by Allie Mackay
“It couldn’t have been anyone else.” He kept his sword aimed at her belly.
Margo swallowed.
He prodded her with the blade. “Speak.”
“I just did.” That was the best she could manage.
Any moment she was going to break out in a cold sweat. Her churning stomach and odd light-headedness warned that she might even be sick.
She did take another backward step, scanning the strand for the vortex-woman. As had happened with Patience, her spell had obviously gone wrong. She hadn’t sent Margo hurtling back in time to witness Magnus’s demise. She’d whisked her here for the terror of living her own death at his hands. She’d probably even planted the banded stone on the strand, needing its help to work her dark magic.
But the entity was nowhere in sight.
And Margo couldn’t distinguish the stone from the gazillion other banded stones scattered everywhere.
She tried to tamp down the panic rising inside her.
She failed abysmally. Although she didn’t see the vortex-woman or her stone, she did see Magnus and his long-bladed sword. She could even smell the weapon’s cold steel, the metallic reek of blood staining its length. This wasn’t a dream or a vision, spun by Patience’s faulty book-peering spell.
This was real.
The hard knot throbbing between her shoulder blades told her as much. She’d always wakened at the point her nightmares became too frightening to bear. Now she was horribly aware that she wasn’t going anywhere. Nor would relief come with the ringing of an alarm clock.
Alarm clocks hadn’t yet been invented.
Any other time she would have smiled at the irony.
She’d always wanted to time travel. Now she had, yet her bad luck had gone with her.
She’d dreamed of Magnus pulling her into his arms and kissing her.
Not threatening her with his sword.
The unfairness of it gave her the anger to glare at him. She lifted her chin, felt the heat staining her cheeks. “If you were the hero I thought you were, you wouldn’t let me stand here shivering and naked.” Something sparked in his eyes then and he lowered his sword, ramming the blade into its scabbard.
“Who are you?” He reached her in a stride. “How did you make the Vikings disappear?”
“I didn’t.”
“You lie.” He grabbed her wrist, gripping hard. “Your face is known to me, sea witch.” He lowered his voice, speaking only for her. “I’d hear why.”
“If I knew, I’d tell you.” Margo kept her chin raised, hoping she looked braver than she felt. His rich burr was heavy, liquid seduction. Even in his anger, each word poured over her, making it hard to think. “My name”—she tossed back her hair, trying anyway—“is Margo Menlove and I came here as a tourist. I’m from New Hope, Pennsylvania, and—”
“Too-rist?” He narrowed his eyes. “I ne’er heard suchlike, nor anyplace called Pen seal—”
“Tourist is a traveler. And you wouldn’t know of Pennsylvania because it doesn’t exist yet.” Margo held his gaze. “Not in your time.”
He frowned. “No’ in my time?”
Margo nodded. “That’s right. Not in your century or for many hundreds of years yet to come.”
“Say you?” Skepticism rolled off him.
“I do.” Margo tossed her head.
He went very still. “My name, lass, is Magnus MacBride. Men call me Viking Slayer. I’m no’ fond of witches, either. Be glad I do not lop the head off your shoulders for speaking such foolery.”
“It’s the truth.”
“The devil you say!” Scowling, he grasped her arms and turned her so that his big, powerfully muscled body shielded her from his men. “See here”—he leaned close, his fierceness making her heart hammer—“I will nae be made the fool. I already know Sigurd Sword Breaker or Donata Greer, the sorceress, conjured you to plague me.
“I have seen you naked as you are now.” His voice went deeper, turning rough. A muscle leapt in his jaw, as if he was struggling to restrain himself. “You rode me in Orosius’s kettle steam.”
Margo blinked.
None of her fantasies about him had included kettles or anyone named Orosius. And she wasn’t about to touch such a prickly theme. Not after the way he’d practically growled the admission.
If he had seen her naked in a dream, vision, or whatever, the experience hadn’t been to his liking.
