Time Everlastin' Book 5

by Mickee Madden

  She closed her eyes for a time, nibbling on her lower lip. "I've been searching for something most of my life and I don't have a clue what that is. A little voice in my head keeps telling me that if I don't find it I'll always be lost."

  Rivulets of tears streaked her cheeks and her chin quivered despite her attempt to stop it. "Lost as in, spending the rest of my life feeling empty and miserable."

  "Mayhaps yer confinement in this realm—"

  "Do you know what I am?" she interjected, staring at him through a wall of tears.

  "I'm no' sure wha' answer ye want from me."

  In a monotone, she told him of her childhood, of losing her brother and moving to the States. Without sweetening her ruthless pursuit of attention, she said, "I never cared who I hurt or how I went about getting what I wanted. Everyone else was to blame for my shortcomings. I inspired to be the top photojournalist of the twentieth-century. When it didn't happen, I turned to yellow journalism."

  "I dinna understand tha' term."

  Shame-faced, she lowered her gaze. "I invented stories and embellished the truth on factual accounts." She shrugged and focused on the mesmerizing momentum of the water coursing down the rocks. "I took compromising photographs of people. Privacy was never a word I held much respect for. I used to think being called a ‘bitch' was high praise, because it meant my weaknesses were well hidden."

  "Down here, lass, we tend to think too much."

  She looked at him for a long stretch, weighing the kindness his eyes portrayed, and questioning why that made her feel all the more unworthy.

  "I didn't come back to Scotland to see my brother," she said in a small voice. "No...I came because I started researching my ancestors and figured he could help me with some of the information."

  She frowned and stared off into space. "Maybe deep inside me...in some more human corner of my mind...I did want to mend things between us. I don't know."

  "Do ye love yer brither?"

  "Yes," she said without hesitation then blinked in surprise. "Yes, I do love him." She smiled tremulously. "He doesn't respect me. I've given him no reason to see me as anything but a disappointment."

  "I'm sure he—"

  "No," she again interrupted. "I behaved abominably at his house. I doubt anyone there cares a hoot if they ever hear from me again."

  A low laugh escaped Broc. "So all yer sass was no' for me alone."

  Despite her mood, she chuckled. "Unfortunately, no. You would like Roan."

  "And wha' o' the ither?"

  "Other?"

  "The mon ye believe ye love?"

  A chill snaked up Taryn's spine and she shivered. "I'm not sure if it's love or...lust. Or even if I care at all, or just that he belongs to someone else and I wanted to conquer him. Oh, God, he does love Beth."

  A new rush of tears broke through the dam of her control and she splashed more water on her face.

  "The unattainable," Broc murmured.

  Taryn lapped up the water around her lips and eyed him pensively. "This is going to sound crazy, I know, but...." Sighing, she sank onto her folded legs. "When I first met him, I thought I had finally found the one. You know...my soul mate? He made me feel things that no one had before.

  "I made a complete ass of myself. I got this ludicrous notion in my head that, if I was that attracted to him, he had to feel it toward me, too." She sighed again, wearily. "I wasn't aware that I even wanted to love someone—wanted to experience all those gooey emotions I hear people talking about."

  "Ye have never been in love?"

  "No. Too full of myself, I guess. What about you?"

  He grinned wistfully. "There was a lass, Rilla, in ma village, I wanted as ma wife."

  "Did she love you?"

  "She wanted Kennaugh."

  "Ah."

  Silence fell upon them for a time then Taryn said, "If I ever get out of here, I'm going to make some serious changes in my life."

  "To wha' end, lass?"

  "The betterment of one Taryn Ingliss." She added wryly, "That should take about a lifetime."

  "Considerin' wha' ye have gone through down here, I'd say ye were doin' yerself proud."

  "About your horse," she said, taking Broc aback.

  "Ma horse?"

  "Yes. Why didn't you try to escape on him when you were above ground?"

  "Weel—"

  "Wait!" Taryn jumped to her feet and knelt by Broc's knees. "You escaped! How did you—"

  "Lass, I didna escape," he said with a hint of impatience. "Afore ye came, I was allowed ou' one night a month to collect the gifts ma clan above leaves me."

  "But you were out! Why come back?"

