She moaned into his mouth, as if hearing his unspoken thoughts.
The last thread of his control snapped. He grabbed a fistful of fabric and pulled, then another and another until he reached the hems, until his palm encountered the soft, warm flesh of her leg.
Need burned through his blood, a need to spread her, to touch her. To enter her.
But as his hand began its slide toward her heat, she froze.
Nay. Not now. Not now.
He yanked back his hand, but it was too late. His body tensed for a primal battle, but when she tried to push away, he forced himself to let her go.
“Always the seducer, aren’t you?” The words should have sounded shrewish, but her voice was too breathless. Her tone almost sad. Over and over, she’d assured him she was no virgin, yet she acted like one. Exactly like one.
“Julia ...” He buried his head in his hands, willing the fire in his body to ease back to the point of bearing. “I’ll not force ye to give more than you’re willing.”
“You forced me ... to kiss you last night.”
“Aye. I’ll not do it again.” His voice sounded pained even to his own ears. And he felt that pain. Jesu, but he felt it.
“Why not?” Her voice was quiet, if unsteady, her question honest. “What changed?”
“I dinna ken.” What had changed? He’d never taken a lass against her will, but he was not averse to coaxing that will along a bit. And he knew well how to make a lass long for him to fill her.
Perhaps he was certain there would be no seducing this lass—if he pushed too hard she would bolt. But that wasn’t the entirety. If he was honest with himself, he wanted her to come to him willingly, body and mind. He wanted ... what?
More intimacy than copulating.
Which was ridiculous. What was more intimate than copulating?
Jesu, he didn’t know what he wanted. All he knew was he’d not gotten it today. And probably never would. There was nothing for it but to move on. Whether or not she was truly a virgin, her gates were closed and he wasn’t certain he had either the patience or fortitude to go through this trial again.
“Are we going to hang around here all day, or are we going to find that chalice so I can go home?” Her tone was tight, her breathing still as fast and shallow as his own. With need, yes. But he sensed something more.
Perhaps a hint of trepidation.
Talon sighed.
He poured the blood from the lamp into the dirt and wiped it off with the linen strip the lass had torn from her shift.
Julia went to stand at the mouth of the cave, hugging herself as if needing to calm her own body as much as he needed to calm his.
“It looks like rain,” she murmured. She wasn’t angry with him, he was sure of it, which only deepened his conviction that the thought of intimacy frightened her. The question was why?
Did he really want to know?
At the moment, his body still throbbing and aching, he’d prefer to think of anything else. Anything but the myriad ways this slip of a lass was wreaking havoc on his body and his life.
EIGHT
Julia stared out through the branches of the bush blocking the cave’s entrance, her arms wrapped around her middle, her hands gripping her waist as if she could force her body to settle down, to release the terrible tension that had gripped her the moment Talon’s lips had pressed against hers.
Her body still trembled, still ached, throbbing and contracting low inside. Wanting.
Yet she didn’t want him at all. Not really. Maybe she’d enjoyed his kisses. Enjoyed? Ha. Died and gone to heaven was more like it.
Maybe, for one brief moment, she’d seen something in his eyes that had made her want ... more. Something she couldn’t even explain. A warmth. A need to hold and be held. To stroke and comfort. Something so much more than sex.
But if, on some subconscious level she’d felt he was offering that, she’d realized her mistake the moment he pulled up her skirt and grabbed her thigh. Clearly his only goal had been to get between her legs. Just like every other male.
Stupid of her to think there was anything more. Yet that brief longing, and its swift demise, had left her with a feeling of such emptiness that she ached.
Why? She’d never needed touch or comfort before. That wasn’t who she was. Warmth wasn’t in her nature. So why would it matter that the brief glimpse she’d gotten of it was false?
It shouldn’t matter. She crossed her arms tighter. It didn’t matter. She was just tired of this place. Just hungry and sore and thoroughly out of her element.