Just now, he was looking her up and down, a heated appraisal. “Aye, you are the same sea witch.
My enemies are using you.”
“I’m not a witch.” Margo flushed, furious that her chill-perked nipples hardened even more beneath his scrutiny.
“And I don’t know your enemies. Not Sigurd Sword Breaker. I never heard of a sorceress named Donata Greer.” She could feel his disbelief beating between them. “They certainly didn’t conjure me. Unless ... Oh, God!”
“You do know them?” He tightened his grip on her, his gaze piercing.
“I might have seen Donata”—Margo took a deep breath, seeking courage—“if she’s a small, raven-haired woman who favors black and lots of jangling silver and jet jewelry. Dark eyes filled with malice.” The entity’s image flashed across her mind, making her skin crawl. “Musky, exotic perfume that’s heavy and cloying—”
“Donata, aye.” He was watching her more closely than ever. “She is many leagues from here, locked behind cloistered walls. You couldn’t have seen her.”
“Well, I saw someone.” Margo held her ground.
“And she looked just as I described.” She wasn’t ready to tell him the woman had arrived in a glowing black cloud.
She kept her chin lifted. And she knew her eyes were snapping.
She didn’t like being called a liar.
“You have described Donata. You know her because she is your mistress.” He loomed closer. Not so near that his bloodied plaid touched her, but close enough for her to feel the heat pouring off him. His breath brushed her cheek, the intimacy scalding. And beneath the salt tang of the sea that clung to his plaid hovered a trace of woodsmoke and man, the scent making her pulse skitter.
As if he knew, anger darkened his eyes and he took another step, crowding her.
Margo swallowed, her heart thundering. “I don’t have a mistress.”
He arched a brow, saying nothing.
His broad shoulders blotted much of the beach from her sight. His long black hair spilled free and wind lifted the gleaming strands, some of them teasing her face. His expression was harsh, cold, and dangerous.
His towering proximity made her breath catch and left her dizzy. She had to tip back her head to meet his gaze.
Looking elsewhere wasn’t an option.
He was so handsome in a fierce, rugged way. His potent male virility thickened the air, heady and overwhelming. Her body hummed in response, craving him against all reason. Fluid warmth began tingling low by her thighs, and her nipples thrust almost painfully, straining to make contact with his broad, hard-muscled chest.
He was the sweetest intoxication.
If only the circumstances weren’t so surreal.
And terrifying.
She glanced at his sword hilt, grip-ready at his side.
“So she was real. The woman I saw.” Nerves rippled in her voice and she hoped he didn’t notice. “When she vanished, I thought I’d imagined her. Everything she’d threatened. Then when I found myself here and—”
“She threatened you?” Suspicion flashed across his face again. “How could she when you banished her?”
“I didn’t banish her.”
“Then what did you do?” His tone said he wouldn’t believe her no matter what she told him.
“She just disappeared.” Margo puffed a hair off her forehead, annoyance beginning to chase her fear.
“And she did that after she threw a fireball into the surf, cursing you the while.”
Heat flooded her when she realized what she’d blurted.
But it wa
s too late now.
“I had nothing to do with it.” She narrowed her eyes at him, indignation shooting through her veins. “I can’t even make my own luck improve. I sure as hell can’t make vortex-women go poof in the night!”
“Vortex-women?” His brows snapped together.
“Yes.” Margo didn’t feel like explaining.
She didn’t like how he was looking at her. And she wished desperately that she weren’t naked. It didn’t matter if he’d somehow dreamed her nude and astride him. In fact, that made it worse. So she squirmed, trying to free her arms from his grasp so she could clap her hands over her breasts.
She shouldn’t be surprised that medieval men had different sensibilities.
Especially a hot-eyed, sword-packing warlord who defined the term alpha male.
But still...
Anger and adrenaline gave her the strength to loosen his grip. Again, she arranged her arms over strategic places, one hand above and the other below.
Then she opened her eyes very wide, fixing him with a frosty stare.
