Highlander's Portrait

by C. A. Szarek

  She closed her eyes as she took another bite. Her little moan of appreciation was his undoing.

  He ordered his manhood to stand down. Then again, stand was the wrong choice of words. Eoin cleared his throat and averted his gaze. Forced his fingers to close around the apple tart, then shoved it into his mouth and chewed. He couldn’t seem to appreciate the flavor bursting on his taste buds like he usually did.

  “Oh my. This is awesome!”

  “She likes it!” Fiona grinned, and Nessie beamed.

  “Thanks, Nessie,” Ashlyn said.

  “I doona do all tha cookin’, bu’ no one can match my sweets,” the housekeeper said.

  “I believe it!” his lass exclaimed.

  The meal couldn’t end soon enough.

  Eoin couldn’t sit still, and his family—especially his grandfather—kept throwing him knowing looks. The glances from Fiona were annoyed, but he couldn’t very well tell his sister all the blood in his body had settled below his waist.

  When the lasses started removing the trenchers, he shot to his feet.

  Angus arched a furry white eyebrow, and even Ashlyn sent him a questioning look.

  “C’mon, lass. I’ll walk ye ta yer quarters,” Eoin told her.

  “Oh. Okay.” She looked at his sister and grandfather. “Thank you for the lovely company and the good meal.”

  “G’night, lass.”

  His sister smiled as if she’d made a fast friend, and with his little pest, that was probably true. She echoed Angus’ evening wishes, and finally Eoin was alone with Ashlyn.

  He resisted the urge to rest his hand at the small of her back. Touching her was a bad idea, especially since he couldn’t get the taste of her mouth out of his memory. Watching her eat Nessie’s famous desserts had been a mistake.

  Eoin had meant to take her to the rooms next to his. The rooms that would be his wife’s when he finally wed, and had a connecting interior door to his own. However, the entry he stopped outside of was the laird’s chambers. He pushed the door open and gestured for Ashlyn to enter in front of him.

  Her brow was knitted. “But…this is the room I was in earlier. The room I bathed and dressed in.”

  “Aye,” he croaked.

  “I thought…I thought…these were your rooms.”

  “Aye.”

  Her cheeks reddened. “I can’t stay with you, Eoin.”

  Instinct was for him to shout, ‘Why not?’ or worse, order her to do just that, but he couldn’t. She’d be angrier with him than she already had the right to be. “There’re rooms adjoining ta my own.” He pointed to the nearby door. “Ye’ll stay there.”

  “Oh. Then why—?” She indicated her surroundings. His things.

  He couldn’t confess he just wasn’t ready to part from her company. An unmanly shiver traversed his limbs and he cleared his throat. He’d lost track of how many times he’d done that all evening. “I needed ta speak wit’ ye before we retire, s’all.”

  Ashlyn cocked her head to one side, studying him. “About what? We’ve been talking all day.”

  She was right, and it was nothing that couldn’t wait until the morn.

  It didn’t matter; he couldn’t let her go, even if she’d be close by, sleeping in a bed that was not his own.

  Eoin frowned.

  “What’s wrong?” she whispered.

  “Nothin’.” It was too quick, if her expression was any indication. “I’m tryin’ ta apologize ta ye,” he blurted. That was only half true. He shifted in his deerskin boots at the end of his bed, and his calf bumped the trunk where he kept his clothing. Eoin avoided looking at his oversized four-poster bed. If he gave the MacLeod tartan and lush furs too much notice, Ashlyn would think he wanted her in his bed.

  Which he did, but surely she wouldn’t be agreeable.

  “What for?” Her pretty was face open, honest.

  Wasn’t she angry at him for kidnapping her?

  “I brough’ ye here, lass. Against yer will.” Eoin held his breath, awaiting her answer.

  ****

  “I’m not mad.” Ashlyn caressed the smooth carved wood of the closest bedpost and tried not to look at him. “I mean, I probably should be. Scratch that, I know I should be…but this is a gift, really.”

  She was probably crazy after all, but sometime over the evening any anger she had for Eoin had melted into enchantment for where—when—she was. She couldn’t put her finger on the why, but didn’t want to examine it, either.

