She was really here again.
Kira Never-Give-Up Bedwell, finally returned to the Trotternish Peninsula on the Isle of Skye.
Castle Wrath was no longer her dearest longing, distant and intangible, but a reality. Better yet, she was already halfway across the high, three-sided promontory that held the ancient stronghold’s ruins. A trek she was finding much easier than years before, since this afternoon was calm and bright, without the fierce wind gusts that had made her last visit so treacherous.
The sheep pats were still everywhere. A distinct quiver of ick slid through her, but she ignored it. She’d just watch her step and pretend the piles of black goop weren’t quite so prevalent.
Not that she really cared.
She blew out a breath that fluffed her bangs and shot a sideways glance at the nearest such obstacle. Fact was, she’d march right through the stuff if need be.
If doing so meant catching another true glimpse of her Highlander.
Savoring the possibility, she inched as close to the edge of the cliff as she dared and peered down at Wrath Bay. Its waters glistened blue in the autumn sunshine, the deep scorings in the smooth flat rocks of the small, crescent-shaped beach staring back at her just as she remembered.
Furrows that, according to Wee Hughie, tour-guide-cum-author, were caused by the keels of countless Clan Donald galleys being drawn onto the shore.
War galleys, she was sure.
Greyhounds of the Sea. Their heyday marked by grooves that must’ve taken centuries to form. Deep indentations in stone that might not even have been visible in her Aidan’s time.
But they were there now, tell-tale remnants of long-ago days.
Kira’s pulse quickened. Much as the past beguiled her, there was only one part of it she ached to seize.
If only she could.
Her heart pounding, she edged even closer to the precipice, a sheer and dizzying drop to the stony beach below. She squinted to see better, her gaze focused on the tide as it surged up and over the rocks and kelp. Brilliant sunlight glinted off the incoming swells, making the water glitter like jewels. But it was the ancient keel marks that continued to hold her attention. Each centuries-old groove was a not-to-be denied reminder that Aidan once walked there.
He’d been a part of this place where she now stood. The knowledge made her want to pull the clip from her hair, throw off her jacket, and run the rest of the way.
Fly across the grass until she reached Castle Wrath’s tumbled walls and moss-grown arches, then collapse before the remains of his stairwell. The dark, downward-winding stair that led, she was sure, straight into Aidan’s great hall.
There, where, for a brief, torch-lit moment, she’d seen him.
Heard him speaking to her as he ascended the tight, corkscrew steps. She shivered, remembering how he’d reached for her, pulling her against him and lowering his head to kiss her only to vanish before her eyes.
A feat he could impossibly do again, she saw, reaching the place where she’d looked into his stairwell.
The steps were gone.
The inky darkness that had stared back at her only to suddenly blaze with torchlight was no more. Even the gap had vanished, leaving only a narrow crevice in its place. No longer yawning, it taunted her. A mere slit in the grassy, nettle-covered earth, the whole of it barely a foot wide and hardly adequate to peer into.
She gaped all the same, shaking her head at the pathetic little opening.
She put a hand over her mouth, disbelief slamming into her, freezing her heart. She’d been so certain, so sure nothing would have changed. Not after the stairs must’ve stood undisturbed for hundreds of years.
Only the briskness of the cold, clean Highland air remained the same. The incredible age of Castle Wrath’s broken stones, and the roar of the surf crashing into its jagged, impervious cliff-foot.
“Oh, no.” Kira dropped to her knees, sagging against what should have been the threshold to Aidan’s world.
Instead, fallen debris and rubble filled the darkness. Lichen-and-weed-grown rocks blocked the ancient steps, each cold, silent stone and layer of rich, peaty earth, creating an impassable barrier.
The way to Aidan’s great hall - to him - was sealed.
Closed off for all eternity.
Unless she possessed enough spirit to brave the cliff’s maze of underground tunnels, stairwells, and rooms, much of which were said to be crumbling into the sea.
Dangerous places where one false step could send her hurtling to certain death.
She blew out a breath, frustration warring with her refusal to give up.
She did have spirit.
