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“NAY,” ETHYN EXCLAIMED when everyone unsheathed their blades, ready to defend him against his wolf. “She means no harm.”
“Och, Cousin, she clearly does,” Cray scoffed, his vision hazing red with his inner dragon. “She means to attack.”
Ethyn shook his head and gestured that everyone lower their weapons. “Nay, she but warns me about something.”
The moment he said it, Phelan’s hackles lowered. She backed away into the night, but not before he swore her gaze swept over everyone as if warning them as well. Of what, though? He sensed no Sassenach in the area or anything else threatening.
“I dinnae ken.” Tiernan sheathed his blade. “What is Phelan warning you about at such a time, Cousin?”
Ethyn shook his head, upset. “I wish I knew.”
“Her timing was interesting,” Madison said softly, her curious eyes on the woodland where the wolf had vanished. “Almost as if it coincided with what we were talking about. That one of our Broun friends might be an impostor.” Only then, thanks to her dragon, did she hear before she saw what had been hidden beneath the blanket Aidan had wrapped around Chloe. “What the...” Madison homed in on Chloe’s swollen belly. A reminder of just how long they’d been gone. “Oh my God, you’re pregnant!”
“I am,” Chloe exclaimed as Madison made her way off his lap and finally embraced her friends hello. They commented about how amazing Madison looked. How absolutely beautiful she was, which, in his opinion, was an understatement.
“And we’re married.” Chloe gestured between her and Julie. “Both of us!”
“Well, congratulations!” Madison smiled at Tiernan and Aidan then looked at her friends again, her voice a little off with good reason. “And all because of these Claddagh rings, I take it?”
“That’s right.” Not convinced Madison was at her best since vanishing any more than Cray was, Julie urged her to sit again. “And what we discovered thanks to our rings, of course.”
“Of course,” Madison murmured, sitting halfway between Cray and Ethyn, which frustrated him to no end. Did she have any idea how much she had frightened him vanishing like that? How upset his dragon had grown? How it struggled toward the surface, eager to break free and go find her?
While a part of him understood that was to be expected of his chivalrous nature, another part downright fumed at her for putting him through such. For doing what Maeve had when she went someplace he could not follow.
Chivalrous nature, is it? Madison thought but didn’t direct at him because she was still coming to terms with what she’d witnessed. What she had learned about him. Something he’d give anything for her not to know, but her dragon was as meddlesome as her human side it seemed.
“How can you say that?” she said into his mind, frowning at the fire rather than looking at him. “When you know that everything that just happened was out of my hands?”
Was it, he wondered? How could she be so sure?
“Of course it was,” she fumed, angry in a flash as her eyes shot to him. She tugged at the Claddagh ring, but it wouldn’t come off. “It’s this ridiculous ring at work!” When she realized she had said that aloud she looked at her friends. “I’m sorry. I only meant it about my situation, not yours.”
When Julie and Chloe glanced from Cray to Madison clearly set to defend him, he shot them a warning look that they best not. He didn’t want Madison to know what she had put him through when she’d vanished then reappeared. What he’d done to try to bring her back from her unresponsive state afterward. It was none of her concern.
Until that is, Tiernan took it upon himself to make it such.
“Och, lass,” his cousin said, no doubt having been in silent league with Aidan to make sure she knew. “If you saw the way Cray worried over you, you wouldnae curse the ring so.”
He ground his jaw and narrowed his eyes at his cousins, not happy in the least. It was one thing to intend to bed the lass, another for her to know he may or may not care about her welfare. Naturally, once Tiernan took the leap, Aidan was right behind him, winking at Cray as if they hadn’t just mended a kinship that could be broken again easily enough.
“Aye,” Aidan agreed, looking at Madison. “I dinnae think I’ve ever seen my brethren so distraught.”
“And that’s saying something,” Chloe chimed in, earning herself a scathing glance from Cray.
Then Julie, just to top it off, decided to add her opinion as well. The only one in the lot he could work with. “But then he really is going through hell with his repressed dragon right now.”
In truth, he was, so he grunted in agreement, deciding now was the time to get things back on track. More importantly, get the focus off what he had done when he thought Madison was lost to him.
“I am going through hell but ‘twill be assuaged soon enough,” he vowed. “Once Madison’s seen to her promise.”
