by Donna Grant
Phelan narrowed his eyes on her, and then unceremoniously tossed her onto the bed. Before he could find a response, she leaned forward and grabbed his hand. He wasn’t sure what she was about until she cupped his hand around her sex.
“Feel that?” she asked him. “I won’t be running from you.”
Phelan sucked in a breath at the dampness he felt on his fingers. He pushed a finger inside her and watched as her eyelids slid shut.
“I’d find you,” he whispered before he kissed her neck. He moved his finger in and out of her. “You know I would.”
“Yes.”
“You wanted me to.”
“No. Yes. I don’t know. Just don’t stop touching me.”
“Never, beauty.”
Phelan kissed down her chest until he was at her breasts once more. He pulled a dark peak into his mouth and suckled as her hips bucked against his hand.
If she thought he prolonged her release in the shower, she was in for a surprise. Or he’d try. When it came to Aisley, he discovered he had no control. He might want to declare her body as his, but she owned him.
It was just a good thing she didn’t know that already.
Phelan added a second finger inside her, but didn’t increase his pace. Beads of water fell from their skin and hair that neither paid attention to.
He shifted his mouth to her other breast and ran his tongue around her nipple before gently scraping his teeth across it. She cried out, her hands clawing at the blankets.
“No’ yet,” he told her when he felt her legs squeeze his hand.
“I can’t help it. It’s coming,” she cried out.
Phelan pulled his fingers from her and played with the hair surrounding her sex. “I said no’ yet.”
Fawn-colored eyes glared at him. “Why?”
“It’ll be better.”
“Show me.”
With a smile he began to kiss down her stomach.
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
Aisley held onto Phelan tightly. She feared as soon as she let go he would disappear, just like her dreams. Her hands itched to run over his sculpted chest and washboard stomach again, to marvel at the width of his shoulders and his muscular arms.
She dragged in a breath, her body quivering as he settled between her legs. He kissed and licked her hip bone before leisurely kissing across to her other hip.
He was torturing her in the most wonderful, sensual way. Her senses were heightened, her blood like lava in her veins. He was the center of her world.
For a second fear flared through Aisley. Phelan had given her release in the shower. It had been quick and amazing, but even then she’d felt whatever was between them almost … strengthening.
That was one thing she couldn’t allow to happen.
To herself.
Or to Phelan.
He suddenly lifted his head, deep lines furrowing his forehead. “What is it, beauty?”
Aisley blinked away the tears that threatened. Why did he have to be so damned nice? She was used to callousness. She could handle cruel.
“This … you … scare me.” It felt good to speak the truth. And she wished she could tell him more.
Like telling him she was Jason’s cousin. It would shatter what was between them—even if it was just attraction. A heavy weight settled on her as she realized just what a disaster she had created by allowing Phelan close.
It was then she comprehended that she needed him to keep Jason at bay long enough for her to do whatever magic she needed to kill Jason once and for all. Making Phelan understand that before he killed her would be the problem, which is why she had to keep it from him.
She should have refused Phelan’s help. But then he was difficult to resist.
His blue-gray eyes held hers. She caught a glimpse of his ancient soul, jaded and yearning. Her heart thundered in her chest.
Because in that instant, that millisecond of time, the connection between them was irreversible.
The fear should have frozen her. Instead, she saw in Phelan the same things she felt. It was selfish of her, but she wanted a few hours of peace. A few hours to pretend that she wasn’t a bad person and her soul didn’t belong to Satan.
She wanted to pretend she had the life she’d once dreamed of and a man who cared deeply for her. Even if in the end she would pay for it all with her death.
“Doona fear me,” Phelan whispered and kissed her stomach, his eyes still on her. “Doona fear this. Most of all, beauty, doona hold back from me. Let me take you away.”
Aisley’s eyes slid shut as his kisses took him closer and closer to her center. She raised her hips, needing contact with him, with the pleasure she found in his arms.
His large hands skimmed all over her body, touching, learning. She could feel herself come alive, almost as if she had been waiting for his touch her whole life.
Then his mouth was on her. Aisley moaned when his tongue licked her sex. He licked and laved her clitoris until she was trembling with need.
He brought her to the brink, only to leave her breathless and begging for more.
“No’ yet,” he murmured against her thigh.
He tongued her again, teasing her clit mercilessly. She cried out when his hands reached up and cupped her breasts. Instantly her breasts swelled.
She bucked against him when he pinched her nipples. The pleasure pain was too much. Desire was tightening low in her belly with each flick of his tongue.
The climax slammed into her, taking her breath as her body trembled with the force of it. She was sailing, floating, drifting on a sea of utter contentment.
Her sex was still clenching when Phelan rose up on his knees and grabbed her hips to lift them up. She watched as he held her steady while the blunt head of his arousal brushed against her.
She moaned. Her sensitive flesh ached to feel him inside her once again. Aisley met his gaze as his thick, hard cock filled her.
The position he had her in prevented her from moving. He was in complete control. And she loved it.
She needed it.
She craved it.
Just as she needed and craved him.
