Often, during her mother’s illness, Lisa had found herself longing for a boyfriend, a lover: someone she could take her battered heart to and curl up with, even if only for an hour, for the illusion of security, warmth, and love. Now, half terrified, worried about her mother dying alone, she had a perverse impulse to seek shelter in the arms of the very man sworn to kill her.
Don’t try to use a Band-Aid on your heart, Lisa, Catherine would have reminded her, had she been there. Any sense of security or intimacy with him would be nothing but an illusion. She needed to keep her mind clear, not filled with romantic fancy about some medieval Highland laird who might decide to kill her tomorrow.
He dropped his hand from her hair, skimming her collarbone and curving his fingers over the lacy scallop of her bra. He studied the sheer fabric with fascination, his gaze caressing the uplifted curves of her breasts, the deeper shadow of her cleavage. “Look at me, lass,” he whispered. Lisa raised her eyes to his and wondered what he saw in them. Hesitation? Curiosity? Desire she couldn’t hide?
Whatever it was he saw in her eyes, it wasn’t a Yes, and this man was a proud one.
He traced a finger down the hollow between her breasts and the smile he gave her held a sadness she couldn’t fathom.
“I will send someone to fetch you another gown, lass,” he said. Then he left the room.
Lisa sank to the floor, clutching the gown. Dear heavens, she thought, what am I going to do?
* * *
Circenn stomped from her room, his mood worsening by the moment. His body ached from head to toe with the effort of being gentle with the lass. His face felt stiff from smiling gently; his fingers clenched and unclenched from touching the swell of her breasts gently. His body rebelled at his gracious, honorable, gentle retreat from her room, and the man within him that had been born into the world five hundred years ago roared that the woman was his, by Dagda! Gentleness be damned! In the ninth century a man had not asked—a man had taken! In the ninth century a woman had been amenable, grateful to find such a fierce protector and able provider.
Circenn laughed softly, bitterly. He’d been far too long without a woman to endure such torment. When he’d walked into the room, carrying the cloak that would have drowned her in its oversized folds, his mind had been focused solely upon covering as much of her as possible—only to find her clad in nothing but two lacy, gauzy pieces of fabric. With little bows! By Dagda, a tiny satin ribbon had perched jauntily between her breasts, and another at the front of the silky fabric that slipped between her legs. Like a gift, he thought. Untie my bows and see what I have to give you. …
He’d tried to look away. To spin on his heel and leave the room, refusing himself the pleasure of viewing her lovely body. He’d sternly reminded himself of rule number four—no physical intimacy. But it had done him no good. Rule number four seemed to have become quite friendly with rule number one—never break an oath—and was cozying up nicely to rule number two—do not lie. What a crowd they were becoming, his broken rules.
Seeing her clad in such a fashion had been worse than if he’d caught her in complete undress. Nude, his hungry eyes could have feasted upon every crevice and hollow of her body; but those pieces of fabric had been cunningly designed to torture a man with the promise of the private slopes and hollows, while granting none of them. Secrets lay beneath that fabric. Were her nipples round dusky coins or puckered coral buds? Was her hair golden and copper there, too? If he had dropped to the floor at her feet, closed his hands around her ankles, and kissed his way up her long, lovely legs, would she have moaned softly, or was she silent when she made love? Nay, he decided abruptly, Lisa Stone would sound like a lioness mating when he took her. Good. He liked that in a woman.
She’d made him feel like a hungry animal, caged by his own rules, and all the more dangerous for it. For a few moments, lust had risen so furiously that he’d feared he might drag her beneath his body, uncaring whether she wished it. Instead, he’d clenched his shaking hands behind his back, dropping the cloak to the floor and thinking of his mother, Morganna, who would have disowned him even for thinking about taking by force that which must be gifted. Never had he felt so nearly violent with desire. She had roused deep, primitive feelings in him: possessiveness, jealousy that another man might see her clad thus, a need to hear her say his name and gaze at him with approval and desire.
