for. Magical was the word he used, if I remember correctly. Could you tell me more about that?”
Magical? Maybe so. That was what her dad had always said, too. All she knew was that when she searched for any object her mind just sort of connected with it, as if the item spoke to her. No way was she saying something as crazy as that out loud, though. Jonathan Flynn still had a week to cut her from the dig team and she wasn’t taking any chances by making him think he might have chosen some sort of crazy woman for his project.
“Dr. Oldham exaggerated, I’m afraid. Yes, I did have an exceptionally high percentage of finds when I interned under him, but honestly, that was only because I worked very hard and I put in a lot of time. There’s not much magic to that.”
“As you say, perhaps not.”
Jonathan’s eyebrow rose and then that smile returned, an expression that sent a shiver up Abby’s neck. Not a smile, she realized, but a mask of a smile, not once reaching his eyes. Silence reigned once again, stretching out as she toyed with her food, moving small bits around on her plate. Perhaps it was that uncomfortable lack of conversation between them that sent the frisson of heat dancing over her skin, setting all the hair on her arms to stand on end.
That or guilt over not eating what had to be an amazingly expensive dinner. Even now she fought an intense urge to take another bite, as if her mind tried to force her into doing something her mouth definitely did not want.
She laid her fork across her plate and grasped her water glass, surprised to see how her hand trembled in response to what had to be nothing more than nerves.
“Would you be terribly disappointed if we skipped dessert?”
Abby jerked her eyes from her hand to meet Jonathan’s gaze at his question.
“Not at all.” At the rate this meal was going, she had little desire to see what the officious waiter might deliver to their table next.
“My schedule is rather more hectic for this visit than I would have liked. If it’s acceptable to you, I’ll have my driver see you home.”
“Oh, absolutely. Of course.” The guy was a zillionaire or something. It only made sense he had more business in town than just having dinner with her. “I appreciate your making time for us to meet.”
“I wouldn’t have missed it, Abigail.” Their server appeared at the table, check in hand, and waited as Jonathan signed the slip. “Let me walk you out to the car.”
The trip from their table outside to the waiting limo was a blur. Abby’s only real awareness was of the sensation of Jonathan’s hand against her lower back, the gesture one of familiarity, almost possessive in nature.
As the driver hurried to open the door, Jonathan grasped her fingers and lifted her hand to his lips, flipping her palm up at the last second.
Abby fought the urge to pull away as his lips grazed over her wrist, lingering for what felt like the longest second of her life.
“We have many more dinners in our future, Abigail. Of that you can be sure.”
Forcing her mouth into a smile, she ducked inside the limo and scooted back in the seat, feeling a modicum of relief only when the vehicle pulled away from the curb.
She wiped a hand over her forehead and laid her head back against the soft leather. Maybe she was coming down with something. That might explain the bizarre way she’d felt back there in the restaurant.
Here she’d had the perfect evening. An evening women the world over would kill for. Chauffeured around in a limousine, wined and dined at maybe the most exclusive place in town, accompanied by an exceptionally attentive and handsome man; what more could she ask for?
As if in answer to her question a picture formed immediately in her mind. Auburn hair, not blond. Blue eyes instead of green. A rolling Scot’s brogue instead of a cultured British tongue.
It seemed that not even a Perfect Evening with a Perfect Man could drive that damned Highlander from her thoughts.
* * *
Flynn O’Dannan raked his bottom teeth over his tingling lips as he stepped back from the curb, watching the limo disappear into traffic. It was as though he could still feel the steady flow of blood through the delicate skin of Abigail’s wrist.
He brushed back a lock of hair from his forehead, smoothed one hand over his chest, and turned to reenter the restaurant, heading straight to the bar this time.
The Bloodlust gripped him like an addiction. An addiction he fully intended never to indulge in again.
“Cognac,” he demanded as he slipped onto the high padded stool.
