She fought to go faster, racing toward completion, but he held her back, slowing her down, stretching out the pleasure to its fullest. Just when she thought she couldn’t take any more, he stood, took a couple steps to the wall, and braced her against it. Forehead to forehead, he pounded into her, pushing her into an explosive orgasm. She screamed with pleasure, and he groaned as he came inside her.
“Mine,” he growled and tightened his arms around her.
Heart pounding and body pulsing with completion, Ella jerked awake, the dream fading from her mind along with the pleasure. Mumbling at her inability to remember the man in her dreams, she lay still. She was dry but cold and naked and she was lying on a lumpy mattress in a strange room. A scratchy blanket covered her and the room was lit by two windows with glass that appeared to be filthy or damaged in some way. Certainly not clear or clean. Above her rough-hewn beams divided the ceiling into sections. The plaster and the beams were darkened with age. She pushed herself up and the blanket slipped to her waist. Cold air swept over her bare breasts, hardening her nipples, and sending a shiver through her. “Harry S Truman,” she screeched. “It’s colder than hell in here.”
Tugging the blanket up, she held it around her shoulders. Shivering, she fought the urge to panic. She hadn’t been kidnapped, and she wasn’t being held against her will. At least, she didn’t think so as she didn’t see any guards, and it would be easy enough to escape through one of the windows. Closing her eyes, she took several breaths then opened them and looked around again. The same room, with its dirty ceiling and matching walls, surrounded her. She searched the room for her clothes, didn’t see them, and tried to remember what had happened.
After several minutes, she remembered stumbling across an endless wilderness in the freaking rain. She remembered falling and deciding to rest for a few moments, then nothing else. She must have fallen asleep or passed out, and someone had found her. They’d brought her here, undressed her, and left her to freeze to death. That sounded feasible except for the last part, she thought as obviously this was someone’s home.
It was old, as was everything in it. The small bed she had slept on was shoved up against the wall with a table on one side of it and a large trunk at the foot. Directly across from it was a fireplace with two large chairs on either side of it. Small footstools sat in front of them. Small tables sat beside each of the chairs, piled high with books, papers, and several candles.
A dining table had been placed to the right of the fireplace. It had two chairs, but one of them also held a pile of books and junk while the other was cleared off and apparently used. Only one in use, she thought and hoped the owner was a woman.
The front door stood in the center of the wall to her right with a casement window on either side of it. A gust of wind rattled slipped beneath it and blew several leaves across the floor. The sight explained the need for the footstools, she thought as a person would want to keep their feet off the floor as much as possible. Just thinking about how cold the floor would be beneath her bare feet made her shiver and decide to stay in bed for a while longer.
Snuggling the blanket around her shoulders, she noticed another door directly across from the entrance. It was in better condition, not as weathered or rotten, and floor to ceiling shelves took up the walls on either side of it. They were packed tight with books, odds and ends, and even several old bones, mostly animal skulls, she hoped. Laughing at her own paranoia, she held her hand out and quoted a line from Macbeth then laughing she dropped her hand and examined the last pieces of furniture in the room.
A large hutch, dark with age, stood against the wall on the right side of the fireplace. It looked like a large dresser with doors beneath it and shelves above it. The top was covered with what appeared to be stacks of dishes, and containers and sacks were arranged on the shelves. Her stomach growled, and she hoped they held food.
The dining table sat a few feet away from the hutch and was covered with stuff as well. The only clear area in the room appeared to be the far left corner. Checking to make sure, she leaned over on the bed and looked between the chairs. A stack of something black, most likely peat she thought took up the corner. She could live with that if someone, anyone, would pile a huge stack on the fire and warm up the room.
Deciding that someone appeared to be her, she started to slide her feet to the floor when a huge dog stood up next to the bed. Screeching, she pressed back against the headboard as it placed its front paws on the edge of the bed and leaned toward her. She froze, fear overwhelming her. When they were nose to nose it licked her. She laughed and ruffled the fur on its neck.
“Nice doggie. Be good.” She edged around it and stood up, leaving the thick wool blanket behind, and tugging the linen sheet from the bed. She wrapped it around herself and tucked the end into the top above her breasts as she hurried toward the fireplace. She was right. The floor was freezing. The entire room was freezing, she thought, as her breath fogged the air until she nearly reached the fireplace. Huddling there as close to the flames as she dared she avoided the biggest clumps of dirt on the floor, then jumped in surprise when the dog sat down and leaned its weight against her. She put her arm around it, and they watched the flames flicker.
“So, doggie, what’s your name, huh?”
“Maggie,” a deep, masculine voice said from behind her.
Chapter Three
Screaming, Ella lost her balance, landed on her bottom, and spotted a wild man standing a few feet from her. Jumping to her feet, she searched for a weapon, grabbed a tankard, and threw it. Liquid sloshed out of it and onto the floor as it sailed through the air toward him. It hit the door frame next to him and a large chunk broke off and flipped through the air. He dodged it as the rest shattered on the stone floor.
“Stay back,” she said and held her hands up as if that would stop him.
