Highlander’s Curse

by Melissa Mayhue

  Her admission was a relief to hear, though he told himself it was only because he didn’t want to see her involved with a Nuadian. After all, his priority was returning to his own time and he needed her safe and healthy in order to send him home.

  “Okay, so I came clean. Now it’s your turn. Why are you really here? I assume your showing up tonight isn’t some random accident, so why did you come looking for me?”

  The serving woman’s return with their food bought him a few minutes to gather himself, but not nearly long enough now that he actually faced telling her what he needed to.

  “I need yer help.”

  Of course he did.

  Abby continued to chew the bite she’d forked into her mouth, though what had started out as truly delicious had quickly taken on the feel of just so much mush. Disappointment roiled in her stomach. What had she expected? That his one night with her had sent him scurrying across the Atlantic hunting for her? That maybe he dreamed of her every single, wretched night, just as she dreamed of him? That sort of thinking obviously would be the epitome of stupid, now, wouldn’t it?

  She flickered her gaze in his direction, darting her eyes away just as quickly when she found him staring at her.

  Stupid of her, yes, but you’d think a great-looking guy like Colin MacAlister would have more than enough experience with women to at least lead her on for a bit. Appeal to her vanity, maybe. Lull her into thinking he had a thing for her. To, at the very least, try to make her feel like he actually had some tiny bit of interest in seeing her for, well, for her. But no, he was here because he needed something from her, and he wasn’t making the slightest effort to hide the fact.

  Was it she who’d always claimed she valued honesty in a man? She might have to reconsider that particular “virtue.” A little white lie to soothe her wounded ego wouldn’t have been so awful.

  “Perfect,” she muttered before she reached for her mug and downed a deep swallow, waiting for the dark liquid to wash over her throat. If they liked her, she didn’t like them. If she liked them, they wanted something from her. “All right, fine, I’ll bite. What exactly do you want from me?” Must be a doozy of a request considering he’d gone to all the trouble to hunt her down.

  “I want to go home.”

  “Pardon me?” Home? She looked up in surprise, meeting his gaze this time. “What do you mean, you want to go home? Go. I’m not stopping you. I didn’t make you come here in the first place.”

  “But that’s exactly what you did. You and yer wishing.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” she denied, even as the warmth of guilt heated her neck and face. How could he possibly know she suffered from some massively stupid infatuation over him? That he’d haunted her dreams since the day they’d met?

  “It’s no ridiculous at all. It’s the Magic.”

  Magic? Her heart pounded so hard she thought everyone in the noisy bar must be hearing it by now. Was this his way of telling her he’d come to find her because he felt the same bizarre attraction she did?

  “So what does that mean? Magic. That you like me? Is that why you hunted me down? Because you like me?”

  He sat back in his seat, his expression what she might expect from someone who’d just discovered his dining partner had an extra foot growing out the side of her head, toes wiggling.

  “I like you well enough, lass, but that’s neither here nor there. We’ve a need to discuss why you summoned me and, more important, how yer to send me home.”

  Again with sending him home. Abby carefully placed her fork across her plate and slowly steepled her hands in front of her, struggling to find some appropriately clever and witty retort. She had nothing.

  “I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

  When Colin leaned forward, his eyes glinted with something that looked remarkably like anger. Abby fought down the urge to back away from him.

  “No? So what yer telling me is that you’ve no idea that you used the Faerie Magic to wish me here, to yer time. Seven hundred years into the future you drag me. And though I’ve no way back to my own time but to fulfill some purpose of yers that brought me here, you willna even disclose to me what that purpose is so that I might complete yer blighted task and get back to my own life. It’s no even of any consequence to you that the lives of my kinsmen depend on my returning. That’s what yer saying, is it?”

  “Seven hundred . . .” Abby paused, staring at the man sitting across from her. He was kidding, right? He had to be kidding.

  But no, there was nothing in his expression, nothing in his serious blue eyes, that said anything even close to kidding. This man believed the giant, steaming pile of BS he was spewing.

  “Okay. That’s it. Done.” She stood, catching up her handbag and slinging its strap across her chest. “Don’t bother to ask me to dinner again, okay? And you know what else? Since you ruined my meal, thank you very much, you can just pay for it. And make sure you leave Mrs. Duncan a good tip while you’re at it, too. I am out of here.”

  She didn’t bother to wait for his response, pushing her way past the men lined up at the bar. The air in here had grown too thin, the walls somehow moving in closer to one another, making her feel trapped and just a bit woozy.

  Outside, breathing in the clear evening air, she stopped, looking first toward the bed-and-breakfast and then to her right, off toward the empty tree-lined road that led outside the village and beyond.

  She needed some time to think. Some time to regroup. Some time to decide whether she wanted to scream in anger or cry with disappointment.

  At the B and B she could escape to the relative privacy of her room to deal with all this, but more than likely Jonathan waited there, and of all the things she was in no mood for, he was at the top of the list.

  No, he’d just dropped to number two on the list.

  Besides, number one on the list might very well come hunting her with more of his send-me-home drivel, and if he did, the B and B would be the most logical place for him to look.