And she thrived on challenges. Each broadsiding kick in the shins only making her roll her sleeves higher, more determined than ever to besiege whom or whatever would hold her down. As if to prove it, she swiped a hand through her hair and kissed her palms for luck. Then, reaching deep into the crevice, she grabbed the first chunk of weedy, nettle-stinging rock she could grip.
Unfortunately, when she pulled, the rock didn’t budge.
A second and third effort cost her two fingernails. Not that she cared. What mattered wasn’t the attractiveness of her hands, but getting into Aidan’s great hall. If the stairwell of their previous encounter was to remain off-limits, she’d just have to find another way to reach him.
Beyond the wisps of a mere ghostly encounter, she’d felt him here so strongly on her last visit, as if he truly was flesh and bone and raw masculinity. As if he’d been waiting for her, just as she hoped he was now.
If only her gift, the magic of the place, or whatever, would kick in again and let him know she was near.
But first she needed to rest.
Shake off a bit more jetlag and gather her strength for the assault it would mean, creeping down into damp, dank-smelling passages. Icky places where she would be able to see no more than a few feet ahead of her flashlight.
She was glad she had one. Bright blue, plastic and beautiful, it rested in her trusty backpack, along with two sets of extra batteries.
Thanks to Alex and Mara Douglas.
She also had the perfect place to rest. The great grass-grown arch of what she was sure had once been the entry into Castle Wrath’s bailey. It, at least, was still there as she remembered, the top half of its imposing bulk rising up out of the cliff-top to wink at her in all its Celtic rune-incised glory. A medieval wonder, undisturbed by time, the arch looked as inviting now as it had twelve years ago.
Strangely beckoning.
Kira frowned. Regrettably, the tangle of brambles and nettles surrounding the arch didn’t beckon at all. Unlike the caved-in entrance to Aidan’s stairwell, the crevices and holes scattered throughout the castle’s empty courtyard appeared anything but filled-in.
Just the opposite, they looked deep, dark, and dangerous. She wasn’t about to search for one with an intact stair until her eyes no longer felt like sandpaper. She would fortify herself with a tuna sandwich and a thermos of tea.
Tea solved everything, the Brits always claimed.
Hoping it was so, she started forward, carefully avoiding the worst of the brambles and nettles, but especially watching where she stepped. She had no desire to get better acquainted with one of those black-staring holes-in-the-ground until she was good and ready.
Sadly, when she reached the arch and managed to scramble on top of it, Castle Wrath’s finest feature proved to have a few cracks of its own. Some looked rather crumbly around the edges while others had a fern or two thrusting up from their depths. Thankfully, none looked wide enough for her to fall through.
Almost tired enough not to care if she did, she quickly claimed the most solid-looking spot the arch-top offered, pleased because her chosen picnic site also seemed to have the thickest, most cushiony grass.
Soft, cushiony grass was good.
A crackless resting place even better.
Proud that she’d made it to the arch without mishap, she shrugged off her backpack and pulled it onto her lap, eager to dig out her treasures. A tightly rolled tartan picnic rug, waterproof on one side and just one of several souvenirs picked up at One Cairn Village. Her tea thermos and packed lunch. Her father’s borrowed mini-binoculars and her two special books.
The Hebridean Clans and Wee Hughie MacSporran’s Rivers of Stone: A Highlander’s Ancestral Journey.
Thinking of the tour guide - no, author, she corrected herself - reminded her of the other treasure in her backpack. The most special one of all. A fine MacDonald dress sporran she’d plucked off the wall display in Innes’s soap-and-candle craft and workshop.
Now hers to cherish, the sporran would be altered into a handbag when she returned to Aldan.
Not wanting to think about her return journey, she unrolled her tartan picnic rug and spread out her goodies. She’d enjoy her afternoon despite her disappointment over the collapsed stairwell.
Filling her stomach and taking time for a soul-soothing glance through her books would do her good. Then she’d be ready to search for access into Castle Wrath’s heart.
Or rather she’d be ready if the words on the page stopped blurring before her eyes. The book, Wee Hughie’s little self-published tome, also felt heavier than it should. In fact, it slipped right from her fingers, bouncing off her knee to disappear into the nearest crack in the arch-top.