“Woman, that was my last tankard.” His voice held a deep snarl as he stalked toward her.
Ella took the words and the movement as a threat and searched for another weapon but only saw a leather-bound book lying on the seat of one of the large fireside chairs. She reached for it, but a growl of warning stopped her. Frozen with fear, she looked at Maggie. The large dog lay beside the fire with her head resting on her paws. That left the wild man. Ella looked at him through the locks of hair that had fallen over her face when she’d bent forward. Had he growled at her?
“Touch my book and ye’ll be sorry,” he said.
Yup, the sound had come from him. She jerked her hand back and put a chair between them while she tightened the sheet around her breasts. “Where am I, and how did I get here? And where are my clothes?” Her voice rose on the last two words.
“You’re at my cottage. My hounds and I found you, and I carried you home. You can thank me for saving your life.”
Ella shoved her hair away, then gripped the edge of the blanket with one hand and the ring around her neck with the other. “Thank you. Now, where are my clothes?”
“In the glen where I left them. They were soaked and did nothing to protect you.”
“Even soaking wet they were better than being naked.”
“No, wet clothes pull the heat from your body. It was better to strip you and wrap a dry blanket around you.”
Ella decided he probably knew best. “They are the only clothes I have, so could you please go get them?’
“No, lass, that I cannot do.”
Planting her hands on her hips, determined to get her way, she demanded, “Why not?”
“The stream has swollen and can’t be crossed. Only a daft person would try it.”
He walked toward her.
She skittered away, circling the chair, keeping it between them.
He smiled as he passed her. “You’re welcome to use my blanket or anything else you find to cover yourself.” He set the bucket on the floor by the cupboard, then walked by her again and opened the trunk at the end of the bed. A second later, he held a bunch of cloth out to her.
She looked at the bundle, then at him.
“To cover your feet,” he said.
Ella stepped forward, snatched it from his hand and drew a chuckle from him when she scurried away again. Frowning, she cleared a space on the table, set the socks down, and moved the books and papers from the second chair to the floor. Sitting down, she lifted a foot to the edge of the chair and pulled on a sock. It was more like a tube of cloth than a sock, and it didn’t have elastic at the top. The second she let go it slid down and pooled around her ankle. She could live with that. She pulled the other one on and looked up and caught him staring at her bare legs where the make-do gown had fallen away.
“Don’t get any ideas, buster, I know karate,” she snapped. She’d only learned a few moves but he wouldn’t know that, she thought and flipped the cloth over her legs, folded her arms across her breasts, and waited to see what he’d do next.
“Buster?” he asked.
“It’s as good a name as any since you haven’t introduced yourself.” Of course, she hadn’t either and deserved the arched-brow, irritated look she received from him.
“Torkel MacAsgaill.”
“Well, Mr. MacAsgaill,” she said, mangling his name, “thank you for saving me and for the blanket and socks.”
“Call me Torkel, lass.”
She tried it out, saying it the way he pronounced it. “Torkel.” Like the word tore, then kell rhyming it with hell. The thought made her smile. She felt like she’d landed in hell. A cold one.
“What should I call you?”
Surprised he hadn’t recognized her, she thought, I’ve finally caught a break and introduced herself. “Ella Ross.” She waited to see if he recognized her name, then relaxed when he didn’t react. The Highlands were the right choice after all. Smiling, she said, “I was on my way to a cottage I’d rented when my car broke down, but as soon as the weather clears up, I’ll call a towing service and be out of your hair.”
He chuckled. “I’m afraid we don’t speak the same language, Ella Ross.”
She laughed. If he was having as hard a time understanding her as she was understanding him, they were in trouble. “Sorry, I’m originally from New York, and I still slip up and let my accent show in my speech sometimes.”
Appearing eager, he moved to the table, sat down, and leaned toward her. “The New World. How are things there? Anything exciting happening?”
What an odd question, she thought, but didn’t ask because his size distracted her. Even sitting down, he was huge. It made her nervous, especially when she realized he’d probably been the one to undress her, and unless the other door led to a bedroom, he’d probably shared the bed with her. The very small bed in which some of the men she knew would’ve taken advantage of an unconscious, naked woman. Pointing to the second door, she asked, “Is there a bed through there?”
“No, not a bed, but a corridor that goes to the barn and other buildings. Its’ much warmer and dryer to use it when the snow piles high and I have to care for the animals.”
She nodded, understanding what he was talking about from her years growing up on a farm. It also explained at least part of the stench in the cottage. She glanced at the door, then the small bed. “I woke up in the bed.”
“So, you did.”
“I’m sorry you had to give up your bed for me.” She waited to see what he’d say.
“No need to be sorry, Ella, by the time I found you and carried you home we were both freezing. Sharing body heat was the only way to warm up quickly.”
“Oh.” She avoided his eyes. “Uh, did anything happen?”
“You don’t snore or make wind in your sleep if that’s what you’re asking,” he grinned.
She glared. “You know what I’m asking—did you touch me?”
“Touch you? Aye, lass, when I undressed you and wrapped you in my blanket. When I carried you home, unwrapped you, and tucked you into my bed.”