  "Tis abou' honor, Taryn."

  "Honor?" She released a near hysterical laugh. "So you do know how to escape!"

  "Karok willna let tha' happen. Should I try, he would haul me back."

  "Okay," she muttered, her mind racing. "The next time he lets you go topside, I could—"

  "Taryn." His stern tone plummeted her hopes. "There be only one way to earn yer freedom."

  She stared into his eyes, her heart jack-hammering, tears pressing for release. "Make love with you," she said dully.

  Broc bolted to his feet, startling her with the ferocity of his motion. His back to her, feet apart, his hands balled into fists at his side, he said harshly, "No' make love, womon! Just sex atween us!"

  Feeling shaky and queasy, she stood and stared at the back of his head, her tears flowing, unchecked. "You said Karok had to believe it would hurt you once I left. He's not a fool. You've made it perfectly clear you can't stand me."

  When he spun to face her, his livid countenance gave her a jolt of fear. To hide its presence, she accused, "You're just interested in sex! Admit it, damn you! You know he won't release me. You...just...want...sex!"

  "Still yer tongue, womon!"

  "I've been down here—what?—a week...two weeks—"

  "Five bloody long months!" he snarled, gripping the top of his hair in both hands and yanking. "Och, I do want ye!"

  Taryn staggered back until the wall stopped her, her breaths coming in hoarse spurts. "Five months and no one has tried to find me?"

  "Aye," he said, angry at revealing this.

  She hugged her trembling body. "Five months?"

  "I hated ye first. Hated yer intrusion in ma pathetic life, and hated yer ability to stand up to me."

  He stepped toward her. "I be only a mon. I think o' havin' ye in ma sleep and when I be awake." He wagged a finger at her. "Yer damn compassion for Karok when he was sick! That be when I weakened. The bloody beast wha' kept ye down here, and ye concerned wi' his sufferin'! Bloody hell, I knew ye were trouble from the beginnin'."

  "I won't have sex with you," she wept.

  "Ye can get past yer revulsion o' me!" he bellowed, closing the distance between them.

  Taryn released a cry of fright when he roughly pulled her into his arms. Before she could stop him, the fingers of one hand entwined in the back of her hair and her head was forced back. His mouth captured hers in a kiss both punishing and unrelenting, sapping her strength and her will to fight back. She wept within, railed within, and died within until his arms encircled her quaking form with the tenderness of a lover, and his kiss became less possessive and more sensual.

  The apathetic coldness that had begun to take root in her heart, melted beneath an onslaught of sensational warmth. Despite his existing facial hair, his mouth evoked a passion in her none of her previous lovers had come close to awakening. She clung to him. The solidity of his masculine body, every plane and every contour, heightened her sexual awareness. When his hands slid beneath her shirt and cupped her naked bottom, hers crept beneath his kilt and conformed to his.

  Nothing made sense at the moment. Nothing mattered but each other.

  Ending the kiss, Broc buried his face against one side of her neck and murmured in Gaelic. Taryn slipped her hands beneath his shirt and explored the muscled flesh.

  "I...need release,
" he said huskily, straightened and peered into her eyes. "The pain is...unbearable."

  Taryn winced, and closed her eyes when he pressed his erection against her abdomen. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes. Her own body ached for release. Ached for him.

  His hand released the ties on her shirt and exposed one breast. When his palm slid over the rigid nipple, she gasped at the spark of pleasure his touch ignited. Her skin was feverish and tight, her mind floating from her body.

  His mouth took possession of hers, demanding, coaxing, evoking a fiery passion low in her belly that rapidly spread through her system like an intoxicating drug. She clung to him, sexual hunger felling any remnant of resistance. His kiss was masterful, probing, breaching the boundaries of her experience.

  Oh, God, why does this feel so good? So right!

  Broc stroked her buttocks, stroked and kneaded before one hand slipped between her legs and cupped one thigh. As if reading his mind, she lifted the leg. He braced it then shifted his other hand beneath his kilt. Taryn became dimly aware of pressure. When he glided into her moist womanhood, burying himself fully, she broke the kiss on a gush of air. He filled her completely, her muscles flexing around him as if starved of sensation, starved of contact.