“Oh, sheesh!” Too late, she lunged for it, a sudden wave of dizziness making her clumsy.
The book was gone, and it was her fault for being such a butterfingers.
Frowning, she sat back and rubbed a hand over her face.
What she needed was some of that tea.
Cure-all of the British Isles.
Good old Earl Grey would give her a boost.
If only she could remember where she’d placed her thermos and packed lunch. Her mind felt fuzzy and the picnic supplies were nowhere to be seen, the smooth stone surface of the arch-top pitifully bare.
Worse, the afternoon had darkened, seeming more like evening than afternoon. Chill wind whistled past her ears, the keening making it hard to think. Not that she’d be able to concentrate even if the day had remained as clear and still as it’d been. Not with all the shouting and dog barking going on around her.
Loud shouting and dog barking.
Even if she couldn’t see anyone or their frenzied canines, the noise was deafening enough for her to jam her fingers in her ears and wriggle them. Something she did with great gusto, until she noticed that Wee Hughie’s tome and her trusty tea thermos weren’t the only things missing.
Her world was missing.
Beginning with her tartan picnic rug and ending with her father’s much-prized mini-binoculars. Most alarming of all, the thick carpet of grass covering the arch-top had vanished, replaced by smooth, polished stone. The whole sweeping lot of it not showing a single weedy crack. And, surprise-surprise, the arch now raged much higher than before.
She stared down at the cobbles. Yep, her perch was definitely up there.
She swallowed, chills beginning to streak up and down her spine.
If the well-swept paving stones were an illusion, the arch’s height wasn’t.
Never in a million years could she have climbed such a towering monstrosity.
Leaping down was unthinkable.
If she could even tear her gaze off Castle Wrath’s bailey and curtain walls long enough to consider the risk. Castle Wrath’s teeming, bustling bailey and its mighty, notably un-tumbled walls.
Thick, crenellated walls of medieval mastery. Massive, whitewashed, and impregnable-looking, they soared proudly into the moody Highland sky, every magnificent foot of them daring her to challenge their existence.
Kira wasn’t about to do so.
After all, she decided, clutching her jacket closer against the wind, there wasn’t a need. Her wits had finally returned, and with them, her heart slowed a pace. She was seeing Castle Wrath as it’d once been. She looked about the bailey, noting its splendor, how blazing torches made the walls glow as if hewn of gold. Awe swept her and she pressed a hand to her breast, ready to appreciate the moment for what it was: another fleeting time-slip.
A tantalizing glimpse into the past, visible for the space of a blink and then forever gone.
Just as she’d seen flashes of Norsemen landing in America. Or, more recently, at One Cairn Village, when she’d caught a look at Ravenscraig’s onetime English lord.
She recognized the moment for what it was because her gift always let her see time slip images as real and solid. Only true ghosts and spirits appeared somewhat translucent.
But this time the image was lasting longer.
Much longer.
She shifted, the fine hairs on the back of her neck beginning to rise.
Never had she enjoyed such a lengthy viewing of the long-ago. A medieval curtain-walled bailey no longer teeming with mere chickens, goats, and scurrying washerwomen, but now also filled with out-for-blood ferocious-looking dogs. Leaping, barking beasts larger than some ponies she’d seen at state fairs back home. Equally over-sized and nearly as shaggy were the wild-eyed gesticulating clansmen who appeared in the same moment as the dogs, the whole unruly lot of them looming up out of nowhere.
One instant there’d been only barking and shouts. The next, the barkers and shouters were there, bold as life, and wanting her.
At least that’s the impression they gave her.
Kira’s heart began to race again. Something was seriously not right. She blinked several times, but the men and the dogs remained.
Garrulous, frowning, and garbed in rough tartan clothing, the clansmen poured out of the wooden buildings lining the curtain walls or stormed from the keep, a flood of plaid-hung outrage bursting from a torch-lit door she recognized as the one leading into Aidan’s hall.
Her breath caught on recognizing it, but she had no time to digest the meaning of the stairwell’s intact appearance. On and on the men came, hollering as they ran at her across the bailey, some wielding swords, others shaking fists. Some held torches, brandishing them like weapons.
They all stared.