  “A…gift?”

  She nodded. “I’ve been writing about seventeenth and eighteenth century Scotland for years. I could’ve never fathomed that I’d see it with my own eyes. For real. Magic…is real.”

  “Aye, ‘tis.”

  Ashlyn laughed and shook her head. “Time travel. And the Fae. Wow.”

  “Are…are ye sure yer…well?”

  When she finally met his gaze, the laird looked confused. She’d never seen Eoin MacLeod unsure. She didn’t like the look on him or the instant urge to make him feel better.

  Yup, I’ve lost my mind.

  She closed her eyes and sucked a breath that pulled against the corset of Fiona’s gown. She sensed Eoin’s presence, felt the heat coming off his body.

  He’d come closer to her.

  Ashlyn opened her eyes and found his.

  He was standing only inches away, and she wanted to reach for him. When she should still want to smack him and shove him from her, all she could do was look at his mouth and remember what it was like to kiss him.

  Dammit.

  “I should want to go home now; you kidnapped me.”

  Eoin winced when she said the K-word. “Lass, I—”

  “It’s okay, Eoin. I…want to stay, at least for a little while. Could I get some paper—parchment—and something to write with?”

  If he was surprised by the request, he hid it well. “Aye, lass. Anathin’.”

  “Do you think Angus would…tell me stories? Answer questions? I could write some things down…”

  “Aye, I know he would.”

  “I was kinda hoping he’d enjoy it, really,” Ashlyn whispered.

  “Aye, he would.”

  Her heart skipped at the intensity in his eyes. “Are you angry that I want to…document the real Clan MacLeod? I’ve done a lot of research. Written about your clan and the Isle of Skye, even the MacLeods of Lewis. I just…talking to Angus would be the real thing. I could see what’s true and what’s not. Plus he can tell me about the Fae. And…magic.”

  Eoin shook his head. “Nay, lass.”

  “Then…is something wrong?”

  “Why do ye ask?”

  “You’re looking at me…funny.” Awareness skittered over all her nerve endings and made her heart stutter. She swallowed. Tried to make herself stand still.

  “Ye…lass.”

  “Eoin?”

  “Ye are tha gift, lass.”

  Heat suffused her face and neck for the millionth time. Ashlyn went to shake her head, but Eoin reached out, dragging two fingers down her cheek and it took all she was made of not to erase the small distance between them and burrow into his chest.

  He must’ve bathed before dinner, because his hair was damp and he smelled so good. Fresh sandalwood and sage washed over her senses.

  She stood there like an idiot, next to the big bed she should probably move away from, before she did something stupid, like grab his hand and drag him to it. Beg Eoin to kiss her again, touch her all over, and make love to her.

  You don’t even know him, idiot.

  Angus said fate had brought her to 1755, and the idea had haunted her brain since that afternoon.

  What was fate? Meeting Eoin?

  Wanting him with a passion she’d never felt for another man?

  Ashlyn wasn’t a one-night-stand kinda girl. She’d had lovers, all of whom she’d been in relationships with.

  If she went there with the laird, it’d be no better than a few nights. She was going home to the future; sh
e’d leave him behind. It wasn’t like they could have a real relationship. Could she kiss him and see where it went?

  Who are you trying to kid? You know where it’d go. Them. Naked. Entangled. With a likely repeat.

  He’d be as good as one of her romance novel heroes.

  Ashlyn trembled.

  They couldn’t be together long term. It was impossible, but the idea that they were doomed before they could start hurt somehow. Which didn’t make sense.

  How can I feel so much for him?

  Nothing made sense, even though she’d processed the time travel part. The 1755 part, the magic part. She was still working on understanding all Angus had said about the Fae.

  She’d bought a picture of Eoin, then met him that very night.

  If that wasn’t fate, what was?

  Just magic? Ashlyn fidgeted in Fiona’s slippers.

  Stop staring at him and say something before he thinks you’re the idiot you are.

  “I don’t know why I want to say this, but I do,” she whispered.

  “What’s tha’, lass?”

  “Thank you, Eoin. For bringing me here.”

