Again My Love (Kaitlyn and the Highlander Book 9)

by Diana Knightley

  “Does anyone in the world besides you know how to work this tech?”

  Magnus and I both said, “Lady Mairead.”

  I added, “Great, we apparently have to see her again.”

  Twenty-six - Kaitlyn

  After a bit more conversation Jack and Barb went to bed and after repacking the vessels into the bags and then hiding them in the back of the shed behind the Sunfish sailboat, Magnus asked, “Would ye like tae come sit with me on the dock?”

  “I’d love to. I’ll check on Archie first, make sure he’s sleeping. Bring the blanket.”

  We donned coats. Magnus carried a bundled blanket, but as we were sneaking through the door that led down to the lake he whispered, “Shew it tae me.”

  I smiled. “You know me so well.” I spread my arms wide. “This, my love, is my grandparents’ lake house. If I think of paradise, it’s exactly like this.”

  We crossed the sloping yard to the dock stretching about twenty feet into the lake, our feet thudded on the boards. The faint sound of water rippling was all around us.

  From horizon to horizon spread a pitch black sky with stars flung across it and glowing high above us a pale moon.

  “There are always the same stars, mo reul-iuil.”

  “Always.”

  Then I said, “There is the east. Way over there, past the horizon, beyond what you can see, is a castle. It’s called Kilchurn, and a boy was born there. He grew up in the shadows of a mountain named Ben Cruachan.” I glanced at him from the corner of my eye.

  He smiled, staring out across the lake. “Och, say it once more.”

  “Ben Cruachan, my love.”

  “Ye are verra sexy.”

  I continued, “I’ve been there before, at Kilchurn Castle, at the edge of a loch, with that man, the grown up boy. He told me I should imagine that this lake and that loch were connected. That our childhoods were close, almost no distance at all. Imagine: I am six years old here, he is six years old there and we are destined through time to love each other more than anything else in the world.”

  “He told ye that?”

  “Aye. He did. And now I’m telling you, so you know it too. Sometimes memories are here,” I tapped my forehead. “Sometimes they are held here.” I pressed my hand over my heart. Then I reached out and pressed a hand to his heart too. “It doesn’t matter that we weren’t both there. I will tell you — you and I, we stood on the top of Castle Kilchurn and you told me that my home in Maine was across the lake and that I should take you there someday, with our children. You said we should teach them to cannonball into the lake. So this is me fulfilling that promise to Old Magnus.”

  “I love ye, mo reul-iuil. I can see it, but I also feel it as if twas an echo. I hold the memory inside.”

  “Good. Because holding some memories while allowing others to leave is part of being human. ‘Not a god,’ as we always say, you aren’t a god, you’re a man, you have to hold onto what’s important. And earlier you said you were weak. I disagree, you’re the strongest man I know. And it’s not your muscles I’m talking about, it’s your heart. Though now that I think of it, that’s a muscle too. Your desire to be happy, it isn’t a weakness, it’s a strength. I’ve never met anyone less involved in petty arguments and less inclined to hate or want revenge, though you would maybe deserve to want it, to hate, because so much terrible shit has been done to you and the people you love. You somehow manage to stay full of love and protection and I don’t know...”

  I stared for a moment up at his face, my palm still pressed to his chest. “Sometimes I am as full of love for you as I think a heart can hold and then there is a moment like this — where I’m reminded of the strength of memory and love, but also of the vulnerability of memory, the ties and entanglements that bind us and that might stretch and fray. I love you—”

  “I love ye too.”

  “Yeah, I know, I know it so much. And now, I am standing here on my grandparents’ dock, years before I am born, with my husband, a man from centuries ago, here, flesh and blood, my helpmate and lover. We are together staring out on the horizon of our worlds at the point in the distance where your time entangles mine and your home meets my own. And just inside this house lies your son, sweetly sleeping, the past, present, and future, and god I want to fuck you.” I grinned.

  He chuckled, grasping my hand, looking down into my eyes. “Twas nae how I thought that story would end, but I liked it and will join ye in the effort. There has already been a great deal said on your love for me. I have enjoyed the words, but would prefer some action tae prove yer heart and mind.”

