by Nina Mason
“I knew she wasn’t alone.”
“Aye, well,” he bit out, annoyed by the tightening in his trousers. “It appears your instincts were spot on.”
She was undeniably beautiful—and had a desirable body—but he didn’t care for shaved muffs and he didn’t like her. He might be there against his will, but she didn’t know that. And flaunting her assets to a suitor of Cat’s violated the code of friendship as far as he was concerned.
“How’s Benedict?”
“Fine. I was just speaking to him, in fact.”
“Has he said anything about me?”
“Not to me.”
His lusts stirred as he regarded her. Images flashed of him taking her, of sinking his fangs into tender flesh while thrusting his cock into slippery heat.
“Don’t you own a robe?”
She smiled, challenging him. “Why? Don’t you like what you see?”
“I like it fine. But what I’d like to see is more consideration for Cathleen. Do you make a habit of exhibiting yourself so brazenly to her gentlemen callers?”
“She’s never had a gentleman caller before now,” Avery returned, looking smug. “You do know she’s a virgin, don’t you?” She looked him up and down, lingering on the telltale bulge in his trousers. “Or, should I say she was before you got here?”
“I haven’t touched her. Not that it’s any of your bloody business.”
“It could be.”
She stepped up to him, calling his canines along with a flood of saliva. He swallowed and stepped back, denying his aching lust.
“I thought you fancied Benedict.”
“There’s plenty of me to go around.”
She closed the gap between them, set both hands on his chest, and danced her fingers across his nipples. Yearning pulsed through his sex. Gritting his teeth, he turned to go.
She grabbed his arm. “Where are you going? Don’t you want me?”
He yanked his arm free. “When I want a lass like yourself, I’ll pay for her. That way nobody gets hurt, if you catch my meaning.”
“Oh, I catch it all right. You just called me a whore.”
“Aye, well, if the cap fits.”
At that, he turned on his heel and strode back down the hall to Cat’s room, the need to feed bubbling in his veins like lava.
* * *
The next time Cat awakened, she felt a bit bleary, but also peaceful and refreshed. Rolling onto her side, she took in the rumpled void beside her and the items on the nightstand: the empty box of cigarettes, overflowing ashtray, and empty bottle of Glenfiddich. The smell of whisky and burnt nicotine burned her nose and jabbed her stomach. Swallowing hard, she looked around for him. He was at the window with the last of her Marlboros burning in his hand. Daylight and curling smoke danced around his silhouette.
“Good morning.” Her mouth felt dry and sticky.
“Is it?” Without looking at her, he took a pull off the cigarette and blew the smoke at the glass. “If you plan to keep me prisoner, you’ll need to get more whisky and ciggies. I prefer Macallan’s, twenty-year, and Gauloises, no filter.” Shooting her a hard look over his shoulder, he added, “I’d offer to pay for them, but I seem to have come out without my billfold.”
Sitting up, she swallowed the snarky comeback rising in her throat. Why was he being such a jerk all of a sudden? “Did something happen? Because last thing I remember we were getting along quite well.”
He said nothing for an infuriatingly long while, and then, “You can keep me here against my will, and you can keep me from telling lies, but you cannot keep me from being unhappy about it.”
“That’s true. You’re in charge of your own happiness.”
Lips compressed, he shot her a stony glare. She climbed off the bed, crossed to the dresser, and looked through the drawers for something to wear. Selecting jeans, a vintage lace top, and a fresh pair of knickers, she draped them over her arm and headed for the door. “Where are you going?”
His question stopped her.
“To take a shower.”
“What about me?”
She rounded on him, uncertain what he meant. Surely, he wasn’t suggesting they shower together. Not given the way he’d been acting. Sweet memories of kissing him seeped out of her memory and trickled down her body, making her shiver with desire. “What about you?”
“I need a wash too. And a coffee.”
“You’re welcome to the shower when I’m finished,” she offered. “And I’ll put the coffee on while the water’s heating. In the meantime, please open the window before Avery goes ballistic. It’s like a bloody hookah den in here.”