If he had any honor, she might be able to shame him.
“Do you always let women stand around naked?
Or”—she couldn’t believe her daring—“is that how men of your day make themselves feel superior?” He was on her in a beat, his hands locking so roughly around her arms that she was sure he’d snap her in two. “Dinnae speak again of ‘my day.’ No’ here, with my men staring at us. Their ears are as sharp as their noses long. If they hear suchlike, they’ll do more than cut off your head. They’ll burn you here and now.”
“And you won’t?” A flicker of hope flared in Margo’s breast.
“I—” He clamped his mouth, glowering at her.
He clearly did see her as a creature of the devil.
But something was shifting between them. A glimmer of doubt in his eyes, a lessening in the hard set of his jaw, it was an indefinable change that she prayed meant he was beginning to believe her.
“Well?” She lifted her chin, challenging him.
She had nothing to lose.
“Death by the elements is no different from biting it by a sword.” She couldn’t hold back a shiver. The sea wind was bitter cold. “Either way you’d be rid of me.”
“Damnation!” He released her, clenching his fists at his sides. For a long moment he glared at her, his expression a frightening blend of fury, hunger, and frustration.
Margo hoped the hunger would win.
“Keep yourself covered.” He snarled the command.
Then he whirled to face his men, his legs spread and his hands on his hips. The stance was pure male aggression. Riled, roused, and full of rage.
Margo knew his next words would seal her fate.
Knowing her luck . . .
She braced for the worst.
“Orosius!” Magnus kept his back to Margo Menlove and roared for the seer, knowing the big man—a formidable fighter, much to the surprise of those who didn’t know him—would have retrieved his heavy bearskin cloak now that the fighting had ended, however odd the battle’s close.
The seer appreciated his comforts.
Magnus still puzzled that Orosius had come along, as he’d sworn off warring years ago. But he had joined them, astonishing everyone.
And he’d fought with a ferocity that rivaled some of Magnus’s younger men.
Magnus was secretly proud of him.
But just now ...
“Orosius! Where are you? I’ll have your cloak, man!” He ignored the stares of his men and glanced up and down the strand, searching for the black-bearded seer.
The lout seemed to have vanished with the Vikings.
Magnus scowled. Such a fate would serve the old goat right.
His absence sent fury coursing through Magnus’s veins because it was so damned hard not to look at the sea siren’s nakedness.
She’d also scalded him with shame.
He’d have torn off his plaid and flung it around her—even if she was a devil-spawned temptress conjured by Donata—if he hadn’t wanted to avoid sullying her with the blood drenching his plaid.
She thought him without honor.
And that stain bit deep.
Furious, he kept searching for the seer. “I need your cloak, Orosius!” He raised his voice, shouting with all his lung power. “If you dinnae come quickly, I’ll find you and rip the damty rag off your back.” He’d also cut the eyes from his men if they didn’t stop gawking at Margo.
“Take your stares from her, you lechers!” he snarled at them, yanking Vengeance halfway out of her scabbard until the bastards turned their backs and fixed their gazes on the horizon.
When two of them glanced over their shoulders, surely spelled by the round fullness of her breasts and the tempting curve of her hips, he knew there was only one way to protect her from his men’s gawking.
“God’s eyes!” Knowing he was damning himself in the by-doing, he yanked off his soiled plaid and threw it onto the strand.
Bare-chested, he stormed around and hauled Margo into his arms, lifting her easily and gathering her to him, effectively shielding her nakedness.
“Dinnae think to fight me, sea witch.” He flashed a warning at her, aware his eyes were blazing. If she so much as wriggled a toe, his honor would shatter.
His infernal loins were already tighter than a bowstring.
And his manhood was a raging, granite-hard agony.
“Unhand me!” She ignored the danger and squirmed in his arms, trying to twist free. “I’m not a witch.”
“I heard you the first time.” Magnus glared down at her, trying hard not to glance below her collarbone.