  He shook his head, making his sable locks dance over his shoulders. “Nay, lass. I doona deserve tha’.” His expression was serious, with a touch of sadness, but there was more there, too. Something that darkened his eyes.

  Ashlyn burned to run her fingers through his hair, then caress his face, touch his neck and chest, then more. Desire settled low and hot, making her legs shake and her core throb, and she tried to shake free, but couldn’t look away from the intensity in his sapphire gaze.

  Chapter Twelve

  “But you do,” she whispered. “It’s…not how I planned my trip to Scotland, but…the surprise is awesome, I guess. Fulfills the purpose of my visit, really. In more ways than you could know.”

  Eoin swallowed and fell into her fathomless brown eyes. His Ashlyn was so sincere, so forgiving when he was so wrong. He would grant her anything in his power. He wanted to. More than that, he needed to.

  She’d forgiven him.

  She really was a gift.

  “I make ye a vow, lass.” His heart sped up, and it took all he was made of to stand there and say what he was thinking. Words he didn’t want to be true, but they had to be.

  For his Ashlyn. Because he couldn’t be an honorless bastard. Any longer than he’d already been.

  “A vow?”

  Wisps of her blonde hair had escaped the fancy style one of the lasses had done for her that morning, and his fingers itched to caress them, tuck them behind her ear, or yank the pins out so he could see the golden waves free, dancing about. Run his hands through the thick locks and bring her closer.

  Taste her mouth. Take her.

  “Aye.” Eoin forced a nod. “When yer done wit’ wha’ever ye need here, I’ll take ye back. Ta yer own time.”

  Even though it’ll kill me to see you walk away.

  The strength of his feelings made no sense. He’d seen this lass at the pub in twenty-first century Inverness, then brought her back home on what? A whim?

  He inhaled, but it didn’t make his head stop spinning. His grandfather’s voice popped into his head with that dreaded word.

  Fate.

  Ashlyn arched an eyebrow and studied him. She pursed her lips, then sucked in an audible breath. “Okay.”

  He couldn’t stop watching her mouth, and he needed to. Being here in his rooms, by his bed, was worse than watching her eat sweet bread. Too much to resist. He wanted to rip his sister’s gown off her.

  She stepped closer and his cock twitched.

  Closer was bad, too tempting, but he wouldn’t have moved away if an enemy had had a sword in his back.

  “So, you’re promising that this is all on my terms?”

  Eoin nodded, his eyes sliding to how her breasts moved up and down in the corset when she breathed.

  “Okay,” Ashlyn repeated.

  Her voice drew his gaze back to her face. Her cheeks were flushed with color again.

  His thoughts scattered because her breasts heaved once more. Damn, he needed to kiss her.

  “Can you…show me to my room?”

  He jumped—then cursed himself to hell and back. “Aye.”

  She smiled.

  His heart skipped and he had to swallow. Do not touch her. If he did, he wouldn’t be showing her anywhere but to his own bed, and Eoin couldn’t. That certainly wouldn’t be something on her terms.

  He’d made more than one vow to his Ashlyn this night.

  She walked ahead of him after he led her through the door. A helpful servant—probably Nessie—had lit the fire in the hearth, so the room was warm and had a welcoming glow. It was smaller than his, but he’d always liked this chamber.

  The furniture was dark wood, matching his own, but it had feminine touches in the carvings, and it wasn’t so oversized, like what was in the laird’s suite.

  He remembered afternoons here, spending time snuggled in his mother’s arms when he was a wee laddie. She’d had a wonderful laugh, his mother. Fiona’s smile looked just like Lady Eleanor’s. ‘Twas a shame his sister had never gotten to know the woman who’d birthed them. She’d been quiet and loving, and he missed her.

  “This quilt is beautiful!” Ashlyn caressed the fluffy bedding, which consisted of a MacLeod tartan stuffed and embroidered with heathers and thistles.

  “My mother made it.”

  Silence fell as she whirled and stood by the bed, wringing her hands in front of her. Then she jerked them behind her. “Umm, I think I can take it from here. Good night, Eoin. Sleep well.”

  He forced his head to nod. “If ye need anathin’, ye doona have ta knock. Come ta me.”