“Avery can kiss my arse.”
The rude comment jarred her. If he was going to act cantankerous all day, perhaps she ought to let him go. But, then again, that was what he wanted, wasn’t it? To gall her into releasing him so he could be off to Scotland and back to business as usual while she went back to her dreary existence with an even bigger hole inside, having found and lost the only creature who could fill it. At the moment, though, he only filled her with the urge to smack him upside the head.
“I can understand why you’re being pissy with me, but what’s Avery done to earn your disdain?”
“Ask her.”
She got a cold, sick feeling in her gut. Her mind jumped back to the Rusty Cauldron, but she couldn’t come up with any way Avery might have offended him. Her gaze sliced from him to the mound of dead soldiers in the nightstand astray. Clearly, he’d been awake while she slept. Did he leave the room? Did something happen between him and Avery?
“I’m asking you.”
“Don’t make the mistake of thinking her a friend.”
Her heart sparked, heating her face. “Tell me what happened.”
His eyes flared in defiance even as his mouth obeyed her command. “I went out to use the phone. After you fell asleep. To ring Benedict about the dogs. She came in, wearing a see-through negligee, put her hands on me, and made her desires abundantly clear. With no regard for your friendship, I might add.”
The shock of discovery and betrayal made her shudder. “What did you do?”
He shrugged. “She’s beautiful...and I was hungry.”
“No.” Her chest tightened, making it hard to breathe. She reached for the wall to steady herself. “Please tell me you didn’t.”
His mouth hitched into a crooked grin. “I didn’t.”
Confusion soon displaced the relief she felt upon hearing his answer. Had he only said it because she’d told him to? She needed to be more careful about how she phrased her questions. “Tell me what you did.”
“I called her a whore, didn’t I?” His face was like granite. “Not in so many words, but she took my meaning.”
The tears in her eyes rolled hot down her cheeks. Avery was her only friend in Wickenham. Her only friend in the world, really. She had to know she was interested in Graham, that he’d spent the better part of the night in her room. So, how could she put the moves on him? He was right. Avery was no friend and it hurt. Profoundly. At least he’d refused to be complicit, as hungry and horny as he was—gulp—thanks to her spell. And speaking of her spell, he couldn’t lie. So why not ask him the jackpot question? She stood there a long time just looking at him, fear raging in her heart as she tried to formulate just how to put it. “Graham,” she began at last, “I need you to be honest...not just with me, but with yourself. Have you ever stopped loving me?”
Turning back to the window, he heaved a sigh. “Nay.”
She stepped toward him, and then stopped. “Then why fight it? Why live in fear? I’d much rather be happy—truly, deliriously happy—for a brief time than pine for what might have been the rest of my days.”
He said nothing, did nothing. Didn’t even flinch. He just stood there at the stupid window like an unfeeling hunk of chiseled marble. Frustrated fury rose in her throat, strangling her. She clutched her clean clothes to her chest, fingers twisting in folds of denim and lace. Finally
, she could bear his silence no longer.
“Say something, damn you.”
He kept quiet for several breathless moments, then said, in a low, pained voice, “There is/By my leaning over the precipice/Of your presence and your absence in hopeless fusion/My finding the secret/Of loving you/Always for the first time.”
She knew the verse. It was from a much longer poem by Andre Breton, one of the founders of surrealism. She swallowed, touched. “Is that how you feel now? About me?”
“I wish I could deny it.”
She glared at his back. “Why deny it? Love is a beautiful thing.”
A scoff escaped his throat. “Not when it’s a death warrant.”
“We’ll find a way,” she told him, wanting to believe it with all her heart. “I drew the Ten of Cups, remember?”
“I hope you’re right. Because I don’t think I could bear to lose you again.”
“Then turn me,” she blurted without meaning to. “If you make me like you, Fitzgerald can’t touch me. And you and I can be together at long bloody last.”