Looking furious, they crowded beneath the arch, gaping up at her as if she were some two-headed monster.
“A faery!” one cried, pointing with his dirk.
“Nae, a witch!” another corrected, glowering at the other. “I’d ken the like anywhere.”
Kira stared back at them, too startled to move. Never had one of her past-glimpses felt so real.
Or as threatening.
She could hear the crackling of their hand-held torches. The flames leapt, casting red stains across the cobbles and curtain walls. Smoke blew on the wind, smelling hot, acrid, and real.
Kira shuddered.
This wasn’t how she’d envisioned her return to Aidan’s world. She’d hoped to sneak into the shell of his ruined great hall and catch a glimpse of him sitting there. See him lairding it at his high table, all sexy and magnificent. Perhaps even catching his eye and exchanging glances before the image faded.
Maybe even share one brief real-time kiss.
Facing a pack of raving, wild-looking Highlandmen who thought she was a witch wasn’t her idea of bliss.
Especially when a great, bearlike man with a mane of thick black hair and an even bushier black beard shouldered his way through the throng. He stopped at the base of the arch where he stretched his arms above his head, loudly cracking his knuckles.
“Come!” he roared at his kinsmen. “If she’s a witch, the laird will be wanting us to seize her. I’ll hoist any souls brave enough onto the arch to get her.”
“O-o-oh, no, you won’t,” Kira disagreed, scooting away from the arch’s edge. She pushed quickly to her feet, knowing from experience that the sudden movement would break the spell, plunging Castle Wrath into splendid ruin and sending its long-ago occupants back into their own day.
To her surprise, nothing happened.
The image, and the angry men, remained. Behind them, above the curtain walls, she saw the clouds part briefly to reveal the rising moon. It’d been daylight when she reached the ruin, now it was clearly gloaming.
And the men below the arch were as flesh-and-blood as her.
“You aren’t really there,” she said anyway, looking down at them. She shook her head against the cold knot forming in her belly. “Any moment you’ll be gone, and so will I!”
But icy wind kept whipping past her, the bailey dogs continued to bark, smoke from the torches burned her eyes, and the Bear was readying himself to hurl the first sword-swinging Highlander onto the arch.
“No swords, you lackwit!” He snatched the other man’s blade and sent it scuttling across the cobbles, instantly endearing himself to Kira.
Until he swung the other man high into the air, informing him, “If there’s any head-lopping to be done, I’ll do it myself. Seeing as I’m the laird’s own ax-man.”
“The laird won’t want a hair on the maid’s head harmed, whoe’er or whate’er she is.”
Kira froze, looking on as he cut a path through the crowd.
It was Aidan. Every inch of him just as bold and glorious as she knew him. Even if his eyes currently blazed with anger, not passion. Fury directed at his men, not her.
He was beautiful in a rage.
Her heart flip-flopping, Kira released the breath she’d been holding. She looked on, watching as he scorched the gathered men with a glare, then upbraided them.
“Your chief will have the tender parts cut off any man who’d dare lift a hand against a woman, any woman,” he warned, throwing back his plaid to reveal the wicked-looking long sword beneath. “As would I.”
His chief? Kira’s jaw slipped. She would’ve sworn Aidan was laird. The history books said so, too.
“Ach, Tavish,” the Bear argued, solving the riddle.
Looking disgusted, the big man set down the warrior he’d been about to hurl onto the arch. “Where are your eyes? That be no woman up there. She’s a witch, plain as day. Have a good look at her.”
And he did. This Tavish who looked so much like Aidan that her heart was still galloping madly. He let his plaid fall back into place and tilted his head, staring up at her with Aidan’s own dark eyes.
Intelligent, measuring eyes, she noted with relief.
“I can see she is dressed oddly.” His gaze swept her from head to toe and back again. “She’s also passing fair and nothing like any witch I’ve e’er had the discomfort to meet.”
“Bah!” Her would-be captor snatched up his fallen sword, resheathing it with a scowl. “The laird’s gone off women, as well you know. He won’t care how bonnie the wench is. Witch, or no’.”
“He’ll care that no woman is mistreated on MacDonald soil.” The man called Tavish planted his hands on his hips and glared round again, raking the others with a cold stare until, one by one, they backed away.