It should frighten her, but it didn’t. Nothing could as long as Phelan was touching her.
He buried himself deep, a satisfied moan rumbling in his chest. She locked her ankles at his waist and fisted the covers when he rotated his hips. He gave her a moment to accommodate his thick length before he began to move.
Aisley groaned at the feel of him thrusting inside her. She arched her back and tightened her legs, but he refused to loosen his hold on her hips.
His fingers dug into her flesh as he continued to plunge inside her, going deeper, harder each time. Already her body was building toward another orgasm.
A cry of pleasure fell from her lips when Phelan’s strokes grew faster. He set up a driving rhythm that she was powerless to ignore.
Her body was on fire. Every fiber of her being was attuned to him, waiting for the next time he would take her to paradise.
She might not be able to move her hips, but she met each of his thrusts by squeezing her legs and clamping down on his staff. He whispered her name and thrust harder.
“Phelan,” she murmured when she felt herself about to peak.
Suddenly he released her hips and leaned over her, his hands on either side of her head. Their gazes clashed, held as he relentlessly pounded her body with his.
Aisley grabbed his waist as she felt the first wave of her orgasm. She screamed his name when the climax took her. With one more thrust, Phelan buried himself deep.
Pleasure swept them, expanding and increasing until it coalesced into a dazzling glow of ecstasy.
* * *
It was becoming easier and easier to hold onto his memories. Whenever he’d forget, a name would suddenly appear in his mind.
Aisley.
He felt the power run through his body, felt the magic consume him with each moment. But there was no heartbeat, no breath.
If only he
knew where he was, he could get back. There were things he had to do. Things like … and just like that, his memory faded.
Whatever awaited him was important. He knew that without a doubt. It drove him to continue to explore his mind and search for the answers.
Aisley.
She wasn’t far. If only he could reach her. She would help him. He was certain of it, just as he was certain that he would get back.
But where was “back” exactly?
It was on the tip of his tongue, but the more he struggled to grasp the name, the further it slipped from him.
He wasn’t giving up though. There was just a little more to do, and then he’d have everything he needed.
Aisley.
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
Phelan never considered himself the type to cuddle after sex, but then again, he’d never had Aisley in his bed before. And it was his bed.
Another first.
He rose up on an elbow and caressed the valley between her breasts and then down to her stomach. She smiled, her eyes closed.
“That tickles,” she murmured.
Phelan opened his mouth to respond when he saw the four-inch scar on her lower stomach. He slowly traced the scar, wondering why she hadn’t told him she’d had a baby. Then wondering where her child was.
“It’s numb there.”
He glanced at her to see the smile gone and her eyes still closed. She was motionless, as if she could barely get the words out. Her sorrow was obvious, and Phelan didn’t like how much that bothered him. “This is one of those secrets you didna want to tell me.”
“Few people know of it. It’s my burden to carry.”
“Was the bairn a lad or lass?”
Her head turned to him as she opened her eyes. “A girl. Remember when I told you I went back to my parents and then left?”
“Aye.”
“I was there six weeks before I learned I was pregnant. We thought it was the flu or something because nothing I ate stayed down. Mum took me to the hospital where the doctor told me I was expecting. The entire ride back home, Mum didn’t say a word.”
Phelan heard the anguish in her words, the barely leashed anger and disbelief. By the way she spoke in hard syllables, he knew the ending couldn’t be good.
“It took another two days before I could keep a piece of toast down. I didn’t see or hear my parents during that time. After the second piece of toast, I grew bold and put a wee bit of butter on it. Then I got crazy and ate some jam.”
She smiled, but it didn’t meet her eyes. Phelan wasn’t sure why, but he took her hand in his and simply held it.
“I went to tell my parents,” she said. “That’s when my father threw me out. Mum just sat there crying. She wouldn’t even look at me. I was allowed to pack a small bag. I had no money, and God forgive me, but I swiped Dad’s wallet on the way out.”
“What else were you to do?” he asked. “I’d have done the same thing, beauty. Where did you go?”
She blew out a breath. “Edinburgh. I had a schoolmate there. She had a live-in boyfriend who didn’t like me, but she gave me the couch for a few weeks. I found work. The money was pitiful, and I was always hungry. There was never any food in the flat. The few times I saved up enough to buy a decent meal, the bastard would steal the money or take the food.”
“Tell me his name.”
That brought out a slight grin. “I might take you up on that. There was no way I could afford a flat on my own, and I was wearing out my welcome. So, I waited another two weeks, keeping my money hidden in my shoes that I wore when I slept. Then I made my way to Pitlochry. I’d just arrived and was looking for somewhere to eat when I met a man who worked at the nearby distillery. I was hired as the store clerk that day. They even found me a small flat to rent.”
“Sounds like things were working out.”
“They were. It was while I was there that I felt my baby move for the first time.”
Her watery smile was radiant and made his breath catch for the love he saw in that smile and her memories. In all his travels, Phelan couldn’t say he had ever seen anything so full of love.
He didn’t trust anyone enough to get close to him to have any deep emotions. With Charon he could lower those walls he put around himself because Charon was a Warrior and had been in Deirdre’s mountain.