  He kissed her again, harder, dividing her attention during each controlled thrust. Never had she felt as one with a man. Never part of the sun, the moon, the stars—the universe. Every stroke of his engorged flesh soared her beyond horizons of mere bliss. Sex did not enter the equation. Sex was all she had ever known.

  Sex and lust.

  Somehow, this barbarian, this man of mystery, questionable hygiene and seesawing temperament, awakened the woman she hadn't known existed.

  She found herself staring into his eyes, their depths drawing her into the man he had kept hidden from her until now. Strain, torture and bliss racked his features, his breathing labored.

  An intense tingling ignited inside her. Taryn tried to speak. Couldn't for lack of breath. The sensation magnified, and magnified until it burst into a fiery orgasm that swept to the tips of her toes and fingers in shuddering wave upon wave.

  A strangled cry escaped her when another ignited, and his thrusts deepened, pushing her to mindless ecstasy. The second orgasm possessed both fire and ice, consuming her with almost frightening intensity. At its peak, he cut his thrust and wrapped his arms about her tightly, experiencing her tremors to his core.

  Breathing in agonized spurts, she managed, "Oh...God."

  She released a mewl of protest when he withdrew and stepped back. Panting, braced against the wall, she stared at him, wondering if his intent was to run off. Her gaze lowered to his heaving chest, then to the bulge distorting the drape of his kilt.

  As if he had all the time in the world, he slipped out of his shirt and tossed it aside. Taryn's eyes drank in the powerful breadth of his chest and shoulders, the musculature of his arms, and the slimness of his waist. She no longer saw his facial hair, only the heady masculinity of his physique.

  How had she not realized how very male he was?

  His kilt fell the way of his shirt. He stood in all his naked majesty, a god among men, his eyes conveying a message she readily divined. She peeled off her shirt and flung it off to one side. Naked herself, she felt an overwhelming shyness, as if his eyes alone had viewed her in this state. They roamed her body like a caress, inducing shivers of delight.

  When his hand lifted, she closed the distance and slipped hers into his warm clasp. He drew her to him, his gaze never wavering from her eyes. Heated flesh and muscle embraced her. His musky scent titillated her olfactory nerves, heightening her sexual awareness.

  "Ye are so wondrous," he murmured by her ear.

  "I need more of you."

  He kissed her with deliberate slowness, a sensuality that hummed along her nerves. Her hands caressed his back and shoulders, his firm buttocks. He dragged his lips across her cheek and rasped, "Did I hurt ye?"

  "No."

  Again, he looked deeply into her eyes, as if skeptical of her reply. "I...have no' released."

  "I know," she smiled. "Does this mean I get more of you?"

  He grinned boyishly. "Twas ma hope, lass."

  He swept her up into his arms and laughed when she squealed gleefully. After a long kiss, he lowered her onto the leaves and positioned himself atop her.

  "Are ye sure? We barbarians are a lustful lot."

  Taryn framed his face and lowered it to receive her kiss. When it ended, passion blazed in his eyes. His mouth encircled her nipple and suckled, the texture of his tongue alternately stroking. With a gasp of pleasure, she stretched her arms above her head, and closed her eyes. She was soon lost to his masterful exploration of her body with his hands and tongue. By the time he pressed into her, she was beyond ready, beyond sexual hunger, beyond need. Her hips met each thrust, drawing him deeper inside her.

  Not once did he lose his rhythm. Muscles taut, body sleek with perspiration, he guided her toward a greater ecstasy, despite her growing exhaustion, and his own. His erection swelled even more inside her as the beginning of a shudder built inside him.

  Her third orgasm, the most glorious of all, rode his own blistering tides of release. As one, they traversed corporeal restraints and entered heavenly planes of sensation. As one they soared through infinite realms of bliss until at last, they gently floated back to earth, lying in each other's arms.

  Hours later, an internal voice prodded Broc awake. He was instantly aware of Taryn's naked and warm body beside him, her head upon the hollow of his left shoulder, one arm and one leg draped across him.

  The voice compelled him to look toward the archway of Taryn's den. There, a stone-faced Karok watched, leaving when tears slipped from the corners of Broc's eyes.

  Gawd help me, Broc silently wept. Wha' have I done?