“Be warned, my friends,” he added, “if you value your bollocks.”
Then, in a whirring blur of plaid and steel, he vaulted onto the arch, landing on his feet in front of Kira before she could even cry out.
“Have no fear,” he said, narrowing his eyes at her all the same. “I mean only to see you to my liege. He’ll decide your fate, though it willnae be beneath an ax-man’s blade. That I can promise you, whoe’er you are.”
“I’m Kira.” She looked at him, his resemblance to Aidan unsettling her, making her knees tremble. “Kira Bedwell of Aldan, Pennsylvania.”
His brow furrowed. “Pen-where?”
“It’s a long way from here.” She tried to smile, but the way he was studying her made it impossible. “A distant place. You won’t know it.”
“It matters not, Kee-rah.” He reached to finger one of the buttons on her jacket. “Though it wouldn’t be wise to let the others see you as closely as I have.” He whipped off his plaid and swirled it over her shoulders. “This will shield you from the worst of their stares. I shall tell them you were shivering with cold.”
“They’ve already seen me.”
His lips quirked. “What men think they see can be corrected.” He winked and patted his sword hilt. “Pay no heed to those blunder-heads below.”
“And your chieftain?” Kira wrapped the plaid around her. It smelled of man and woodsmoke. “I can’t imagine he’d be easily persuaded.”
“Aidan is a fair and reasonable man.” He glanced toward the keep, then back at her. “Crazed as it sounds, I suspect he might even be expecting you.”
Aidan.
The breath froze in Kira’s throat.
She said nothing, her tongue too thick for words.
Her champion shrugged, his gaze dipping to her feet and the hill-walking boots she’d bought before leaving on her trip. “Och, aye,” he drawled, “I’d wager my soul you won’t be a surprise.”
Kira took a deep breath. “Why not?”
“Would that I could explain. ‘Tis a feeling I have here.” Looking slightly sheepish, he pressed a hand to his heart.
Kira bit her lip, her own heart pounding so wildly, she wondered he didn’t hear it.
Showing no signs of doing so, he stepped closer, his expression unreadable.
“Come now, let me get you down from here before you do catch a chill.” He reached for her, sweeping her into his arms. “Aidan’s in the great hall, holding council, though I doubt he’ll mind the disruption,” he added, hefting her over his shoulder as he made to jump from the arch.
But not before Kira caught a quick glimpse of Wrath Bay.
Wrath Bay, the incoming tide, and the little crescent-shaped beach.
A picturesque, moonlit cove now crowded with scores of moored, medieval-looking galleys.
Nary a keel mark to be seen.
Aidan slammed down his ale cup, well pleased with the decisions of his war council. “‘Tis settled, then.” He lifted his voice so it was heard not just at the high table and on the dais, but throughout Castle Wrath’s hall. “Conan Dearg’s time has come to pass. We ride for Ardcraig on the morrow. At first light and not a heartbeat later.”
“Aye, let the bastard’s days of bluster and swagger be ended!” someone yelled from the shadows.
“To his capture!” Another grabbed an ale jug, waving it in the air before taking a great swig. “May Wrath’s dungeon give him a foretaste of hell!”
Cheers rose to the rafters, the hall resounding with agreement as men stamped their feet and rattled swords. Aidan looked on, scarce hearing them. Only his own voice echoing in his ears. Unable to rid himself of it, he pinned a furious stare on the platter of spiced salmon set before him and did his best to fight back a grimace.
A groan, too, were he honest.
Not a heartbeat later.
He’d made a poor word choice. A thoughtless mistake that only reminded him that his heart still thundered with thoughts of her. Certainty that she was near pounded through him, despite the impossibility of such a notion. He felt her all the same. Even now when he could so easily swipe an arm across the table, sending feasting goods and ale hurtling to the floor.
At least the dogs would thank him.
And still she’d haunt him.
He scowled, his temples beginning to throb. “Thor’s blood,” he growled, snatching his ale cup and downing the frothy brew before such mooning got the better of him.
Now was not the time to dwell on her.
