Okay, that probably wasn’t the brightest thing to say, seeing how she shrank away from his touch and stopped breathing, the moonlight showing the terror in her eyes. He sighed again and slowly sat her up on the floor in front of him—ready to grab her if she decided jumping in the water might be preferable to being in the boat with him. “This isn’t what it seems, lass. I’m not really kidnapping—well, okay, I am, but not to do ye any harm. I have a powerful favor to ask, but I … You’re going to have to trust … Aw, hell, Peg,” he growled, scrubbing his face with his hands. “My word of honor, I’ll have ye back home safe and sound an hour after sunrise.”
She scrambled away with a gasp until she bumped into the next seat. “I can’t be gone all night. My children!”
“They’re perfectly safe with Mom and Dad.”
“But your parents are expecting us back no later than ten!”
He shook his head. “I told Dad that if we’re not home by eleven, then we won’t be back until morning.”
“Your father knows you’re doing this to me?” She dropped her gaze to his feet. “Please, Duncan, just take me home.”
“I promise I will—in the morning.” He reached forward to lift her chin. “But ye need to know that the magic’s going to make it seem like we’re gone for several days.”
She gasped again, clutching her coat closed at her throat as her eyes searched his. “Are you insane or am I?”
“Do you remember the night of the fire when Robbie and Alec and I arrived by boat, and ye noticed we all had the beginnings of beards?”
He saw confusion replace some of her fear as she slowly nodded.
“That was because we’d been on the mountain across the fiord for two and a half days even though we’d left you just the afternoon before.”
“That’s not possible.”
“It is for the magic, lass. Because remember I told you that even if ye don’t believe, the magic goes about its business anyway?”
She dropped her gaze to his feet again, saying nothing—only to suddenly scramble toward him when something gently bumped the boat and surfaced right beside them. “Ohmigod, what is that?”
She was squeezing his neck so tightly, Duncan couldn’t help but smile that she was more afraid of things that went bump in the night than of him, apparently. “That would be a big old whale with a warped sense of humor.” He pried himself free, then turned Peg to put her back to his chest and wrapped his arms around her. “He’s just wanting to meet you, since I’ve told him all about this amazing woman I’ve been trying to catch the eye of.” He tightened his arms against her trembling. “I’m not sure if this is the same one or not, but a friend of Mac’s from Midnight Bay told me about this giant whale named Leviathan. Trace said he actually met Leviathan up close and personal one day, and that the beast is quite … friendly. He’s not going to hurt us, Peg. He’s just wanting to say hello.”
“P-please take me home,” she softly petitioned.
“In the morning,” he repeated, lowering her to sit between his legs. Keeping a hand on her shoulder, he reached back and started the engine. “I promise to have ye home before your children wake up.”
So with Peg huddled on the floor in front of him hugging herself and occasionally rubbing her forehead, Duncan resumed his trip at full throttle, not slowing down until he spotted the once again fully formed beach. The whale slipped back from keeping pace with them when Duncan shut off the engine and lifted the motor, and silently sank beneath the surface as they drifted up onto the gravel.
Peg didn’t move, and apparently wasn’t even willing to look at him. Duncan walked past her and climbed out and dragged the boat farther up onto the beach, then grabbed the rope on the bow and tied it to the closest tree. He took his sword out and slipped it on over his shoulders, then grabbed the backpack and extended his free hand. “Come on, Peg.”
She still didn’t move except to curl into a tighter ball.
“The sooner we get going, the sooner you’ll be home, lass.” He sighed when she still refused to move. “And the more cooperative ye are, the less of a bastard I’ll be.”
She finally lifted her head. “You promised never to hurt me.”
“I’m trying to keep that promise by keeping you safe, but I need to get hold of the magic to do that.”
“W-what’s the favor you want from me?”
He dropped his hand. “There’s something I’m needing that’s in a cave up on the mountain behind me, but my shoulders are too broad to reach it. Wait; you aren’t claustrophobic, are you?” he asked, just now realizing that might be a problem. “Because there’s about twenty or thirty feet of the cave that’s quite narrow.”
She immediately nodded. “Yes. Yes, I’m scared to death of tight places,” she blatantly lied. “I just freeze up and can’t move.” She lowered her gaze and shrugged her shoulders. “So I guess I can’t help you, so you might as well take me home.” But curiosity apparently getting the best of her, she looked up again. “Um, what is it that you wanted me to get for you?” she asked, her gaze lifting to the mountain behind him. “Gold? Or tourmaline? Did you find a gem mine or something?”
“I doubt it’s gems,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m not exactly sure what’s in there because I can’t actually see it, because the cave curves too sharply.”
“Then how do you know something’s even there?” she snapped.
Duncan ran a hand over his jaw to hide his grin, glad to see she was finally tired of being afraid. “I just know. I can feel its energy.”
She snorted and settled back against the side of the boat and hugged her knees to her chest. “Then I guess you’re going to have to ask some narrow-shouldered fairy to crawl in there and get it for you.”