And Talon was just another man. End of story.
Her stomach growled noisily.
“You’re hungry,” Talon said.
If she’d been home, in the middle of a meeting, such a sound would have mortified her. But here ... She gave a mental shrug.
“You could hear it from there, huh?”
“Aye. ’Tis likely the queen heard it from London.”
“Very funny.” She turned back to him. “You’re not hungry?”
“I am. The ring will provide.”
She walked back to where he sat wiping out the magic lamp. “You depend on that ring for everything, don’t you?”
“And why not?”
She went to sit on a large rock sticking out from the cave wall like a stool. “What if you lost it? Would you even know how to fend for yourself?”
The look he threw her was laced with annoyance. “I’ll not lose it.”
She leaned forward, resting her forearms on her knees as she laced her fingers together. “How long until the food arrives?”
“The ring feeds me when it pleases.”
“Okay.”
As he finished cleaning the lamp, he met her gaze. “I dinna ken okay. Ye’ve said it before. What does it mean?”
She had to think about that for a moment. “All right, for the most part. Sometimes I use it instead of yes. Just now, I was accepting your words. Maybe I understand would have been a more accurate way . . .” Her voice trailed off as the food appeared out of thin air.
A thick loaf of bread and a pair of large, roasted turkey legs suddenly sat in the dirt halfway between them, along with a large pitcher of some kind of liquid.
The heavenly scents of roast meat and fresh bread met her nose, making her stomach growl with need.
“Nice.” She reached for a turkey leg, barely fazed about having to brush off a bit of dirt to eat it. “Where does this stuff come from?”
“I dinna ken.” Talon reached for the other turkey leg.
Julia took a big bite, finding the roast meat juicy and perfectly cooked. Or maybe she was just hungry enough that her taste buds would have welcomed cardboard.
She was nearly done with the turkey leg when the rain started, a first-class downpour. “Now what?”
“We finish our meal, then we’ll set out.” Talon tossed his cleaned turkey bone into a corner of the cave.
“In the rain?”
He looked at her with amusement. “The hood of your cloak will keep ye warm enough. Do ye fear the rain in your time?”
“I don’t know if I fear it, but I certainly don’t walk around in it without an umbrella.”
“An um ... ?”
“Umbrella. It’s a portable ... tent ... thingie that people carry over their heads to keep them from getting wet. Even when it rains, it’s not that big of a problem. I’m rarely out in any weather all that long. I live my life almost entirely indoors.”
“Why?”
“I live in a city. A city with buildings a hundred stories tall.” Finished with her own turkey leg, she hesitated, then tossed the bone where Talon had, unable to shake the guilty feeling that she’d just littered.
She noted the ring hadn’t bothered to send along moist towelettes. Or even napkins. Seeing no other choice, she wiped her greasy fingers on the hem of her dress.
“Stories?” Talon handed her the pitcher and she lifted one side to her mouth and took a long drink, then han
ded it back to him.
“Levels. Full levels with ceilings even you could walk under with ease.”
He eyed her with disbelief. “A hundred, one on top of the next?”
“Yep. Skyscrapers, we call them, though they don’t really touch the sky.”
He broke off a thick chunk of bread and handed it to her. “How long does it take to reach the top of such a place?”
“Not long, not with elevators. An elevator is like a tiny room big enough for ten or so people to stand up in. A thick cord on a pulley lifts it. It all happens mechanically. And electrically. But that’s a story for another day.”
If they had another day. With any luck, her time here was almost over.
He eyed her with a wary curiosity. “Much has changed in the future, aye?”
“You can’t begin to imagine.”
“You can tell me about it as we ride.”
“Did the horses come back?”
“Nay, but with a wee bit of cooperation from the amethyst, we’ll get new ones.”
She shook her head at him. “See, this is what I’m talking about. What would we do if you didn’t have that ring?”
He met her gaze. “We’d walk.”
“Oh.”
