by Brenda Joyce
Kristin sighed. “Sam, should we get to the point?”
“Oh, yeah,” Sam said, licking her lips. “Why are you after my sister?”
“Payback is a bitch,” Kristin said softly. Her eyes glowed and a dark wave resonated from her body. “Bitch get down, in so much pain.”
Sam felt a knife go through her stomach. She gasped, “I should have known—a witch from hell.” She flung her power at her.
Kristin was struck so hard she slammed against the kitchen counter.
Although her stomach still hurt, enough that she was afraid she might be bleeding, Sam smiled. “You can’t mess with a Rose.” She struck her again and Kristin cried out, going down to her knees. Then Sam advanced. “What has Tabby ever done to you?” she demanded, standing over her. “Why are you hunting her?”
Kristin closed her eyes and began chanting silently. Sam tensed, fully aware that Kristin was trying to cast a spell on her. She steeled herself against it. If Kristin was as powerful as her mother or grandmother had been, she might be toast. “Answer me, bitch!”
Kristin opened her eyes, which glowed eerily again, like incandescent opal. “Where is your sister, Sam?”
“She’s at Blayde, in Scotland.” Sam was horrified—she’d just told Kristin where her sister was!
Worse, she was confused. Suddenly she didn’t know what she wanted from Kristin, or why she was filled with so much urgency. And the moment she became aware of her confusion, she knew she had been mesmerized.
She had to fight the spell. She hadn’t told Kristin the year in which she could find Tabby.
“Is she there now, in the present? Or did she go into the past?” Kristin asked, approaching.
Sam struggled against the witch’s hypnotic eyes, knowing she must not answer, but replied helplessly, “She’s in the past.”
“What year, exactly?”
“1298.” Crap, Sam thought, as she spoke. Kristin had dark power and she was after Tabby, and Sam had just told her where to find her. But she’d get out of this spell and go back in time, somehow. She’d protect her sister, to hell with Macleod.
Kristin smiled and said, “Don’t move, darling, not yet.” She turned and went into the kitchen.
Sam felt as if she was caught up in an invisible vise. She knew she had to act—she had to destroy Kristin—but her will would not obey her mind.
Kristin returned, holding a butcher knife. “Take the knife, Sam.”
Sam knew what Kristin intended. I am a Rose, she thought, furious, and suddenly she lifted her hand and to her relief, her power blazed. The knife was struck from Kristin’s hand.
“Bitch get down, in so much pain,” Kristin hissed.
The invisible knife stabbed through her, but Sam strode forward, fighting the pain. Kristin paled and turned, rushing for the door. Sam picked up the knife, gasping in pain as she did so. Kristin murmured in a strange language Sam had heard before. Shocked, she held her abdomen with one hand, the knife in the other.
She was chanting in the ancient tongue of the demons.
Kristin seized the moment and ran out of the loft.
Sam breathed hard, slowly sliding down the wall to the floor, and eventually, the pain lessened. How did the witch know a language that only the oldest, most ancient demons still used?
“ARE YE HURT?” Macleod repeated, his gaze piercing.
Tabby inhaled and started to get up. He put his arm around her, helping her to her feet. “I’m fine.” She was still shaken. He had been at her side in another crisis and she was glad. Of course, there was no way of knowing whether she would have been attacked again if she’d remained in New York, where she was supposed to be.
But it was hard to hold a grudge now. She smiled wanly. “You appeared in the nick of time.”
“I was leavin’ the tower an’ I felt the evil, Tabitha.” He was subdued, too. “It dinna follow us.”
Tabby felt her insides lurch with dread. “Okay, you may be right…may being the operative word.”
“I am right. Do ye wish to sit down?”
His face had that hard warrior expression now, and she felt his impatience. He wanted to fight the evil spirit. She just knew it. “I’m okay. I feel a bit battered and I might even be bruised, but I’ll live.”
His face tightened impossibly. “Evil dared to breach my walls!” He erupted, and the walls shook. Small pieces of stone and mortar fell from the ceiling. Tabby ducked and Macleod pulled her close.