  “I will.”

  Eoin practically fled the room, almost tripping over his feet. He needed to retreat and stop imagining Ashlyn undressing, or donning the sleeping gown folded on the trunk at the end of the bed that had been his mother’s.

  Thoughts of his mother should cool his ardor regarding the honey-haired lass, but it didn’t. He remembered every inch of Ashlyn’s bare skin against his when he’d held her in the cave of the Faery Stones. The taste of her kiss preoccupied him, and he wanted to experience it again. And so much more.

  He shut the adjoining door with a resounding thud.

  His fingers made quick work of his belt, and he slid the plaid from around his waist. Normally he slept in the nude, but he didn’t dare with Ashlyn so close, so he pulled soft short pants from his trunk and slipped them on. He tossed the yellow leine, then remembered it was Angus’, and folded it. Set it on his trunk with a mental note to have Nessie or Peg return it to his grandfather after laundering.

  Eoin didn’t expect to sleep. He was half-aroused, his cock making itself known with his every movement. The organ wasn’t concerned with sorting through the chaos in his head about Ashlyn. It just wanted her. To be inside her.

  He turned down his bedding with a sigh.

  The knock on the connecting made him freeze.

  “Eoin?” Ashlyn’s soft call penetrated the wood panel.

  “Come,” he called. His heart and his manhood jolted with the door’s creak when she pushed her way into his room.

  Her eyes raked his frame and she stilled, stopping right inside. “Oh. You’re already ready for bed. I’m sorry—”

  Eoin stepped away from his bed. “What’s wrong, Ashlyn?” He liked the way her name rolled off his tongue. He should say it more often.

  She shuddered and rubbed her arm.

  “Lass?” he whispered.

  “I, um…I…can’t get out of this dress. Alone.”

  Oh. Shite.

  He was about to come out of his own skin. Eoin should call some of the lasses. He shouldn’t— “C’mere, lass, an’ I shall help ye.” The words were his own, but they were so wrong. They couldn’t be helped.

  “I’m sorry for asking, the ties are on the back, I tried…” She shrugged, and it lifted her tempting breasts yet
again.

  “‘Tis fine.” He gestured and Ashlyn obeyed, giving him her back so he could open the corset.

  He subtly sucked in air, bidding his head to stop spinning. Her shoulders were already bare, and he longed to lean down and taste her skin. His fingers shook when he reached for the green ribbon. He fumbled but got the job done as best he could.

  She lifted her hands, holding the loosening fabric to the front of her body, and he wanted to beg her to let it drop to the floor.

  “Thanks,” Ashlyn whispered. She turned and spared Eoin a glance that resulted in their gazes locking. She swallowed and the need to kiss her throat burned.

  “Anathin’ fer ye, lass.” Even to his own ears, his voice was lower, full of desire.

  She flushed and fidgeted, pinning the green fabric over her perfect breasts. “Good night, my laird.” His lass retreated to the lady’s chamber, but her parting phrase had him hard and aching.

  He couldn’t move. Eoin stared at the door she’d left ajar.

  Go to bed, you wretch.

  Before he could assure himself of the idiot he was, the adjoining panel swung open again.

  Ashlyn stood before him, her hair long and loose, wearing nothing but the ivory sleeping gown. The light behind her from the hearth gave her a golden aura that sucked away his breath.

  His heart thundered and his blood rushed south. If he’d wanted her before, the yearning was now tenfold. His cock ached, and he wasn’t wearing a leine or plaid to hide it. He didn’t dare glance down. His short pants were no doubt tented. “Ashlyn?” Her name fell from his mouth.

  “Eoin…I…” She worried her bottom lip. “I don’t want to be alone. Can I sleep with you?”

  God’s blood, I’m doomed.

  ****

  Ashlyn called herself every weak name she could think of.

  Was she really standing there, begging a guy she’d met less than twenty-four hours ago to sleep with him?

  As in share his bed, not his body. Although she couldn’t deny she wanted him.

  Eoin wasn’t wearing anything except a pair of ivory shorts that stopped at his knees. They clung to his powerful thighs. The closest thing to eighteenth century boxers there were.