“Christ, you’re contrary,” he muttered, dropping the backpack. He walked along the boat, reached in, plucked her out, and stood her on her feet, then bent to get right in her face. “We can do this the hard way if you insist, just so long as you realize we’re not leaving here until I have what I came for—even if it takes a month. You really want to be away from your children that long?”
“Fine,” she growled, jerking away and striding toward the woods. She waved over her shoulder. “Just so you realize that I’m pressing kidnapping charges against you the moment we get back.” She stopped and turned and even pointed a finger at him—which he happened to notice was trembling. “And I’m chaining off the pit, and if I ever see you on my land again, I’m digging out my shotgun.”
That said, she spun around and strode up into the trees, and Duncan finally let his grin escape as he wondered how long before Peg realized she didn’t know where to go. He walked over and snatched up the backpack and followed, only to find her standing in the middle of the bed of moss hugging herself as she looked around.
“The cave’s three-quarters of the way up the mountain,” he said, dropping to one knee beside her and opening the backpack. “I’ve brought ye a change of clothes and some sturdy boots that you might want to put on before we start the hike up.”
She turned to face him and stepped back. “You’ve had this planned?”
He pulled a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt out and set them on the ground. “For a few days,” he said with a nod. He looked up at her. “I came over here twice before; first trying to find what I was looking for, and then with Alec and Robbie. The first trip is when I found the pup and also when I fell into a hole inside the mountain. The last time was the night your house burned. I had hopes of reaching my … instrument of power without involving you, but it seems Mac has made that impossible.”
She took another step back. “What does Mac have to do with this?”
Duncan sat down and patted the moss beside him. “Come here, Peg, and I’ll tell you a fantastical tale that might help make sense of what we’re doing.”
She did sit down, but on the other side of the backpack. “If you think I’m going to— What is that noise I keep hearing?” she asked suddenly, looking around. “I
t sounds like breathing or … snoring or something. Only it’s seems to be coming from everywhere.”
Duncan rolled to his knees in front of her. “You can hear that?” He grabbed her shoulders. “Truly, Peg, you can hear the mountain?”
She shrank away from him. “The mountain?” she whispered, looking around again. “You think it’s breathing? You … you hear it, too?”
He pulled her into his arms and kissed the top of her head. “Ah, lass, ye have no idea how relieved I am that you can sense the mountain’s energy.” He tilted her head back, although he couldn’t see her that well because they were in the woods. “That’s the magic, Peg. That’s what I’ve been talking about.” He hugged her to him again. “And you can feel it.”
“Mountains don’t breathe,” she muttered, pushing against his chest. She bent her knees when he let her go and wrapped her arms around them, apparently to keep him from hugging her again. “Mountains are inanimate objects made of rock and dirt and granite.”
“Tell the good people of Spellbound Falls they’re inanimate,” he said with a chuckle, sitting down beside her. “Because I’m pretty sure some of these mountains picked themselves up and moved about a month ago.” He rested his arms on his knees and looked toward the fiord. “Nothing’s inanimate, lass; quantum physics has already proven that much. Everything, even something as solid as granite, is nothing but pure energy.” He gestured behind him even though he wasn’t certain she could see it. “This mountain is very much alive, but at the moment it’s … napping.”
“Okay,” she said with a snort. “Now you’re just messing with me.” She picked up the clothes he’d set beside the pack and scrambled to her feet. “I have no idea why you’re so all-fired determined to make me believe mountains breathe and there’s something on this one that you— Um, Duncan?” she suddenly whispered in midsentence. “How did you pick out what size clothes to bring for me?”
He frowned up at her; enough moonlight reflecting off the water for him to see that she’d dropped the shirt and was holding the jeans up by the waist. “I guessed, mostly. I wear a thirty-eight waist, and figured since you’re about half my size that you’d wear an eighteen or twenty.”
“You got me size twenty clothes?” she cried. She stepped up and held the jeans spread open in front of his face. “Do you honest to God think my ass is that wide?” she growled, shaking the pants at him.
Duncan snagged them out of her hands so she would quit hitting him with them. “I think that’s a loaded question coming from a woman,” he growled back, even as he held the pants up and realized they’d likely fall off him. “Why in hell are they bigger than mine if the number is less than half my waist size?”
She snatched them back. “Because women don’t like wearing big numbers on our asses.” She shook the jeans at him again. “Did you even unfold them to see if they at least looked like they’d fit me?”
Duncan dropped his chin to his chest to hide his grin. Christ, she was in a full-blown rage, and all over the size of a pair of jeans. But at least she was through being afraid of him—although she may be planning his death, he realized when she hurled the jeans at his head.
“Did you even look at them?” she repeated.
“Not closely,” he muttered, tossing the pants over his shoulder into the trees. “Wait, check out the other pair. I had the salesgirl go get them when I realized I should bring two changes of clothes, and I told her that you were just about her size. Maybe she grabbed smaller ones. Here,” he said, opening a side pocket on the pack and handing her a headlamp. “Put this on so you can see what you’re doing.”
She turned on the light, slid it on her head, and adjusted the straps, then pointed the three LED bulbs directly at him, making Duncan have to lift his hand before he went permanently blind. “Thanks,” she said far too cheerily, turning to look down into the top of the pack—which thankfully took the lights off him.