Unfortunately, in trying to shield her from his men, he was holding her so tightly that her breasts were crushed against his chest. Her chill-hardened nipples pressed into him, a torture beyond bearing. Worst of all, the silken curls of her womanhood kept rubbing across his hip. And the hot, slick heat of her was making him crazy.
“I know you heard me.” She wriggled again, her damned female curls brushing perilously close to his groin. “You don’t believe me, so I have no choice but to tell you again. I am not a witch. I think Donata disappeared on purpose. But I don’t know what happened to the Vikings.”
“And pigs fly.” Magnus tightened his arms around her. “Now be still.”
Afraid he’d embarrass himself if she moved again, he set his face in his worst scowl, hoping to deter her.
She only glared back him, so beautiful in her rage that raw need clawed at his chest.
In truth, she didn’t need to wriggle to best him.
Her scent assailed him. Minding him of cold, clean air on a frosty winter night, but with a trace of rose, the fragrance swirled around him, tantalizing and more annoying than a bee beneath his collar.
Every muscle in his body tensed and hot blood roared through his veins, scalding him. Soon he wouldn’t be able to breathe. He could feel the lust and anger churning inside him, seething and boiling.
For two pins, he’d lean down and nuzzle her neck just to drink in her beguiling scent.
“Orosius!” He yelled louder this time. “Where—”
“I’m here.” The seer ambled over to them, the big Norse war ax he preferred in battle still in his hand. Its blade and haft were smeared with red, but the seer’s prized bearskin cloak looked clean.
Leastways it was as unsullied as it would ever be.
Orosius carried the cloak over one arm, as if he knew why Magnus wanted it.
“I’ll have that.” Magnus yanked it from his friend’s arm, and setting Margo from him, he swirled the cloak around her.
“Thank you.” She snatched the bearskin tight against herself, her eyes still shooting blue fire at him.
“I’ll find you suitable raiments later.” If you don’t disappear into the mist. Keeping the sentiment to himself, he glowered back at her, for the moment glad to have her out of his arms.
Now that she was covered, he could breathe a
gain.
He dusted his hands, demonstrably.
Sadly, he burned to pull the mantle right back off her shoulders, once again freeing her smooth, silken skin, the sweet curve of her hip, and those full, round breasts to his hungering view.
She was a lavish feast he was so tempted to fall upon. Desire ripped through him, especially now, fresh from battle and with the rush of victory hot in his blood. He took a step toward her, halting only because he was so furious that he’d erred about her.
She was the sea siren from the kettle steam. And he’d been so sure she was innocent.
Now...
She’d proved that her dark magic was potent. She might be trapped in Donata’s thrall, but she was the more skilled.
Who but a powerful she-devil could make a score of Viking ships and their crews simply vanish?
It was unthinkable.
So frightening, he doubted he’d sleep well for weeks.
And he was the Viking Slayer.
Nothing had scared him since he was a suckling bairn at his mother’s breast. And though he’d never bairn at his mother’s breast. And though he’d never admit it, he suspected he’d been fearless even then.
Yet this day, here at Loch Gairloch, and in the midst of some damned fine fighting, the sea vixen had shown her true colors, teaching him the new face of terror.
And still he burned for her.
Chapter 11
She’d spelled him.
Magnus was sure of it. Why else would her shivering have shaken him to the core, his heart turning over when he’d stepped near to glower at her and then caught the chattering of her teeth? What other reason outside a witchy one could make him pledge to find her clothes?
How could any female save Satan’s own seductress hold such power over him that just looking at her made him ache to roll her beneath him and bed her?
She wasn’t a witch, she claimed.
She was a too-rist.
Magnus hardened his expression as he watched her fuss with the bearskin, smoothing the cloak’s heavy furred folds. Penseal-where’er. He shuddered, wondering if she’d made up the name to muddle his wits. But the word had sounded true on her tongue. A small part of him believed her. Her horror and anger were too real.