Circenn drew a deep breath, held it until his heart slowed, then released it. Now that he knew what was beneath her clothing—no matter what gown he made her wear—how would he be able to look at her again without seeing in his mind the endless expanse of silken skin? The gentle swells of her breasts, the tight nipples peaking the sheer gauze, the slight mound between her thighs.
Thwarted desire translated well into rage. He stomped down the stairs to the kitchen, determined to find Alesone or Floria and have one of them see to it that the lass was properly attired. Then he would send one of the Douglas brothers to teach her about their time, something he should have done himself, but he simply couldn’t trust himself near her at the moment. He would go train with his men and release some of his frustration in the pure, clean joy of swinging a heavy sword, grunting and cursing. And he would not entertain one more erotic thought for the remainder of the day.
Shaking his head, he burst into the kitchen. It took him only an instant to realize that none of his plans for the day was going to go right. In fact, the day seemed to have taken on a devilish persona, determined to mock him.
He drew to an abrupt halt, hastily averting his gaze from the sight of the rounded and flushed bare bottom gripped in Duncan Douglas’s hands.
Alesone had one long leg wrapped around Duncan’s waist, her arms twined around his neck and her skirts tossed up to her shoulders. The foot that remained on the floor was arched upon the tips of her toes, as Duncan’s hands guided her against him in a steady, intense rhythm. The low, sensual sounds of passion filled the room, soft intakes of air, husky murmurs of pleasure, and damned if Duncan wasn’t emitting a deeply satisfied sound with each thrust.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” Circenn roared, glancing at the ceiling, the walls, the floor—anywhere but at Alesone’s shapely derriere. “Duncan! Alesone! Get out of the kitchen! Take it to the rooms upstairs! You know I have rules—”
“Ah, yes, the legendary Brodie rules,” Duncan said dryly. He stopped rocking the maid against him with more leisure than Circenn appreciated. “Which include among them: When knights are in residence, no tupping in the kitchen.”
Alesone made a soft sound of protest at being interrupted.
“I eat in here!” Circenn thundered, feeling entirely too put upon.
“So does Duncan,” Alesone purred suggestively. She slid her leg down from Duncan’s waist slowly, giving Circenn a good, long look. With a coy smile, she dropped a lid onto the honey pot perched on the table near Duncan.
Circenn did not want to know what they’d been doing with the honey, and his expression must have clearly said as much, for Duncan burst into laughter.
“Excuse us, Cin.” He grinned as he dropped Alesone’s skirts with one hand, swung her up into his arms, and swept her from the kitchen.
Images of one-person-in-particular’s bare, rounded bottom assaulted him.
Circenn kicked out a chair, dropped his head on the table, and reconsidered killing the lass just to put himself out of his misery.
RUBY TOOK THE STAIRS TO THE STONES’ APARTMENT two at a time, but slowed her stride when she reached the third floor and proceeded down the dimly lit corridor. A colorful welcome mat—one of Lisa’s determinedly optimistic touches—brightened the appearance of the dismal door with its chips of peeling brown paint curling up from the underlying gray metal. APT. 3-G dangled at a lopsided slant from a single screw. Ruby raised her hand to knock but found herself straightening the sign instead, then dropped her fist to her side. She was dreading this visit. Twining a strand of hair around a nervous finger, she reminded herself that Lisa always
faced things head-on; the least she could do was emulate her. When she raised her hand again, she knocked firmly. Elizabeth, the day nurse, opened it and ushered her in.
“Lisa? Is that you, darling?” Catherine called, a note of hope in her voice.
“No, Mrs. Stone. It’s just me, Ruby,” she replied as she crossed the small living room and turned down the narrow hallway to the bedroom. Entering the cozy room, she sank into a chair next to Catherine’s bed and wondered where to begin. She plucked idly at the half-finished patchwork quilt resting on the arm of the chair. How was she going to break the latest news to Lisa’s mom? Catherine was critically ill, her daughter had disappeared, and now Ruby had even worse news for her.
“What did the man at the museum say?” Catherine asked anxiously.
Ruby smoothed her hair and shifted in her seat. “Would you like some tea, honey?” she evaded.