  “Oh you would? Well, yes, I suppose we could...” I spread my hand down his chest enjoying the form and curve of his muscles. “But we’ve only gotten to the first of the directions. Now we have to turn this way, to the north.” We turned that way.

  “I’m not sure what to say about this direction except that there lies the North Pole and I don’t know if anyone has told you yet, but the ice is melting, and some days, if you’re listening, you’ll feel like it’s all going to fall apart, but to focus on that means to not focus on love and happiness and our strength, so instead turn here, west: Los Angeles. The place where you passed me that red envelope. And then turn here, south: Our home, Magnus, your home and mine. We’ve been building it together against great odds and though we might need to move again, we’ll keep our family together. Our fear is nothing but a thing.”

  Magnus stared down the dark lake shore. “Tis more than a thing, they are wantin’ tae arrest ye and try ye for murder.”

  I shrugged. “We’ll figure that out.”

  I spread the blanket on the end of the dock, sat down, and brought it up and around my back to warm my arms. It was quite cold out here.

  Magnus sat down beside me, and then I lay back and looked up at the stars. “It looks like that night at Balloch when you took me on the high walls.”

  “Here I have only the lowly dock risin’ and fallin’ on the water instead of the high strong stone walls of a castle.”

  “Stone walls crumble. It might be better to float.”

  He was leaning on an arm looking down at me.

  I said, “You should look at the stars, it’s beautiful tonight, high and clear and...”

  He shook his head and slowly lifted a side of my shirt exposing the breast closest to him, looking down on it with what could best be described as joy. “Nae, I have seen the stars. I haena seen your breast in ever long.”

  I softly sang a few lines from the Foo Fighter’s song by the same name. While my breast was cool, his gaze intense, the breeze causing me to shiver slightly.

  He said, focused on my breast, a breath away from kissing me there — “Tis beautiful, what dost it mean?” His words were warm on my skin. I arched toward his mouth.

  “It’s a Foo Fighters song, a love poem.”

  While I stared up at the tiny pinpoints of light on a jet black sky, he kissed my breast, lips and sucks and gentle nibbles. “Ye are wrigglin’, mo reul-iuil.”

  I arched more and my legs spread. He chuckled. “Ye are an easy magic, tae open wide for me with a kiss.”

  I gasped, “It’s the where of the kiss.”

  I am guessin’ ye are ready for me. Ye are a verra accomodatin’ wife.” His hand slid into the waist band of my pants and played between my legs.

  “Accommodating, like easy? Alas, I’m dreadfully insulted.” I added “More, more.” I arched higher.

  “I wasna speakin’ for me, twas m’cock speakin’ his heart, he daena mean it as an insult.”

  I pulled the other side of my shirt up and turned so he could suckle that breast too. I whispered. “I don’t think your cock has ever spoken his heart before, why has he been so quiet?”

  Magnus chuckled. “M’cock prefers the action tae the spoken profession of love.”

  I giggled and raised to shimmy my pants down my legs and laid them on the dock above our heads. I rolled the blanket up around me and started pushing the wa
istband of Magnus’s sweatpants down. “I accept it as a compliment then, Master Magnus.”

  “Good, m’cock meant it as the highest compliment.” His pants were off, he pulled my hip to his waist and his hand rubbed up and down the inside of my thighs. I was so ready for him and he for me. I pressed closer and closer as his breathy mouth was on my neck and down my shoulder. He shifted forward, rolling me to my back and—

  There was a noise.

  Magnus went still. Then in one fast move he slid off me to his stomach on the dock. Pressed there, but every muscle on his back rippling, tensed, ready — to leap up. I turned to my stomach and went as flat as I could.

  “What is it?”

  A big dark bear shambled through the yard between us at the end of the dock and the house.

  Magnus, full of stealth and quiet, reached beside him and without taking his eyes from the bear, got his hand on a long pool noodle. He drew it from its strap and crossed it in front of him, raised, as if it was a sword. It arced gracefully up, neon yellow, loose and wiggly.