He rounded on her, meeting her eyes with golden daggers. “You don’t ken what you’re asking.”
Saying nothing more, he just stood there, as still as a mighty oak. In comparison, she felt like a hummingbird, constantly in motion. Blinking, breathing, swallowing, twitching. Even her pounding heartbeat seemed excessive. And her emotions, which bubbled like a cauldron of witch’s brew. She bit her lip, fighting to keep them from boiling over, but lost the battle.
“I don’t understand you.” Her throat was tight and her eyes filling with tears. “You couldn’t have known what he’d do to Caitriona. And maybe you didn’t know he’d come for Catharine. But you do believe he’ll come for me, and yet, you obstinately refuse to do the one thing that will protect me—”
“Turning you isn’t the only way. Fitzgerald hasn’t come looking for you yet because he hasn’t picked up on my feelings—and he never will if I don’t allow them to take deeper root.” The look in his eyes chilled her to the marrow. “Release me from this infernal spell, dammit, so I can do what I should have done the moment I drew the Queen of Swords.”
Her heart shattered like a mirror. How could he not see leaving her would destroy her as surely as anything Fitzgerald might do?
“No,” she countered, incensed. “I won’t let you. Even if I have to keep you spellbound forever—you big, stupid, bloody-minded vampire.”
And at that, she stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.
Chapter 9: Taming the Scotsman
Cat elected to take a bath instead of a shower, wanting the extra time to cogitate and cool down. Maybe she should release him from the spell, let him run back to Scotland like a frightened rabbit, and try to forget she’d ever set eyes on him. That way, she’d be safe. And then what? Come back in another hundred years and go through it all again? The thought of it—and his mulishness—made her blood hotter than the bathwater in which she soaked. Had he never stopped to think this through? Or, was he too blinded by the smoke of self-blame, wishful thinking, and denial to see anything? It seemed so, meaning she’d have to lead him like a horse to water.
But could she make him drink?
Before climbing into the tub, she’d put on the coffee, as promised, and given him the all clear. Avery was nowhere around, thank the goddess, because she felt so angry and hurt right now, she might have flown into a rage reminiscent of her mother.
She took a deep, temper-cooling breath and let it out. After her bath and his shower, she’d take him to the liquor store for whisky and cigarettes. It was the least she could do, though a small, wicked part of her was tempted to deny him his pacifiers to force him to feed on her. Blessedly, that part of her hadn’t yet gained a foothold in her otherwise charitable constitution.
The way she saw it, she had until midnight on Sunday to convert him to her way of thinking. Come Monday, she had to teach and get back to her dissertation. Until then, she’d keep him under her thumb. As long as the spell was in force, he was at her mercy. He did, of course, still have his natural superior strength, but she’d be willing to wager he wouldn’t use it against her.
If he ran, she’d bring him back with the smoke. Still, she didn’t believe he would run. Though he talked a good game, she suspected part of him wanted to remain her prisoner, wanted to be with her without feeling he’d betrayed his conscience. It was only a matter of time before those shields of his fell like Salome’s veils. She just hoped it would be sooner rather than later. As annoyed as she was with him at present, she still wanted him to strip her of her title.
If by midnight on Sunday, he refused to see sense and she remained a virgin, she didn’t have a clue what she would do. But, she didn’t need to think about that just now, did she?
* * *
Returning to her bedroom after her bath—dressed in the jeans, lace top, and sneakers she took with her—she found him, to her horror, perusing the bookcase containing her vast collection of Scottish bodice-rippers. A blush scorched her face as he pulled one from the shelf, sliding a bemused glance in her direction.
Turning the paperback over, he began to read the back-cover blurb aloud: “No one can tell the hot-blooded Scottish lass whom to marry! But the much-feared man Nora runs to for protection may be more perilous to her heart than any unwanted groom... And much more difficult to tame!”
With a chuckle, he looked up, meeting her mortified gaze. “Taming the Scotsman? Don’t go getting any ideas now, eh?”