  That made the decision easy enough.

  Turning to her right, she adjusted her purse strap high up on her shoulder and headed out, her pace picking up as she approached the edge of the village limits.

  Damn it! Of all the times she’d imagined seeing Colin MacAlister again, of all the times she’d dreamed of him, not one of them had turned out even remotely like the last few minutes. Damn it all to hell!

  At what point had she made the fateful leap that had sent her hurtling into bizarro world? Instead of simply picking guys to like who didn’t like her back, now she was picking men who apparently needed heavy medication simply to function in normal society.

  Medication that Colin apparently had been skipping lately.

  For the past few months she’d allowed her imagination free rein, skipping along blindly without a protest as she’d almost convinced herself the hunky Highlander was actually The One, for no better reasons than because he’d haunted her dreams and got her totally hot just thinking about him.

  And look what she’d gotten out of indulging in that little fantasy.

  The man of her dreams, literally, was a total loon, babbling on about needing to be sent to his home seven-freaking-hundred years ago.

  “Stark raving lunatic,” she growled, walking even faster.

  She wanted to kick something. Or hit something. Or simply stomp her feet up and down while screaming at the top of her lungs.

  Worse, worse, way worse than his being a loon, was what all this meant about her. She was an idiot of gobsmacking proportions. Because, loon or not, just thinking of him, of his perfectly sculpted features, of the scent that filled her nose when he was close, of the way his hands felt on her skin, or the way his voice soothed her soul—all of it made her want nothing so much as to be with him.

  If what she experienced wasn’t crushing in a major way, she couldn’t even begin to imagine what it could be.

  Other than serious mental illness, maybe. Perhaps Co
lin MacAlister wasn’t the only one in need of medication.

  Slowing to a stop, she stared off into the distance, listening to the sound of her own racing heart.

  She’d left the outskirts of the village behind and reached an area where the road narrowed. Steep rock walls as high as her waist hemmed in both sides of the lane out here, stretching off into the distance.

  It was quiet here. Lonely. The perfect place to confront herself.

  “I am way too smart to be this stupid.”

  The affirmation, intended to bolster her confidence, echoed back at her off the rocks in a mocking parody.

  Now that she’d stopped moving, Abby realized the bottoms of her feet burned like crazy and she considered for the first time her poor choice of footwear. Flip-flops were hardly intelligent stomping-off-in-a-huff shoes and were even less practical should she need to scramble over one of these rock walls to avoid any vehicle careening down the narrow lane. Not to mention, now that she thought of it, how noisy they were, flapping against her feet when she walked.

  “And total gravel magnets,” she grumbled under her breath as she braced a hand against the rock wall to balance on one foot in order to remove the tiny, irritating pieces of gravel lodged between her feet and the soles of her shoes.

  Everything about her life at this very minute was so ridiculously stupid, from her obsession with a crazy man right up to storming down the road like she had somewhere to go. And she had no one to blame for any of it but herself.

  She might not be able to do anything about the way she felt, but she could be sensible for a change and head back to Swan House. Granted, with the sun staying up until almost ten o’clock, she’d have another hour or so before she’d have to worry about being caught out in the dark. But realistically, what could she possibly hope to accomplish from this little jaunt? Blisters, most likely, because peace of mind sure didn’t seem to be hanging out anywhere along this path.

  Switching hands, she shifted her balance and lifted her other foot, slipping off the second flip-flop to dust away the offending gravel.

  “Running away will do neither of us any good, now will it, Abby?”

  Colin’s voice, coming from mere inches behind her, sent a shock of panic resounding through her. Her breath escaped in a bizarre gagged-sounding squeal, even as her body tried to respond by twirling around to face him. The one-footed maneuver sent her pitching forward, with nothing but Colin to prevent her from landing face-first in the middle of the road.

  “What the hell’s wrong with you?” she gasped, clutching at the arms that tightened around her as she tried to regain her balance. “You scared me half to death.” She’d never heard a single noise to indicate anyone was within a mile of her, let alone right at her shoulder. “You can’t just go sneaking up on people like that.”

  “I had no need to sneak. You looked as if yer thoughts had taken you far away from this place.”

  Not far enough.

  “You know what? Leave me alone. Just turn around and walk away, okay?” Abby forced herself to push out of Colin’s arms, refusing to meet his eyes. One look there and she knew she’d be lost. “It’s been a long day and, frankly, I’m just not up to listening to any more of your seven-hundred-years-ago crap.”

  “Then we’ll no speak on it again this night. Allow me to see you safely back to the inn where yer staying.” He reached out, clasping her hand in his.

  She should say no. She should step away from him, jerk her hand from his grasp, and tell him to get lost. So many things she should do.

  Instead, her hand warmly ensconced in his, she fell into step beside him, allowing him to lead her back toward Swan House. Not a word passed between them the entire way and yet it felt entirely comfortable and natural, as if they’d done this a million times before.

  At the gate to Swan House he stopped, pulling her closer, staring down into her eyes with a gaze that sent her heart racing.

  “I’ve handled this all very badly and for that, I apologize. You asked at the pub why I came looking for you. I came because of this.” He held out his hand for her inspection, palm up.