She looked up, instantly aware of him in every possible way. He was courageous, powerful, sexual and a gazillion-percent male. “I think you should control your anger—not that I blame you for it—so the whole wing of this castle doesn’t come down on us.”
He released her. “Aye.”
“Macleod, I feel certain that evil came from New York. It was the same evil that came from the Met. It is the evil associated with An Tùir-Tara. But is there any chance I am wrong? Could it be the Melvaig witch, sending us a little present?”
“Criosaidh is a witch, Tabitha, but a mostly human one. There are rumors one of her grandfathers was a deamhan, but I dinna ken the truth. But she lives an’ breathes as we do. She canna put herself into the air as evil.” His expression changed. “Or I dinna think she can.”
Tabby hugged herself. Now that the attack was over, the ramifications were suddenly sinking in—all of them very bad for her and Macleod.
“I’ll protect ye.”
She met his steady regard. “Why? Because we’re sharing a bed?”
“Aye…an’ ye’re Innocent.”
“But you’ve refused to take your vows.”
His dark blue eyes glinted. “MacNeil has harped on me like a shrew for almost a hundred years. Dinna start, Tabitha. Ye’re Innocent and ye have power. I wish to protect ye an’ I will.”
“I have a news flash.” Tabby grimaced. “Your power is meant to stop our flesh-and-blood enemies. You can’t stop a spirit, apparently.”
“But ye can.”
“Maybe, but my powers are erratic!” Tabby cried, really worried now. “One day they will be strong, I think, but I can’t depend on them. If we’re counting on me, we’re in trouble, Macleod!”
“Yer magic is stronger than ye believe.” He left the hall and Tabby followed him into the bedchamber.
“We still don’t know why a vanquished demon would hunt me,” she finally said.
“Ye have enemies,” he said flatly, staring down at the locked chest at the foot of the bed. His expression became thoughtful.
“As far as I know, my enemies are dead. Every time we’ve fought evil, we’ve vanquished it—otherwise, we’d be dead right now.”
“But the evil has come back from the vanquished, aye?” He gave her a look over his shoulder and knelt, taking keys from his belt.
She suddenly recalled something he’d said to her—if he didn’t kill his enemies, they would kill him. Maybe their worlds weren’t as different as she’d believed. “Macleod, I don’t think it got in here. It was at the embrasures, and really mad that it couldn’t get in. But it pushed the door closed, sending its energy from the window.” She sobered. She’d barely been able to open the door. And she had been afraid that the spirit would break her back.
Macleod darkened. “’Twas in the hall with ye, Tabitha, right there, outside this chamber door. I felt it strongly.”
“I put a protective spell on the bedroom, but not the hall.” Tabby shivered. “She hates me—or us.”
He shifted to look at her. “She?”
“Remember the Met?” When he nodded, Tabby said, “My first visit there, I saw your mother’s pendant and instantly felt a woman’s dark evil. This spirit is a woman.”
He stared. “Ghosts dinna haunt the past, they haunt the future.”
He was right. It was one thing for a ghost of any kind to haunt her in 2008, coming from 1550. But this ghost had gone backward in time. Slowly, she said, “Well, if we can time-travel, I guess it can, too.” Then she added, “What are
you doing?”
“Hold this,” Macleod said, reaching into his jeans’ pocket.
Tabby started as he handed her the amulet he’d stolen from the Met. It was ice-cold in her hand. “I forgot about this entirely.”
He gave her a look and unlocked the chest.
Tabby felt her tension soar as she realized what he was doing. He had told her that he’d left his pendant in a chest at Blayde. But she had the same pendant in her hand, and she didn’t know what to expect. There couldn’t be two of a single object, could there?