In retrospect, he should have seen what was coming and where it might lead to. But he was so set on making sure she knew he didn’t care that he didn’t see the trap he’d laid for himself until it was too late.
“I’ll see through my promise after the kiss,” Madison snapped. “And the getting to know each other part.”
He was so caught off guard that she was back to saying she would lay with him again, he didn’t see what was coming next.
Chloe’s eyebrows shot up. “I guess you're at the get-to-know-Cray part then, Madison.”
“If, that is,” Julie mused, “she remembered the kiss.”
Baffled, Madison’s attention swung to her friends. “Remember what kiss?”
“The one that shouldnae have been given to ye without yer permission,” Ethyn grumbled, scowling at Cray.
Madison’s eyes widened in disbelief before they narrowed on Cray in sudden, mortified understanding. “When?” She stood and shook her head, her temper through the roof in an instant. “When did you do something, you had no right to do?”
“It was really more of a Sleeping Beauty moment when he—”
“When,” Madison ground out, cutting off Chloe. Her furious eyes never left his. “When I was unconscious? Passed out? Because I obviously must've been to have ended up in your arms. On your lap.”
“He was just trying to bring you back,” Julie piped up, flinching at the fierce scowl Cray shot her way.
“It’s true,” Chloe added, rambling on. “It was really sweet, actually. He—”
“Enough,” he bit out.
Not about to stick around for any more of this, he strode into the dark woodland, eager to escape. He had been a bloody fool to brush his lips across Madison's when he thought her lost to him. It was instinctual. What he’d done when Maeve had faded away, hoping she might stay a while longer. Not succumb to death. Not leave when they had only just found each other again.
“Cray,” Madison called out, clearly more riled up by the moment as she followed him someplace she should not go.
Somewhere he did not want another lass ever again.
Yet there she was right behind him, taunting him with her sweet scent, with a dragon that was far too tempting.
“Leave me be, lass,” he ground out, striding through the forest, needing to vent somehow. Craving his repressed inner beast almost as much as the woman pursuing him.
“No,” she replied, not just anger and curiosity in her voice, but compassion for him.
Pity.
“I will warn ye one last time.” He made sure she heard the threat in his voice. “Leave me be, lass.”
Anyone that knew him knew when he needed space, it was best to give it to him. Especially since his inner dragon had been repressed. It was often hard to see reason beyond anger. Then add his fluctuating magic, and it was harder than ever to contain his rage.
His fury at the past and all that had happened.
When she murmured, “I’m sorry,” he realized she had heard his thoughts.
She was once again in his mind uninvited.
Suddenly so furious, he couldn’t see straight, he spun on her only to find Phelan between the two of them with her teeth bared. When the wolf growled, he saw red and growled back.
For a split second, he swore the wolf's eyes flashed with its own inner light before it growled in warning one last time. Then it stalked into the forest rather than flee in fear like any wolf should when confronted with a dragon, repressed or not.
Nevertheless, the wolf’s warning made him realize how dangerous he had become. He’d been about to go at Madison in a way he would never have in the past. In a way, he never would with any lass.
“Go back to the others,” he said through clenched teeth. He balled his fists, trying to navigate his overwhelming emotions. “I cannae be trusted right now.”
“Obviously,” she replied with far less anger than he anticipated. Her face would have been shrouded in darkness if he didn’t have such excellent vision. “But I’m not running back to the others. I’m standing right here until you tell me why you did what you did.”
Talking about his feelings had never been his strong point and now proved no different. Avoiding the truth, however, was no longer an option. He had kissed her, and he would kiss her again.
“It seemed like the thing to do at the time.” And I thought it would bring you back. “’Twas but a peck.”
More of a light brush. A sampling that only made him want more.
“I think you did it because you knew what I was witnessing,” she murmured. “I think you knew Maeve was there. Or the brotherhood was using her. More specifically—”
Before she could say it, before she voiced the blasted words that said their monstrous enemies might have used his unborn child against him, he yanked her into his arms and closed his mouth over hers.
There was nothing romantic about the way he kissed her.
Not at all.
Determined to drive her away, he took her roughly, forcing his tongue into her mouth, making sure she couldn’t utter another word.
Only to get a result he did not expect.