But never with a woman.
Until that moment he hadn’t cared to feel the dangerous emotion of love. He didn’t want to experience it, but he couldn’t deny he wouldn’t mind having someone love him. No one ever had.
Or ever would.
“I was watching the telly and drinking a glass of milk when she moved,” Aisley continued. “I worked harder to get our life set up after that. Everyone at the distillery was so nice and helpful. When my babe grew restless, I’d sing to her. She’d push her little fist or foot against my stomach, and I’d place my hand atop it.”
Phelan swallowed. He was afraid to move, afraid to speak lest he break the spell and Aisley stopped talking. He wanted, needed to hear more, to see that other side so many took for granted.
“For months my life kept improving. I was making a fresh start. The past was far behind me. I managed to pick up an extra shift for more money one Saturday. It was late, and the tourist crowd was all but done for the day. A couple came in and asked for a specialty blend that was kept below the store. My ankles had been swollen for weeks, and my belly was so huge I couldn’t see the lower half of my body.”
Phelan closed his eyes, no longer wanting to hear any more.
“I’d walked those stairs many times,” Aisley said. “I took them slowly down and found the bottle. I was halfway back up when my foot slipped or I didn’t quite place it on the step properly. I don’t remember falling. I remember the pain that exploded in my body. Then everything went black.”
He looked at her to see her eyes on the ceiling. Her body was stiff, her words barely above a whisper.
“Apparently the fall triggered labor. For six hours I was in labor before they realized my little girl had the cord wrapped around her neck twice. There was an emergency C-section. When I finally woke from the surgery the doctor was standing by my bed. He told me my baby was dying. Something about a defect with her heart. I stopped listening when I learned I was going to lose her. It didn’t matter why, only that I was.”
Phelan watched a lone tear fall from her eye to disappear in her hair. He couldn’t understand how anyone could suffer so, and yet still want to love. “You doona have to tell the rest.”
“I convinced them to bring her to me,” Aisley continued as if she hadn’t heard him. “I held her in my arms and told her all the things I’d planned to tell her while she was growing up. She looked up at me with those pale brown eyes as she gripped my finger in her little fist. Then she took a breath and was gone.”
Phelan had no words. He drew Aisley into his arms and held her. He didn’t know how long they lay there. All he knew was that it felt right, Aisley felt right.
She had revealed one of her deepest secrets. He had the feeling she had never told anyone what she just shared with him.
He swallowed as he thought of his secret. Phelan wanted to tell her, needed to tell her.
“My friends think I was stolen from my family as a lad of six. The truth is I wanted to go with Isla.”
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
Aisley smoothed a lock of Phelan’s dark hair from his face. She was glad Phelan was talking, because then she wouldn’t have to think about the past. “You were just a child.”
“Aye. A child who was angry at my Da and my older brother. I walked away from the house to sulk, I suppose. It’s difficult to remember. When I looked up there was this woman with the mesmerizing ice-blue eyes.”
“What did she want?” Aisley asked.
He leaned back against the headboard, his hard muscles moving and bunching. “Me. I didna know that at the time. I doona believe she worked too hard to convince me to g
o with her. There is one thing I remember above all others. I didna look back. No’ once, Aisley.”
“You’re being too hard on yourself. How were you to know what she wanted?”
“That’s no’ the point, is it? I was angry. I agreed to leave with a woman I didna know. I didna even ask where we were going. It wasna until we reached the foot of Cairn Toul that I hesitated.”
Aisley didn’t want to know this. She already cared too much for Phelan, and the more she cared, the more she put her plan in jeopardy. If she learned more, her heart was going to be in serious danger.
She hadn’t meant to tell him so much about her baby. When she began, it all spilled out in a tumble. She told him things she had never shared with another soul, never wanted to share. They were her private tortures, her misery.
“Isla must have used magic, because the next thing I recall was being inside the mountain. That’s the first time I saw Deirdre.”
Aisley sat up and turned so that she faced Phelan. He laid his hand on her leg with one side of his mouth tilted upward. “You joke about meeting one of the most powerful Druids ever?”
“Never,” he said with vehemence. “That woman was the Devil’s daughter and deserves to endure her death a thousand times a day.”
Aisley ran her palm over his muscular stomach, remembering how his body had moved over hers, bringing her untold pleasure and unimaginable carnal indulgence. He was sin and sensuality, wickedness and sex.
He was everything she needed and wanted.
Everything Jason could use against her.
“Were you scared?” Aisley asked.
“Out of my mind frightened. She hadna even spoken, but I knew she was evil. Beautiful, but evil. It wasna her floor-length white hair that made my skin crawl. It was her white eyes. They seemed to see right into my soul. She smiled, then told Isla to take me away.
“I was foolish enough to try and run. One of Deirdre’s Warriors stopped me. After that, I knew there would be no escape. I followed Isla down a long corridor that led to a hidden door. From there we went down stairs that seemed to never end. The lower we went, the darker it became. She held a torch to help light our way, but that only made everything scarier.”