Now was-
The time for his world to upend. Spin around him, stealing his breath. The ale cup slid from his hand, landing on the table with a loud clack and spill of gold-tinged foam. Eyes wide, he shot to his feet. Uproar filled the hall, a ruckus unfolding near the shadowed entry. Scores of kinsmen shoved through the door, loud and boisterous. Murder on their faces. His best friend, cousin, what-have-you, led the fray, his dream lass clutched in his arms.
“By the gods,” Aidan bellowed, staring. “What goes on here?”
“A witch!” Mundy, his Irish-born ax-man raised his voice above the din. “We caught her dancing nekkid on the gatehouse arch, a horde o’ winged demons flying round her head.”
Hoots and guffaws accompanied Mundy’s outburst, one man slapping him hard on the back before leaping onto a trestle bench.
The trestle leaper’s mirth vanishing, he peered round, his eyes glinting in the torchlight. “That flame-haired vixen wasn’t nekkid and if Mundy saw flying demons, I saw none.” He raised an arm to point at the lass. “She is garbed like no maid I’ve e’er seen and Tavish is the only soul I ken able to vault to such heights. Seeing as she doesn’t have wings, there’s only one thing she can be – just what Mundy says. A witch!”
“She is none the like.” Tavish’s face darkened as he mounted the dais steps, Aidan’s beauty still cradled protectively in his arms. “Ne’er have I carried a more womanly female,” he vowed, setting her on her feet in front of the high table.
“I daresay you’ll agree,” he added, his gaze seeking Aidan’s.
“Without doubt!” Still staring, Aidan tamped down the urge to challenge his friend to a round in the lists for daring to touch his woman.
A thought that brought an immediate jab of guilt when he caught a closer look at his kinsmen’s faces. Murder wasn’t the only emotion painted on the fierce and bearded countenances he loved so well. Ranging from suspicion, to fear, to blood-lust, their expressions made it clear he owed Tavish much for coming to his tamhasg’s rescue.
“Where did you find her?” He glared at him all the same, the blood roaring in his ears making it hard to think. “How did she get here?”
“I don’t know how I got here.” His tamhasg answered, brushing at the plaid slung loosely about her shoulders. “Not exactly. I-”
“She spelled herself here!” someone yelled.
Others chimed in, those standing near making the sign against evil as they edged away from her.
“Cease!” Aidan slammed his fist on the table, jarring cutlery and tipping over wine goblets. “I’ll no’ have you babbling like women!” he roared, his fury squelching the foul-tempered rumbles.
For good measure, he put back his shoulders and looked round, letting his stare act as a further warning. Fear was something he couldn’t condone within his walls. A MacDonald feared nothing. Even if his men seemed to have momentarily forgotten. He folded his arms, watching them. It also appeared to have slipped their minds that he didn’t tolerate injustice. Another trait he expected all MacDonalds to adhere to.
Most especially when in regard to females.
He drew a deep breath, schooling his features. He knew better than any present that the woman was no witch.
Not that he meant to share how he knew.
She was something he couldn’t fathom. But all that mattered was that she stood before him. Scarce able to believe it, he came around the high table and put a hand on her arm. That one touch – her physical nearness – shot jolts of white-hot flame all through him.
Fighting the urge to clutch her to him, he drew himself to his fullest height, feigning a look of fierceness lest his superstitious kinsmen doubt his ability to deal with a woman they held for a witch.
There would be time enough to win them over to her. If she wasn’t an illusion.
Hoping she wasn’t, he raised her arm and raked the hall with all the lairdly sternness he had in him. “I can feel this woman’s warmth through her clothes. Even” – he jerked a glance at Tavish – “the thickness of Tavish’s plaid. All ken witches have blood of ice. If she’s of the fae, or merely a troubled woman here to find succor, it will be to me to decide. No one else shall touch her or even glance askance at her. I forbid it.”
Displeased grumbles answered him. A sea of shifting, edgy manhood, all with doubting, belligerent faces. Only a few looked down, swatting at sleeves and hitching sword belts.