He’d spent the last three years carefully planning, setting up the intricate web necessary for him to assume the identity of Jonathan Flynn, to put together this excavation. Finding the likely candidates, locating an abandoned stone circle, obtaining the proper papers and permission; all of it had cost him a small fortune.
Money accumulated over several lifetimes. Money well spent.
Of the women he’d chosen to be part of this so-called archaeological expedition, Abigail Porter seemed the best candidate on which to concentrate his time. Her actions tonight demonstrated that she would be pliable and easy to manipulate through her emotions. Though she had resisted his best attempt to place a Compulsion on her to eat the foods he knew from his background investigations she least liked, that meant little.
Two of the others had failed that step. They wouldn’t be joining his team in Scotland next week.
Unfortunately, her resistance wasn’t proof in itself. There were a few strong-willed Mortals who had the ability to resist, though they were rare.
Just a taste. Her blood can’t deceive.
No! He pounded back the useless alcohol, enjoying the burn in his throat. Signaling the bartender for another, he slammed the glass to the bar with shaking hands. What he wouldn’t give for a draught of Faerie Nectar.
No. Control returning, he denied the Bloodlust more calmly now, knowing all too well the effects of tasting blood. Indeed, through the blood it would be impossible to hide any trace of Faerie heritage from him. The sweet tang of Magic would pulse through his veins even as it flowed through hers.
Giving in to the craving would provide the knowledge he sought, but there would be a price to pay. A heavy price. Ingesting blood resulted in the loss of his invincibility. The loss of control. And as desperately as he desired the exotic caress of the Magic, he equally despised feeling the vulnerability of a mere Mortal. It was a trade he was unwilling to make. He was strong enough to fight the addiction’s siren call. He wasn’t a power-hungry monster like the masters he’d served all the years. His only desire was to go home.
Soon enough he would know for sure. If, as he suspected, Abigail was a Faerie descendant, she’d locate the Portal he sought and he’d be well on his way back home. Back to Wyddecol, the home of the Faerie, where the Magic would flow through him for the rest of his days without any negative consequences.
He was a patient man. After waiting all these centuries, what did a few more weeks matter?
Seven
SCOTLAND
JUNE
PRESENT DAY
Terror slithered up and around Abby, spreading and tightening until it covered her like a second ski
n. It seeped deep inside her body, oozing in a foul black sludge as it merged with her bloodstream, polluting her river of life.
Horror tingled through her, holding her captive as she fought for her next breath until, at last, she forced herself to break free. To run.
Harder and harder she drove herself, one heavy footfall after the other, pounding down onto the ground she covered. The sound hammered against her ears before echoing away, lost in the endless black emptiness through which she traveled.
The terror was close now. Gaining on her. So close she could feel its icy fingers graze her shoulder, feel its fetid breath waft across her cheek.
“No!” she screamed, pumping her arms to force herself to run faster through the disorienting black void.
Running away.
Running toward that distant patch of light. Toward her haven of safety.
Toward him.
She could see him in the distance, the mysterious Highlander who haunted her dreams. Dreams that had turned to nightmares of late.
Even the realization she dreamed did nothing to lessen the grip of the hideous terror.
Forward she pushed, her chest burning with her effort as she swallowed great gulps of air. Forward, on toward the light. On toward safety. On toward him.
The instant her foot touched the circle of light, relief flooded her body, leaving her weak, drained, as if she’d given all she had to reach this spot.
She pitched forward, falling, falling endlessly into the bright nothingness.
And then she was in his arms.
Strong arms lifted her, enfolded her, drew her against the chest made of steel.
His lips, warm and gentle, grazed over hers, stealing her breath away.
“We must leave this place, Abby.”
No. She struggled to refuse him, not remembering why it was so important to her to refuse. She didn’t want him to go. She wanted . . .
Wait! He’d spoken?
Abby’s eyes flew open, the rolling brogue of Colin’s speech still rumbling in her ears as if she’d actually heard the words.
Highlander’s Curse Page 5