He replaced the book and withdrew another, again reading the back-cover blurb, but to himself this time. He laughed and looked up, catching her watching. “Seriously? This is what does it for you?” Winking, he added, “I’d best put my kilt back in mothballs, eh?”
She looked away. She probably should be relieved his mood had improved, but she was too humiliated to process the shift. When she looked back, he’d moved on, thank the goddess. Now, he stood before her altar with his back to her. Bending over, he fingered her statue of Hecate, depicting the goddess of witchcraft in her three-bodied form as maiden, mother, and crone.
“How long have you been practicing magick?”
“Only since my last year in secondary school,” she told him, still addled. “But I’ve always been interested in the occult...and mythology. Especially Celtic mythology.”
“Oh, aye?” He turned his head, regarding her briefly, before returning his eyes to the book. “You’re acquainted then with the tales of Cuchulainn and Fionn mac Cumhaill?”
“Of course.”
Cuchulainn and Fionn mac Cumhaill were heroes of Irish mythology whose legends extended to Scotland and the Isle of Man.
“My Granda used to tell me their stories when I was a wee laddie.” He looked through the book as he spoke. “Along with his own adventures in the Forty-Five, of course.”
The Forty-Five was what Highlanders called the 1745 Jacobite rebellion led by Prince Charles Edward Stuart in his bid to restore his family’s claim to the British throne. The campaign ended in the slaughter at Culloden, after which the English banned all trappings of Highland culture, including the wearing of tartan.
“Your grandfather was a Jacobite?”
“Oh, aye.” He returned the book to the altar. Moving his attention to the shelf above, he ran a finger down the spine of her grimoire, but didn’t remove it. “And his father and grandfather before him. We Logans have been fighting for the cause of freedom since the days of William Wallace.” Turning, he looked hard at her. “Please tell me you ken who that is.”
She felt the sting of insult. “Of course I do. He’s the guy in Braveheart.”
She realized how daft it sounded the moment it was out of her mouth. With a grunt, he turned back to the altar. “Braveheart is a load of bollocks. For one thing, Robert the Bruce never betrayed Wallace. For another, Wallace supported John Balliol not the Bruce as heir to the throne.” He paused, chuckling. “And I’m reasonably certain Sir William never got a
leg over the She-Wolf of France.” Looking down, he shook his head. “And don’t even get me started on the schiltrons.”
“Schiltrons?” Despite reading loads of Scottish history, she’d never heard the word.
“The lads with the sharpened spikes. Wallace invented them. As a defense against English cavalry charges. But the men formed into clumps, like giant porcupines, not in lines the way the bloody film depicts.”
“Oh.”
Silently, she tacked on a holy shit. She knew he’d “died” back in 1815, having done the math while he recounted his story. She also knew he’d been an earl and lived in a castle on the Black Isle. She just hadn’t had time to think it all the way through. He’d been a Highland nobleman, born in the devastating aftermath of failed rebellion, forever marked by those times. She’d been there too, as Caitriona Fraser, daughter of a laird. No wonder she’d always been so drawn to Scottish romances.
He’d moved to her desk and was now looking through her reference materials. “What are you working on to do with vampires?”
“My doctoral dissertation.” She swallowed to moisten her dry mouth. “On the archetype’s evolution in literature. I’m what’s known as ABD. Do you know what that means?”
“Aye.” He leaned in for a closer look. “All But Dissertation. It means you’ve completed all the coursework for your Ph.D., just not the research paper.” A small laugh tumbled from his mouth. “As it happens, I’ve earned a doctorate or two myself over the years.”
Feeling her jaw begin to drop, she clamped it shut. Why should she be surprised? If she’d been around as long as he had, she’d have earned multiple advanced degrees too. And she admired him all the more for his enterprise and obvious intelligence.
As she watched him sorting through her books and papers, a plan began to hatch in her mind—a plan that promised to save her job.
“You collect vampire novels, right?”
“Aye.” He picked up Carmilla and turned it over to read the back cover. “Call it morbid fascination, eh?”