She wet her lips. Time travel changed everything. If she traveled back to the future, but to a few days before she’d ever met Macleod, what would she find? Would she encounter a slightly younger version of herself? Would she come face-to-face with herself? Was it even possible? “I need the Book,” Tabby said suddenly. “Every Wisdom you can think of is in that Book. I’ve never been without it, not in my entire life.” She became uneasy. “The Book is always guarded by a powerful Rose witch. My grandmother left it to me. I don’t know if I can manage without it.”
His glance was steady. “The Masters live by many rules, Tabitha. Over the years, I have learned a few of their laws. ’Tis forbidden fer a Master to leap forward or backward an’ encounter his self in another time. ’Tis one of the most sacred parts of the Code.”
“Why?” Tabby asked with some dread.
“I dinna ken, but the consequences are dire—or so I have been told.”
Tabby looked at the pendant in her palm. The moonstone was flat and lifeless. “This has lost its power. It had magic, Macleod, but it’s gone.”
He had heard her but he didn’t respond. He reached into the open chest and, to Tabby’s shock, produced the identical pendant. Even though he held it, she instantly felt its warmth and power, its protective magic. The entire talisman glowed. She looked more closely; the moonstone was as bright and alive as a star.
Suddenly she cried out, dropping the pendant she held. It had become so cold it had burned her hand. Incredulous, she looked at the patch of frostbite on her palm. Then she saw the pendant on the stone floor, turning into white-gold dust…and it was gone.
Macleod seized her hand. “Ye’ll be fine. A wrapped rag with loch water will take the chill from yer hand.”
“That was pure physics. One object cannot be in two different places at the same time.”
He said, “Take my mother’s amulet, Tabitha. I want ye to have it.”
Tabby went still. “What?”
“Elasaid was a priestess an’ a Healer. She had great white power—like ye do. She dinna cast spells, but her power an’ faith made the Innocent strong. My father used to tell her she’d be lost without the amulet. She dinna deny it.” Suddenly his face hardened and he looked away from her.
Tabby felt a surge of grief coming from him but as suddenly as she had felt it, it was gone. She touched his bare arm. He still had pain deep within him, even ninety-seven years after the murders of his family, and that anguish had to be faced and released. Suddenly she wanted to help him, comfort him, as urgently and passionately as she had when she’d first glimpsed him at the Met. It felt like the most important thing in her life.
She was shocked by the powerful feeling.
“What happened to Elasaid, Macleod?” she asked softly.
He said, “Ye dinna ken? I have the amulet…she is lost.”
Tabby started. He pulled away from her. He spoke dispassionately now, the way a curator might recite facts to a museum audience. “She died in a fire here at Blayde, an’ her body was never found.”
“I am so sorry,” Tabby whispered. Suddenly she wondered if she’d been unfair to him from the first moment they’d met in her loft. She’d been judging him and condemning him incessantly. He was a product of his times, but he was a good man and he had suffered terribly in his life—and more suffering was to come.
“I want ye to have the pendant.”
Their gazes locked. What did such a gesture mean? She could not fathom why he’d give her a family heirloom, especially a magical one. She did not delude herself by thinking that it had anything to do with their personal relationship. “Macleod, why? Why give it to me?”
“’Twill keep ye safe. It has power, Tabitha, power ye should have. An’ with the pendant, ye’ll never be lost.”
Tabby shook her head. “I can’t take it, Macleod. It’s all you have left of her.”
His face darkened. “Tabitha, I dinna think ye ken how grave the attack was.”
She didn’t like the sound of it. “No, I do. She almost broke my back.”
He said softly, “She dinna wait fer the night.”
THE GREAT HALL WAS FILLED with Macleod’s men and their women, the evening meal concluding. Voices were raised in mild debate, laughter, song and conversation. The hounds had been let in and they were scrounging for leftovers, but they were big, beautiful dogs, and they only added to the unusual warmth of the medieval scene. Tabby sat alone at the table, near its head, where Macleod had been seated while they were eating. She had been starving, but she’d eaten rapidly and mindlessly, too upset to enjoy the wild salmon.
She was exhausted. She was worried about Sam, and about what was going to happen later that night—and she was not thinking about sex, she was thinking about evil. At least it couldn’t get into the bedchamber, even if it could slam a shutter and keep the door closed.