“Come, Aidan.” A gap-toothed man stepped forward, clearly speaking for them all. “You ken the damage a witch can wreak. Only last year, Widow MacRae’s best cow started giving soured milk after the old woman granted a night’s shelter to a witch. The same creature caused the widow’s daughter to lose her bairn. And-”
“Nonsense!” Aidan cut him off, silencing the rest with another cold stare. “I’ll have no such foolery spoken in my hall. The lass is no witch and it will go poorly for the man who dares say so again. Mark it and be wary.”
Beside him, his tamhasg drew in a breath. “Of course, I’m not a witch.” She glanced out over the smoke-hazed hall, looked quickly back at him. “I’m not a faery either, just an ordinary red-blooded woman.”
Aidan didn’t like her worried frown, wished he could reassure her. Regrettably, he wasn’t even sure what’d she’d said. He couldn’t be certain because the scent of her was clouding his wits. The closeness and warmth of her sweet, lush body was making him crazy.
“Who are you?” He turned to her, tamped down the urge to lean in and breathe more deeply of her perfume. The fragrance teased his senses, more beguiling than any scent he’d ever known. “I would know your name at last,” he added, the words so low he wasn’t even sure he’d said them.
Her eyes widened, the slight tremble of her lips telling him he had. “I’m Kira.” She met his gaze, saying her name for the second time that evening. “Kira Bedwell.”
“Kee-rah Bedwell.” He pronounced the name as her champion had done, only with an even richer, sexier burr. “It is an apt name.”
Kira blinked, not certain she’d heard a slight emphasis on the last words.
His scowl told her she’d imagined it.
Not that it mattered.
With a voice like that he could set a woman into ecstasy just reading the back of a cereal box. He’d sounded sexy in her dreams. In person, he undid her. Six foot four inches of pure, wild and savage Highland masculinity was almost more than she could take. Especially when those inches were put together so well. His tall, muscle-ripped frame made all the more irresistible by the thick, silky-black hair just brushing his shoulders and his dark, smoldering gaze.
“Lass.” He looked at her, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly. “I’ll ask you again. How did you get here?”
“It was a time slip.” She lowered her voice, not wanting his men to hear. “One that expanded, or….” She let the words tail off, slid another glance at his men. When she looked back at him, he’d stepped closer. So near that her pulse leapt. “Let’s just say I’ve come a long way,” she blurted, too awe-struck to manage anything better. “From Aldan, Pennsylvania.”
And I think I am going to faint.
Her heart had surely stopped. And with it, her ability to breathe. She stared up at him, everything in her world slamming to a halt. Nothing existed except the man before her. His gaze held hers, commanding and possessive. He towered over her, all medieval male and gorgeous, the heat in his eyes melting her.
She blinked, swallowing against the fluttering in her stomach. The bite of so much smoke-filled air. An acrid haze that stung her eyes, while the reek of peat, overly-spiced food, dogs, and ale made her nose twitch. She stood frozen, taking it all in, her ears ringing with the grumbles of angry, tartan-draped men. Harried, scrambling servants rushed past, their faces averted. The general, noisy chaos like nothing she could have imagined. It all whirled around her in a great, dizzying cacophony. The wild, torch-lit, colorful place she’d dreamt of so long.
Diminished to nothing when compared with the wonder of his hand on her arm.
“See that no one disturbs us.” He spoke again, his voice smooth, deep, and flowing right through her.
Even if his words were directed at the man called Tavish rather than her. “Settle the hall – even if you must draw blood.”
Tavish nodded.
Aidan turned away and started forward, pulling her along beside him. Kinsmen and dogs made room as they passed, heading for the shadowed arch of a nearby stair tower.
“I’d have words with you in my privy quarters.” He didn’t break stride as he swept her off her feet, scooping her into his arms. “Words long overdue.”
Then he was carrying her up the winding, torch-lit stair, mounting the steps two at a time. Kira slid her arms around his neck, holding fast. The truth of her situation becoming more clear the higher they climbed the tight, circular stair.
A very new-looking stair, lit by stinking, sputtering rush lights and whatever pale moonlight fell through the narrow, deep-set arrow slits.
This was for real.
She was no longer dreaming about the ancient past – she was in it.
And judging by Aidan’s frown, he was anything but pleased to see her there.