“But we didn’t, uh, make love?”
“No, even though you’re a friendly lass, and I spent most of the night keeping your hands from straying.”
Ella gasped at his audacity. She wouldn’t have groped him. At least, not knowingly. She watched him, trying to see if he was teasing her, but couldn’t figure out what to believe or think, about him. One moment he was grinning and teasing her, the next, like now, he was serious. Even somber. He behaved so casually as if they weren’t stuck in his cottage with a storm raging. Or, at least it had been.
He picked up a dirty bowl, carried it to a hutch, and added it to the pile of dishes already there. “Are you hungry, Ella?”
He’d said there were other buildings connected to the corridor. Was one of them a kitchen with a stove? If not then did that mean he cooked on the fire, and it was also his only source of heat?
She examined the fireplace with new eyes. A big iron pot hung from a hook above the flames and several heavy looking iron pans sat on the hearth. She’d hoped when she’d first seen them that they were decorative, but now she figured they were what he used to prepare meals. That thought was followed by another. They were going to freeze to death or starve or both.
“Ella?”
“Hmm?” She looked in his direction but didn’t really pay attention to him as she wondered how long it would take them to freeze to death, and if anyone would ever find their frozen bodies. Maybe centuries from now an archeologist would find them and use them as examples of ancient man, like that guy they’d found in the mountains somewhere. Where had that been? Planting her chin on her palm, she thought about it and recalled he’d been found somewhere in Europe.
A hand waved back and forth in front of her face, and she batted it away. “What are you doing?”
“I asked if you were hungry. You didn’t answer me. Are you sick? Daft?”
“Daft? No, of course not. I’ve just got a lot on my mind,” she said, gritting her teeth. “I was thinking about what would happen when they find our bodies.”
“We’ll not be dying anytime soon not if you are who I think you are,” he said, grinned and rubbed his hands together.
His hands were large and appeared to be covered with scars and calluses. The hands of a working man, she thought and could almost feel them on her body. Licking her suddenly dry lips, she puzzled over what he’d just said. Who did he think she was, she wondered followed by maybe she should be asking him if he was daft and remembered the pepper spray in her tote. She looked around, searching for it, then turned back to him. “Please tell me you didn’t leave my tote behind.”
“I couldn’t carry both you and that big bag. The bag was tempting, but I chose to save you.”
“I really, really need it. It’s all I have.”
He pointed at her and she realized after a moment that he was actually pointing at the necklace.
“You still have your jewelry.”
Ella grasped the ring. “It was a gift from my travel agent, Aileen.”
“Aileen with the long red hair and unusual aqua eyes?”
“Yes, that’s her,” she said, feeling disgruntled he’d described the other woman so accurately.
“When did she give it to you?”
“Yesterday, when I arrived in Scotland. She put it on me, and I can’t get it off.” Smiling, she said, “Surely you have a boat. If you go get my tote, I’ll give the ring to you—if you can figure out a way to remove it.”
“I do have a boat but I can’t use it to cross the river and I’ve already told you I can’t go get it without dying. Is it worth my life to fetch it?”
“No, of course not.”
“Good, now, tell me. Are you hungry?”
Her stomach growled. She smiled, even though he’d left her clothes and her bag in the glen. “I’m starving. I missed breakfast because I was in a hurry to catch my flight, then when I arrived in Inverness I had to catch a train, and it didn’t have a dining car.” She stopped talking because he appeared genuinely puzzled. “What?”
“You’ll have to tell me abo
ut this “catching a flight” and about Inverness. It’s been a long time since I was last there. And about the other things you mentioned.”
“The train?” she asked.
He nodded. “Aye.”
“You don’t get out much, do you?”
“It’s been a very long time since I left the glen,” Torkel said and turned away.
He chose a bowl from the stack and began scraping it with a large wooden spoon. Chunks and flakes of whatever had been in it and left to harden flipped into the air and fell to the dirty floor. He continued scraping while he moved to the fireplace and used his foot to push a flat skillet-like piece of iron over the flames.
Ella watched, fascinated, as he ladled water from the bucket into the bowl. Next, he threw a handful of something into it and stirred it around with the spoon. Thinking it was soap flakes, she gave him points for washing it even though his home appeared to have been trashed by burglars. Filthy ones, she thought and hid her grin.
He moved back to the fire, and bent down, his kilt rising up in the back and giving her a glimpse of strong thighs. Intrigued, she leaned forward and tracked his every move, hoping for another peek.
He held the bowl near the flames, and she wondered if he intended to dump the dirty water on the fire? Wouldn’t that put it out or did he have a drain of some kind built into the hearth? Before she could ask him, he scooped a clump of greyish-brown goop from the bowl, dropped it on the hot surface of the iron plate, and smoothed it out with the back of the spoon. It sizzled while he fashioned three more of the mounds on the hot surface. After several minutes, he flipped them over and leaned a shoulder against the mantle while they cooked.
She was a guest, an unexpected one at that, but maybe she should offer to help him because there was no way she was eating whatever he was cooking. On the other hand she didn’t want to say that and offend him and have him growl at her again.
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