  Chapter 13

  The night teemed with disquieting impressions. Lachlan stared at the hill in the distance, his mind formulating the layout of the Callanish Standing Stones. Although he was but a boy when he'd last seen them, the image was stark clear, defying his fervent wish to banish them. The knowing continued to set off his internal alarms. When he'd snuck out of the MacLachlan home so long ago, to romp among the ancient towering markers, neither the site nor the eerie soundless night had frightened him. If anything, he'd known peace there. Known a sense of belonging that, to this day, he didn't understand.

  He didn't sense peace now.

  And he definitely didn't belong.

  Waves of air laden with indecipherable murmurings crashed against his eardrums and deafened him to all else. A bitter taste coated his tongue and a burning sensation pinched the lining of his nostrils. An obstruction had formed in his throat, pulsating in cadence with his erratic heartbeat. The queasiness in his stomach intensified.

  Fear.

  He had never experienced it quite to this degree.

  "Lannie?"

  Roan's voice was but a distant, surrealistic sibilation. A firm grip on his arm shook Lachlan. His fear held fast.

  "Lannie!"

  Roan's harsh whisper, spoken close to his ear, wrenched Lachlan from the spell. Filling his air-starved lungs to capacity, he sagged against the rock and mortar wall of the Astory Inn. A cool breeze stirred against his sweat-coated skin. Shivering, he dully stared into Roan's concern-darkened eyes, and slowly released a shuddering breath to appease the ache in his lungs.

  "Damn me, mon, wha's wrong wi' you?"

  "Canna you feel it?" Lachlan asked, his voice a hoarse whisper.

  "Feel wha'?"

  Lachlan stared beyond Roan, his blurring gaze unable to see the hill clearly now. "There's somethin' here."

  With a grimace, Roan glanced back at the site. "Aye. Ma bones are colder than the bloody air."

  "Roan..." Lachlan gulped back the psychological mass in his throat. "...I-I canna do this."

  Roan jerked with a start, his expression questioning the motive behind Lachlan's strained words. "I've never known yo
u to squirmy at an unknown. Lannie, get hold o' yerself."

  "I shouldna be here."

  "Listen to me, you old corbie," Roan snarled low. "Wha'ever is happenin' to you, you canna give in to it! Reith is in danger, aye?"

  "Aye," Lachlan murmured sickly, and closed his eyes.

  "You would never let the lad come to harm."

  Lachlan shook his head. He pressed a hand to his abdomen in a futile attempt to alleviate the churning in his stomach. "Tis na canny," he said, and drew a thready breath. "I feel like somethin's watchin' me, Roan."

  "Some...thing?" Again, Roan grimaced. "Weel, pull yerself togither. We need to find Reith before his wee heart becomes departed from his wee chest."

  "Thank you for tha' image," Lachlan said sourly, and straightened from the wall. He gave his head a sound shake to cast off his gloom. "Blue, wha' do you make o'—"

  Lachlan lifted a hand to his right shoulder. Where the Faerie queen had perched earlier, was devoid of her presence. "Blue?" he barked in a whisper.

  "She's gone?"

  Probing the other shoulder and his nape, Lachlan nodded. "I dinna know when she left."

  Roan stared bleakly at the side of the inn. "Damn me," he breathed. "She's gone efter Reith."

  "Sweet Jesus," Lachlan said through clenched teeth, and dashed toward the inn, Roan close at his heel.

  The unlocked front door burst open. Undaunted by the interior darkness, Lachlan led Roan to a staircase and ascended with reckless speed. On the second floor conflicting impressions cross-lanced his mind. Although determined to reach Blue and Reith and knowing they were in the basement, he couldn't resist an undeniable force that pulled him to a door midway down a long hall. A twist of the knob told him it was locked. Without hesitation, he stepped back, bumping into Roan, lifted a booted foot, and slammed it against the paneled barrier. The shriek of wood splintering echoed with eerie abandon.

  Lachlan entered the darkness beyond the threshold, panting, his brain afire, his blood now liquid fire pumping through his veins.

  Behind him, Roan groped for a switch. Finding it, he engaged a fixture on the right side of the door. Before his eyes could adjust, Lachlan bit out, "Taryn was here," and ran into the hall.