He heard her sigh just before she sat back on her heels holding the other jeans and blinded him again. “The only reason you’re not dead right now is because the salesgirl was a size smaller than me.” She straightened to her knees and trained the light into the pack again, then reared up with a gasp when her hand came out holding a box.
Duncan closed his eyes when he saw what she was holding. “I … ah … I had a worry that it might be your time of the month.”
“Please tell me you didn’t buy this stuff from Ezra,” she whispered.
“Nay, I shopped in Turtleback Station.”
She dropped the box on the moss with a snort, then pulled two pairs of thick wool socks out of the pack, another sweatshirt—that he was afraid was size twenty—and finally the boots. She peeled back the tongue on one of them and shone the light inside before tossing them down. And then he heard her gasp again as her hand emerged with a pair of panties dangling from her finger.
“These you get in a size four?” she growled, blinding him with light as she shoved the scrap of lace in his face.
He snatched the panties away and shoved them in his pocket. “What in hell size do ye wear, then?”
He didn’t know how she did it, but her nose lifted in the air even while she still managed to keep the headlamp blaring at him. “Women do not discuss their sizes with men. I can’t wait to see what you got me for a bra,” she said, training the light down inside the pack again.
Duncan tried to stifle his chuckle but out it came anyway, although he was afraid it sounded more nervous than humorous. “I didn’t get ye a bra.”
“Because?” she asked far too softly.
“Because last time I checked I was a red-blooded male, and for us bras are just one more confounding obstacle we’ve got to get past.”
That little comment was met by silence as the lamp’s beam dropped toward the ground, only to suddenly shoot up into the forest as she scrambled to her feet. “I’d better go change,” she said.
Duncan jumped up to cut her off and pulled her into his arms. “You’re perfectly safe with me, Peg,” he quietly told her as the beam illuminated his chest. “I would never force myself on you.”
“Yeah,” she muttered. “You’ve even stopped stealing kisses.”
“Did ye ever consider I might be waiting for you to steal one from me?” He pulled the light off her head when its beam hit him smack in the eyes and tossed it on the ground as he took a calming breath. “Sometimes a man needs a little encouragement.”
“We can’t be together … that way, Duncan. It’s not that I really don’t want to, but that we … just can’t.”
“Because our making love might kill me?” He snorted. “Trust me, Peg; what I’m about to show you will make your family curse look like a parlor trick.”
“Olivia told you about my curse?”
“No, Mac told me after Olivia told him.”
“She told Mac?”
Duncan smiled at the horror in her voice. “What, do ye honestly believe that husbands and wives don’t share their concerns for a friend with each other? Tell me, did you keep secrets from your husband?”
“Um … I guess not.”
Duncan prepared himself for a really big gasp this time. “So ye never told him about the kiss from the ski patroller who got you safely down off TarStone eleven years ago? Were ye not dating your future husband at the time?”
Only instead of gasping, she went as still as a stone. “How do you know about that?” she whispered, the horror back in her voice. “Ohmigod. Ohmigod,” she repeated louder, suddenly struggling to get free.
Duncan crushed her against him with a laugh. “I guess we know what sort of impression I made on you that day, don’t we?” He threaded his fingers through her hair and tilted her head back, turning serious. “Do you have any idea how many nights I lay awake thinking about the bonnie lass I let get away? Ye haunted my dreams for years.” He lowered his mouth to hers. “Ye still do,” he murmured, capturing another “Ohmigod” when he kissed her.
Not that she participated—as usual
. In fact, this time she gave him a punch in the belly and started talking the moment he lifted his head.
“It was you,” she cried. “Even after I told you I’d gotten separated from my boyfriend, you kissed me again.”
“Ye had such a kissable mouth, lass. Ye still do,” he said, pulling her more firmly against him when she tried to punch him again.
“You gave me a card with your phone number.” She snorted. “You actually had cards made up to … What? To hand out to every female you rescued?”
“I saw ye slip it inside your bra when you thought I wasn’t looking,” he said, struggling to hold back his laughter.
“Only so I could show my friends what an arrogant, no-good, rotten—”
He kissed her again, partly to shut her up but mostly to taste her fire. She might not remember their kiss all that fondly, but he sure as hell did. Because even being the skirt-chasing idiot he had been at the time, he’d recognized that the young girl was different; her taste and smell and contrariness at not kissing him back, her not agreeing to meet him that evening because she had a boyfriend, and refusing even to give him her name.
Christ, talk about Providence having two people’s paths cross; he’d searched every damn square inch of the resort for a week after finding her lost and hurt and crying in the woods several hundred yards from the trail, even chasing down every female he saw wearing a bright pink knit hat. But a damn lot of women wore pink hats, he’d quickly discovered to his frustration.
Duncan’s attention suddenly snapped back to the woman he was kissing right now when he realized she’d wrapped her arms around his waist and was kissing him back. Lord, she tasted as good as he remembered when her lips parted and her tongue tentatively touched his. And that’s when he knew why her apple crisps were so sweet, because he caught himself wanting to lick every square inch of her.
Charmed by His Love Page 26