Catherine’s green eyes, uptilted and once as bright as her daughter’s, met Ruby’s with a cool reminder that she wasn’t dead yet and wasn’t stupid either. “What did you find out, Ruby? Don’t try to distract me with tea. Has anyone seen my daughter?”
Ruby gently rubbed her eyes with her fingertips, careful not to smear her mascara. She’d been up most of the night and wondered for the tenth time how Lisa had managed to survive working two jobs for so long. She had been closing at the club when she received an urgent message from Mrs. Stone saying that Lisa had been missing since the night before last. She had immediately phoned the police, then gone to the museum to see if Lisa had arrived at work last night—which she hadn’t—then gone directly to the police station after speaking with that horse’s ass Steinmann.
The officer had dutifully filed a missing person’s report, which had been amended in a matter of hours by a warrant for Lisa Stone’s arrest.
“No one has seen her since night before last,” Ruby informed Catherine. “The museum’s security cameras have her on tape. The last recorded image of her is outside Steinmann’s office.”
“So at least we know that she made it to work the night you saw her at the bus stop,” Catherine said. “Do the cameras show her leaving that night?”
“No. That’s what’s so strange. Her slicker is still hanging by the door, and none of the cameras register her leaving. There are no cameras in Steinnman’s office, but he was quick to point out that there’s a window she might have used.” And quicker to make heinous accusations that Ruby knew weren’t true. But how was she to prove it, and where on earth was Lisa? She didn’t mention to Catherine that she’d gone to the police a second time, then had called every hospital within a sixty-mile radius, praying there were no Jane Does; blessedly, there hadn’t been.
“Isn’t Steinmann’s office on the third floor?” Catherine asked, perplexed.
“Yes. But he promptly pointed out that Lisa took rappelling when she was younger. I guess she listed that on her application as one of her hobbies. I know she was pretty proud of that skill.” Ruby shifted in her chair and took a deep breath. “Mrs. Stone, there’s an artifact missing from the museum, and …”
“They’ve accused my daughter of stealing,” Catherine said tightly. “Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Her … er … disappearance does make things look bad. According to Steinmann and his trusty tapes, he and a colleague entered his office several hours after Lisa had. The door wasn’t locked and initially he thought she’d simply failed to lock up. Now he thinks she was hiding in the office, took the artifact after they left, and slipped out the window.”
“What is this artifact?”
“They won’t say. It seems they aren’t completely certain what it was.”
“My daughter is not a thief,” Catherine said stiffly. “I will go speak with them.”
“Catherine, let me handle this for you. You can’t get up—”
“I have a wheelchair!” She gripped the sides of her hospital bed with thin hands and tried to push herself up.
“Catherine, honey,” Ruby said, her heart breaking. “We’ll find her. I promise. And we’ll clear her name.” She placed her hand over Catherine’s, gently loosening her grip on the rails. “We both know Lisa would never do something like this. We’ll find a way to prove it.”
“My daughter would never steal and she certainly wouldn’t leave me!” Catherine snapped. “She should leave me, but she wouldn’t.” The sudden burst of anger drained her, and she lay still for a moment. She drew a shuddering breath, then said faintly, “Steinnman pressed charges, didn’t he? There’s a … warrant … out for her, isn’t there?”
Ruby flinched. “Yes.”
Catherine inclined her head stiffly, then sank back against the pillows and closed her eyes. She was silent for so long that Ruby wondered if she’d fallen asleep. When she spoke again there was steel in her voice: “My daughter did not steal anything, and she’s in great trouble. Lisa is too responsible not to come home unless something awful happened to her.” Catherine opened her eyes. “Ruby, I hate to ask anything more of you, but for Lisa …”
Ruby didn’t hesitate. “There’s no need for apologies, honey, you know I love Lisa like a sister. Until she comes home—and she will be found and cleared—I’ll be spending most of my time here. She may call or try to get a message to you, and someone who can move at the drop of a hat needs to be here in case she does.”
“But you have your own life …” Catherine said gently.