They finished eating. When they were done, Talon rose, lifted his cloak off the ground and shook it out, then swirled it over his shoulders, lifting the hood over his head.
As Julia did the same, he picked up the lamp and tucked it under his arm beneath the cloak.
“You’re just going to carry it like that?”
“Have ye another suggestion?”
She made a wry twist with her mouth. “Not a one.” Nothing went with you around here unless you hand-carried it.
They walked together to the mouth of the cave. Julia stared at the rain with dismay. It wasn’t coming down as hard as she’d thought, but still, they’d be soaked in no time.
“Don’t you think we should wait until it stops?”
“Och, lassie. ‘Tis Scotland. The rain is as common as the sun. If we avoid it, we’ll ne’er reach the chalice. And I’ve vowed to deliver it in less than a fortnight. I’ve no time to wait. Particularly when I dinna ken where we are going.”
Julia groaned. “Great. Just great.” The first thing she’d be doing when she got home was checking into the nearest hospital with pneumonia.
Taking a deep, bracing breath, she followed Talon into the rain.
Talon held Julia tight against him, her legs draped over one side of the horse as he kept her from slipping off the bare-backed beast. He’d requested horses of his ring and had to wait nearly an hour, but finally a pair had ridden up, each sporting a bridle. Neither a saddle. He’d helped Julia mount, but she’d slipped off the rain-soaked beast and back into his arms, her horsemanship of last night gone as if it had never been.
She’d wanted to try again, but he wouldn’t allow it. Not when she might fall beneath the horse’s hooves and be trampled. So he’d pulled her up in front of him, and there she’d stayed, holding the lamp for him, keeping it hidden from sight beneath her robe.
The second mount trailed behind them. He’d be lying to himself if he claimed disappointment over the riding arrangements. The feel of the lass leaning back against him pleased him overmuch.
They’d traveled the morning, seeing few others in the rainy weather. Two men had passed them on the muddy track a few miles earlier. The way one of the men’s eyes had widened as he’d glanced at Julia, Talon had feared he’d glimpsed the lamp, but the pair had continued on and he’d seen no further sign of them.
Soon after, the rain had stopped. Once the horses were dry, he would pull into a secluded copse and try begging a pair of saddles from the ring. And perhaps a return of Julia’s horsemanship skills.
But not yet. His arm squeezed her against him lightly. Not yet.
The track led them over open moors, pitted and water-logged. Bright yellow tufts of gorse dotted the landscape while overhead the clouds thinned, the sun struggling to break through.
Julia’s head tipped back against his shoulder blade.
“Will ye sleep, then?” he asked softly.
“No.” She straightened, and he was sorry he’d commented. She glanced back at him. “Does it bother you when I lean on you?”
He met her partial gaze. “Nay, it pleases me. Make yerself comfortable.”
She watched him a moment more, then gifted him with one of her rare smiles and leaned back against him. “Do you think the rain’s through with us?”
“Och, ’tis an impossible thing to know. The rain comes and goes.” He brushed the top of her head with his chin. “If you’re not in need of sleep, tell me the one thing that has changed the most in the future, lass. What will surprise me most?”
“Ha. One thing?” She looked back at him with a saucy green eye. “I’m not sure I can narrow it to one. How about the fact that the first thing I’ll do when I get back is call my boss in New York ... in the American colonies ... and talk to him as clearly as you and I are talking now. Then I’ll fly home inside the belly of a huge metal bird and arrive home the same day I leave Scotland.”
He stared at her, then shook his head. “You’re telling tales.”
“Not at all. And that’s just the beginning. The Industrial Revolution started a hundred and fifty, maybe two hundred years ago, leading to new technologies that have grown at an exponential rate ever since. For the parts of the world that have embraced technology, life has changed irrevocably.”
Technology? Her words made little impact, since he had no conception of the things of which she spoke. Flying in the belly of a bird? Clearly, the vision her words put in his head was not what she meant. Such a thing was impossible.