  There, in the center of his hand, a cut, a twin to the mark on her palm, more healed, but still an identical wound.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I ken how confused you must be. I’ll come to you on the morrow when yer rested, and we’ll work it out, aye?”

  Not tomorrow, now. Explain it now.

  Her brain supplied all the proper things to say; her mouth simply refused to cooperate.

  Instead she nodded, leaning in as he dipped his mouth to cover hers. He pulled her close and she was lost, wavering somewhere between reality and the dream world where they’d shared this moment so many times before.

  “Keep yer distance from Flynn,” he whispered when he broke the kiss, his lips still so close his breath feathered over her heated face. “Dinna think to trust the man. He’s no what you believe him to be. He’s dangerous. Promise me you’ll no allow yerself to be alone with him.”

  “I don’t . . .” She paused, refusing to even think about what he’d said. His words now made no more sense than anything else he’d said all evening. At this moment, she had no desire to talk and certainly none to argue. Not with him so close she could practically taste him. “Hush.”

  As if he were an addiction, she stretched up on tiptoe and pressed her body against his, reestablishing the kiss.

  She felt as much as heard his groan against her lips, and a shiver ran down her spine, lodging low in her stomach, agitating the pool of need already growing there.

  He dropped her hand and grasped her shoulders, gently pushing away from her, a crooked smile on his lips.

  “You should go inside now. Straight to yer bed-chamber with you. And lock yer door. I’ll see you on the morrow.” He bent his head once more to kiss her forehead. “Dinna forget what I told you.”

  Abby stared after him, trying her best to rein in her stampeding emotions. What she felt when she was close to that man made no more sense than the words that came out of his mouth.

  No more sense than the knowledge that, had he not walked away, she would have led him directly up to her room.

  And not just to sleep in her bed this time.

  He thought Jonathan Flynn was dangerous?

  “You’re the dangerous one,” she whispered to the empty space where he’d been moments ago. Whether he was saying things that sounded crazy or touching her in a way that made her feel crazy, she couldn’t decide which was worse.

  Abby turned and pushed open the gate, her mind filled with the memory of Colin as he’d been that first morning, gloriously naked in her bed with nothing but a thin bedcover draped across his hard physique.

  Two steps down the walk, a prickle of unease colored the lovely image and she snapped her head up to find herself squarely in the intense scrutiny of her employer, Jonathan Flynn. Like some disapproving parent waiting for his only daughter to return from a first date, he stepped from the shadows of the ivy-covered porch, his arms crossed in front of him, an unusual frown creasing his face.

  “I was worried about you.”

  Was that accusation she heard in his voice? She walked closer, stopping at the bottom step. “You didn’t need to be.”

  “Mackenzie seemed to think you and . . .”—he nodded his head in the direction of the road—“that one had some sort of argument. She mentioned some concerns that you were upset when you left the pub and that he followed after you.”

  So what if they had? Abby gritted her teeth against the irritation she felt. What went on between her and Colin was none of Mackenzie’s business and certainly none of Jonathan’s.

  “After speaking to her,” Jonathan continued, “when you didn’t return, I quite naturally had concerns, too. I don’t like those feelings, Abigail. I don’t like having to worry over your safety.”

  Abby took in a deep, sweet breath, holding it for a second before releasing it and, hopefully, all her irritation with
it.

  No such luck.

  It didn’t matter, she told herself, stepping up onto the porch next to him. None of this mattered. No reason to let it annoy her. But it did.

  “I’m sorry about how you felt, Jonathan. Your worry wasn’t necessary. Next time, you and Mackenzie both might try remembering I’m a big girl and you’re not my parents.”

  As she stepped forward to push past him, he snagged her upper arm, drawing her up sharply, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of her arm as he pulled her to within inches of him.

  “Let me assure you, Abigail, of all the feelings I do have for you, not one of them is the least bit paternal.”

  His eyes glittered with the same barely controlled emotion she’d seen that day at the dig. An emotion Abby wasn’t sure she wanted to understand.

  The hair on her arms seemed to stand on end and it felt like a thousand tiny bugs were crawling over her skin. Her breath caught in her lungs and, for just an instant, she could have sworn Jonathan was going to kiss her, but not in a good way. Not like Colin had.

  And then the instant passed and he dropped his hand from her arm, brushing past her without another word to stalk out through the garden and into the woods beyond.

  Holy shit!

  Rubbing at the spots where Jonathan’s fingers had dug into her arm, she hurried into the house and up the stairs, not slowing until she was behind her locked door.

  Keep yer distance from Flynn. He’s dangerous.

  Colin’s cryptic warning hammered at the inside of her head as she reached a shaking hand toward her toothbrush.

  Well, if that wasn’t just the perfect ending to a perfectly bizarre evening, she didn’t know what was.

  Fourteen

  None of this was going at all as he’d planned!

  Flynn slammed his fist into a large rowan tree, jerking back in surprise as pain flared through his fingers. The dark red stain oozing from the torn skin of his knuckles served as evidence of what he should have remembered.