Demons only came out to rape, murder and maim at night. But this vanquished demonic spirit had attacked her in broad daylight.
She felt sick. Okay, she was afraid. That thing could appear at any moment, at any time, in the broad light of day. She would have to be on guard now all the time—there was no respite.
Tabby was sipping red wine and staring at Macleod. She couldn’t help herself. He had turned into her anchor, in a way. If she had to be back in the past, in this kind of predicament, then she was sort of glad he was with her. It was sure better than being alone when the thing came back.
Macleod stood before the fire with several of his men, and firelight emphasized his sculpted features and impossibly muscular body. He’d changed his clothes and was dressed in his leine and his red-and-black plaid—which she had learned was called a brat—and he had come to dinner fully armed. But he was smiling and pleasantly relaxed, a mug of ale in his hand, apparently enjoying being with his friends. It was as if an evil ghost hadn’t just assaulted her inside his home—or assaulted them last night in her New York City loft.
Would any battle of any kind ever unsettle him? Tabby didn’t think so.
Tabby knew that he knew she was staring. He hadn’t looked her way since leaving her at the table, but she knew it. Stories seemed to be exchanged. The conversation was in Gael, so Tabby only caught the occasional word. The men gathered around him were eager for his company and attention. He was well liked, even admired, and he was certainly respected, she thought grimly.
She didn’t particularly like his arrogant attitude, but there was no denying that she admired him once in a while and she certainly respected him.
She was trying to be calm, composed and objective about him and her circumstances, but her elevated blood pressure was a dead giveaway that nothing was normal now. She didn’t want to be in the Middle Ages, but there she was. She didn’t want to be Macleod’s current meaningless affair, but she’d already been there and done that—and her hot, aching body was so insistent she was almost certain she wasn’t going to be able to send him away that night, even if he thought her chattel. She did not want to go home and find her life devoid of passion, returning to her existence as perfect, proper Tabby. But she had a terrible inkling that would be the end result of her jaunt to historic Scotland.
If she survived that hateful woman’s ghost.
It was too bad he was so good-looking. It was even worse that she knew every inch of his powerful body. Thinking about that made her flush everywhere.
He suddenly approached, his stare direct and penetrating. Tabby inhaled.
She knew what he wanted. It was time to stand her ground.
There was a principle at stake. He had to understand that he was not her owner or even her boss. He did not have authority over her. Tabby got to her feet, her blood roaring. How was she going to resist him? She didn’t want to resist him, not now. Only a very foolish woman would sleep alone when her other option was a night with Macleod.
“Damn it,” she said as he came up to her. “This is still wrong. It’s frankly insane.”
His mouth curved in amusement. “Pleasure is natural, Tabitha, an’ I canna stop thinkin’ about pleasuring ye.”
Her insides vanished. Every private inch of her quivered violently. “You do that on purpose,” she accused softly, pressing her palm to his chest to hold him back. Touching him only made her light-headed.
“Aye, I do.” He had a lazy light in his eyes now, one promising all kinds of sensual delights. It was too damn sexy.
Tabby realized her mouth was watering. “I am worried about my sister,” she said, somewhat desperately.
He started.
“Macleod, I’ve been here maybe eight or nine hours. But is it eight or nine hours later in New York in 2008? Or is it days later, weeks later, months later? How does time travel work? Is it the parallel continuum that some say it is? Is Sam a wreck because I’ve been gone all day, or by now, have years passed, without her having heard a word from me? I have to go back. I can’t just vanish from her life forever.”
If she had vanished without a trace, she knew her sister would never quit searching for her. Sam would find a way to track her down—or die trying.
“Tabitha, I hardly have the answers ye seek, except I swear I will make certain ye see yer sister again.”
His words cut through the terrific sexual tension sizzling between them. Did he think she would stay in medieval Scotland forever? Because that was not even a remote possibility. “You mean that I will see Sam again because in a few days I am going home.”