Yet he listened to her raptly, enchanted by the sound of her voice and the enthusiasm lacing her words. And for mile after mile, he asked her questions, listening carefully, for he soon found that the more pointed his questions, the more pleasure in her voice when she answered.
“You’ve the same deep enthusiasm for explaining as a man who once tutored me,” he told her after a time. All the children of the clan had been expected to read and write. Even the son of the clan drunk. “Have ye never wanted to tutor others? Bairns?”
She was quiet for a moment. “When I was a girl, I thought I wanted to be a ... tutor ... when I grew up. We call them teachers in my time.”
“The wish left ye?” She’d told him all about her work in finance, which seemed a strange life for a lass.
“Yes.” Her tone was colorless, unhappy, all the more apparent in contrast to the richness of her words before.
He squeezed her softly. “Why?”
She sighed, her mood palpably moving to one of reflection. And unhappiness, he thought. He frowned, sorry for it.
He felt her shrug. “Nothing happened. I just changed my mind.”
But the defensiveness in her tone told him much. And nothing at all. Something had happened to make her alter her course. An alteration, he sensed, that had been a mistake. A simple change of mind, or something more? He wondered.
The more he got to know her, the more curious he became about her. When was the last time he’d probed a woman for her thoughts or her life’s history? When was the last time he’d cared enough to ask?
Without a doubt, this lass was more interesting than any he’d known, her history far, far in the future. That was all it was, he told himself. Simple curiosity. A natural desire to understand her strange world.
Little to do with the woman herself.
But his arm tightened a fraction more around her middle, his chin brushing the soft, silken crown of her head. Deep inside, a part of him began to wish she wouldn’t leave him.
Talon judged the sun to be just past its zenith when he led them through a copse and down to a stream hidden from the road. Clouds still blanketed the sky, but the rain showed no signs of resuming, for which he gave thanks.
“What are we doing?” Julia asked, straightening and st
retching.
“’Tis time we rested this poor beast and requested saddles, I’m thinking. Are ye hungry?”
“Not really. I’m thirsty, but I see the water fountain.”
Water fountain? “Ye mean the burn?”
She threw him a small smile, which he was near certain meant she’d been jesting. He smiled in return. It mattered little that he couldn’t share the jest. Her smile was gift enough.
He swung off the beast’s back, then grabbed Julia around her slender waist and lifted her down, resisting the urge to pull her into his arms and kiss her again as he had in the cave. At the thought of it, of pulling her into his arms and sliding his tongue between those beckoning lips, his body tightened all over again.
But she’d not welcome his kiss again so soon, he was certain of it. Not when he’d frightened her.
The thought gave him pause. Is that what he’d done? Frightened her?
His conviction remained that she was as skittish as a virgin. And it was high time he treated her as such. Even if it killed him.
Which it well might.
He released her the moment her feet touched the ground, while his good intentions still held firm. As she turned away and attempted to work the stiffness out of her legs, he pleaded his case for saddles from his ring, then grabbed the reins of the horses and led them down to the burn.
“Are ye ready to ride again?” he asked as she walked beside him.
“I think I lost my skill.”
“Mayhap the ring will return it.”
She gave him a look that was an odd mix of shyness and excitement. “Could you teach me to ride? For real?”
A smile broke over his face and he had to clench his hands to keep from brushing a loose wisp of golden hair from across her cheek. “Aye. Once we have saddles. If the skill doesna come back to you.”
She grinned at him, sending his heart tumbling end over end in his chest. “Okay.”
At the water’s edge, she knelt and scooped water into her hands as he knelt beside her and did the same. When they’d had enough, they rose and paced while the horses drank their fill.
“Talon, what will you do after you deliver the chalice to your client? Will you go home? To the Highlands?” Her hood was back, her golden head a beacon lighting the dreary day. Bonny, bonny lass.
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