  I tried to stifle my giggle.

  The bear kept shambling. It rocked the trash can. Luckily Jack had locked the lid down.

  Then the bear stood on its back legs, still and giant and ferocious in its silence, and looked out at us on the end of the dock.

  Magnus stared at the bear. The bear stared at Magnus.

  The pool noodle wiggled in the cool breeze.

  Then the bear dropped to all fours again and shambled away.

  Magnus watched it go, tense and focused, then as soon as it was out of sight he collapsed down with relief. “Och, he was eyein’ me.”

  I giggled. “What were you going to do with the noodle?”

  “I daena ken. I needed tae draw a sword and twas the only thing I had close. I was a half-second from tossin’ ye intae the lake.”

  “That would have been surprising. Man, my heart is racing.”

  “Och, mine as well, tis fear and danger and starin’ at a battle, I need tae—” He shoved aside the blanket, nudged my legs aside, and climbed onto me. I wrapped around him as he thrust inside me.

  He was fast and hard and deep, no longer the slow romantic, fondling, teasing, and relishing of moments before — this was his battle fuck. We had been here before. This wasn’t wanting, this was needing, desperate and forceful, taking his adrenaline, his battle-ready, fear-hardened body full of the wash of hormones, out of his mind, and allowing it to use my body, also with adrenaline coursing — riding the wave of it, together, ohgodohgodohgod, with low moans rumbling through us, until he came and there was — release.

  And then collapse.

  And then the sweet fondling that came after. His gratitude made plain with his mouth on my skin and his sighs of relief in my ears.

  I was pretty sure if his cock had words they would be — thank ye.

  My response would be — you are always welcome.

  But Magnus didn’t have words. He held me tight and when he rolled to his side he brought me with him, front to front, cuddled. His lips on my forehead, the deepest sigh of them all into my hair.

  I love ye.

  I heard it inside my heart.

  I turned my head to look up at the stars. The Milky Way stretched across the sky, boundless and infinite, at least to me. I was sure there was a limit, to strength and time and space — I ran my hand down his arm, loose and relaxed now that the danger was over. Sex had released the pressure on him.

  I hadn’t really thought that much about that part of being his wife, accommodating his needs. If you had asked me three years ago about being this receptacle for him, an old-school man, I would have told you to fuck off. My strength was my independence, or so I thought, but here, cuddled in his muscular arms, I was strength. Strong enough to live through danger, to take what needed to happen, to help him meet what’s next. To receive and hold and love.

  God I was a stereotype — wife.

  But also, so freaking proud of myself that I was this terrible arse of a wife to Magnus. Accommodating him.

  His cock liked me.

  I giggled softly.

  He murmured. “What is funny?”

  “I was thinking about your cock talking to me earlier.”

  He put his hand over his cock. “Wheesht, he will hear ye laughin’, he is verra insecure when he is sleepin’.”

  “You are cracking me up. But speaking of sleeping, we should dress. We need to go to bed.”

  We crept up the dock to the house and snuck through the door to the guest room, shifting little Archie to his own bed in the corner, and climbing into the double bed, not nearly large enough for the three of us.

  I fell asleep wrapped in Magnus’s arms, with the sweet sounds of Archie sleeping beside us.

  Twenty-seven - Magnus

  At the first ray of sunlight, Archie climbed intae bed with us, laughin’ and happy. I snored loudly, pretendin’ tae be asleep.

  Then, hearin’ the sounds of work in the kitchen, Archie crawled across us and dashed through the door tae see, “What Baba make?”

  Kaitlyn filled his space, nestlin’ beside me. “He calls her Baba.”

  I said, “Aye, he has fallen for her as well.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  I trailed a finger up and down on her arm. “Ye mean, after breakfast?”

  “Definitely, after breakfast, I can hear your stomach rumbling.”

  “I have been thinking on goin’ tae speak tae Lady Mairead if I can find her. I could use her advice on how best tae protect ye.”

  “That sounds like a risky business.”