Ruby’s eyes filled with tears. Catherine’s health had deteriorated rapidly since she’d last seen her, the night they had gone out to celebrate Lisa’s birthday. She clasped Catherine’s hand in hers and said firmly, “We’re going to find her, Catherine, and I’m hanging around until we do. I won’t hear any arguments about it. We’ll find her.”
If she’s still alive, Ruby thought, with a silent prayer.
DUNCAN WHISTLED A LIVELY TUNE AS HE MADE HIS WAY to Circenn’s chambers. Things had become quite interesting since the lass from the future had arrived. Circenn had willfully broken an oath and lied, and that, in Duncan’s mind, was nearly cause for celebration. Even Galan had conceded over breakfast this morning that it was something of a breakthrough. Although Galan had pushed Circenn to fulfill his vow last night, this morning he’d admitted to Duncan that he hadn’t seen Circenn Brodie quite so off balance in years. Nor had he seen such a look of fascination on his face as he’d glimpsed when he’d burst into Circenn’s chambers last night. Galan had agreed with Duncan that the lass might be the best thing that could have happened to Circenn, shaking up his rigid rules, forcing him to question himself.
Eighteen generations of Douglases had served the immortal laird of Brodie, and in the past few generations there had been much talk and deep concern about his increasing withdrawal. The Douglases were worried about him. In the not-so-distant past, the laird of Brodie had presided over the courts of his eleven manors. But he hadn’t done so in over a century, leaving it to the various knights he’d appointed in his place to settle his people’s disputes. It used to be that the laird of Brodie had actively ridden out to his villages, talked with and been well acquainted with his people. Now Duncan wasn’t sure Circenn could identify one of his own villagers if he stood before him.
For the past hundred years, Circenn had spent most of his time traveling from country to country, fighting other people’s wars, and never being touched by any of it. He had only returned to Scotland to join the fight for his motherland when Robert the Bruce had been crowned king by Isabel, Countess of Buchan, at Scone.
Duncan’s Uncle Tomas argued that the laird of Brodie needed to wed, that it would draw him back into the joys of life. But Circenn refused to wed again, and they could hardly force him. Duncan’s father had settled for trying to get him to be intimate with a woman, but it seemed that Circenn Brodie had taken another of his absurd oaths and sworn off intimacy.
Circenn’s origins were lost in the mists of time, and the few times Duncan had questioned him about how he’d come to be immort
al, the laird had grown taciturn, refusing to discuss it. But while sharing excessive quantities of whisky with Circenn one night, Duncan had come to understand a bit of why Circenn had decided not to become involved with another woman. Two hundred and twenty-eight years ago, Circenn’s second wife had died at the age of forty-eight, and Circenn had admitted, in a whisky-induced confidence, that he simply refused to watch another wife die.
“So, just tup every now and then,” Duncan had offered.
Circenn had sighed. “I cannot. I cannot seem to keep my heart from following where my body goes. If I am interested enough in a woman to take her to my bed, I want more of her. I want her out of my bed, too.”
Duncan had been shaken by that comment. “So spend time with her until it wears off,” he’d said easily.
Circenn had shot him a dark look. “Have you never met a woman with whom it did not wear off? A woman with whom you went to sleep at night, with the scent of her in your nostrils, and woke up in the morning wanting her as badly as you wanted to breathe?”
“Nay,” Duncan had assured him. “Lasses are merely lasses. You attribute too much significance to it. It is simply tupping.”
But it was not simply tupping to the laird of Brodie, and Duncan knew that. Lately, “simply tupping” wasn’t scratching Duncan’s endless itch, either. He wondered if it might be related to aging—that as a man grew older, indiscriminate intimacy began to chafe rather than to soothe.
Recently, Duncan had surprised himself by lingering with a wench past the duration of their physical intimacy, prolonging the afterglow, even asking questions besides “When is your husband expected back?”
Damned unnerving was what that was.
He shrugged, pushing the thought from his mind with a more pleasurable musing about Circenn. He had bet Galan his best horse that Circenn couldn’t bring himself to kill the woman from the future, and it was a bet he planned to collect on. The laird of Brodie needed to come back to life, and perhaps the unusual lass was the one to help him do it.
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