  “She kens the future, she tries nae tae see it, but she has seen it. I feel sure she will tell me. And she kens how tae use the tech. She owes ye now that ye have saved her life. She will be forthcomin’.”

  “Where will she be?”

  I said, “You tell me.”

  “I think she is in Paris. I believe she is in the year 1904, there’s a love letter with the paintings. I believe she went there to rest and recuperate.”

  “I canna go alone. I need ye tae come with me, mo reul-iuil.”

  She raised up to look down on my face. “You need me?”

  I nodded. “I do, though how can ye come? Ye canna leave Archie.”

  She looked thoughtful for a moment. “We’ll give him a few more days and then we can go at night, right after he goes to sleep. We’ll tell him to have breakfast with Jack and Baba and that we’ll be back later that day. As long as we’re back before the next night, which we can do, as long... He’ll be fine.”

  “Aye, true. He is verra strong and happy and healthy, ye have already built him back from the lost boy we found.”

  “We have, my love, we did it together. He took the jump in stride. He’s building resilience. He will be a strong warrior...” She paused a beat, then said, “Like his mother.”

  “Ye are a terrible arse.”

  “I am, and now my love I need breakfast. Then we will cannonball, and maybe go to Bar Harbor, eat a lobster, more cannonballs. I rather liked watching you pounding down the dock in your wee bathing suit.”

  “Tis nae wee.”

  “Smaller than your kilt, more thigh, quite sexy that.” She kissed me, threw the covers back, kissed m’stomach, and climbed from the bed. “See you in the kitchen.”

  We were washing dishes, Kaitlyn and I, when she asked, “So tell me more about Hayley, you found her a month after she got there?”

  “Aye, ye had remembered the dates wrong.”

  Kaitlyn groaned. “She must have been furious.”

  “She was verra upset with ye, questioned yer loyalty, but I believe I smoothed it over with her. And she daena hold it as rough as I thought she might. I think twas because of Fraoch.”

  Kaitlyn shook her head. “Fraoch MacDonald? He is missing a tooth.”

  “He is still verra charmin’ when he wants tae be, and a scoundrel when he daena. But whether his charms worked upon her or nae, her charms had him verra
afflicted. He reeked of rose and was attentive in a way that made his attentions clear. All the men were speakin’ on it.”

  “I can’t believe he was wearing Madame Greer’s rose water perfume.”

  “I told him twas verra strong. He said Hayley told him he had a stench and he dinna want tae bother her with it.”

  Kaitlyn groaned. “So he’s hot for her?”

  “Och aye, and sufferin’. He believes she is married. That tae act on it is a sin. He would watch her in a way that...” I shewed Kaitlyn that Fraoch was almost crosseyed with love.

  She laughed. “I mean Hayley is very awesome. He should love her. But also, she is a handful. Like she would be a handful for a modern man. Opinionated, bossy, a woman like her would be a nightmare of a wife for any eighteenth century Highlander.”

  “You have a great many opinions.”

  Kaitlyn said, “True, I mean, yeah, though I’ve always been willing to see the other side in things. She believes her opinions are facts, indisputable. There’s a subtle difference, I suppose. I’m still a modern woman, sure, but our saving grace is that you aren’t actually a true Highlander. You have grown into a very fine modern man.”

  “My sword is still verra big,” I joked.

  She returned the joke, “Och aye, tis the one thing ye have retained from your homeland, the awesome sword.” Her eyes glinted mischievously and she continued with the Scottish accent, “Your sword was verra wiggly the other night on the dock though.”

  “Wasna speakin’ on my weapon, my own sword was big enough.”

  She sighed. “Man, I am so horny. You must be too, all we’re talking about is your dick.” She blew bubbles toward me.

  “Tis only one solution that I can see.”

  “Yep. But we might have to wait, we have things to do.”

  Twenty-eight - Magnus

  Archie, while we washed the dishes and straightened after dinner, was nestled on the couch beside Baba, who was readin’ tae him from large books, full of pictures and poetry and stories that were written for his young ear. Kaitlyn, on seein’ the domestic scene, looked up at me. “We can go tomorrow.”