by Caro LaFever
The power of him slammed into her again.
The power of his wide shoulders, hard and muscled. The power of his chest with the flat planes of masculinity covered with a fine dusting of dark hair. The power of his abdomen, a perfect six-pack.
“Do you work out?” she blurted. The man had to. No male could have a body like this and not spend hours keeping it in shape.
His straight brows rose and his full mouth smirked. “Like what ye see, lovely Lilly?”
Friends, not lovers. Friends.
“I was only making conversation.” She forced her gaze away from the splendid male specimen and turned to stare blankly through the window.
“Sure ye were.” To her relief, he didn’t pursue the subject. Instead, he went silent.
Her usual curiosity got the better of her. She glanced over her shoulder.
He still leaned on the stone as if he had not a care in the world, yet there was something about his stance that alerted her to his turmoil. Stiff muscles and fisted hands. “What are you thinking about?”
His gaze swung away from the couch and back at her. The sky-blue had turned stormy. “I suppose I’m going to have to bunk down in here and let ye have the bed.”
That was his problem. One of many but one she could tackle in short order. “You’re sweet. I’ll be fine on the couch with a pillow and a blanket, though.”
His big body stiffened further and a black scowl appeared. “I’m not sweet.”
“Well, the thought was sweet.” She walked to the couch and gave it a once over. It was big, made for a man his size. The leather was soft and appeared comfortable. She’d be fine here. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t slept in far worse places—the hard ground of an African hut, the sandy beach in the Greek islands. Plus, she didn’t want him to have a restless night and be even grumpier tomorrow. “If I could just borrow one of your pillows and a blan—”
“You’ll have the bed,” he bellowed over her words. “That’s the last I’ll say about it.”
Turning, she frowned. “You know, ordering me about isn’t going to get you very far.”
“I don’t want to get anywhere with ye, so it’s of no consequence what ye think about my orders.” He marched to the low table in front of the couch and flipped it open. Inside the hollowed-out center, was a plain cotton-covered pillow and a simple blue blanket. “This will do for me. Now get yourself to bed and leave me alone.”
“Wow.” Ignoring his continued orders, she walked to his side and stared down. “That’s really cool. I thought it was an antique.”
“It is one.” He snatched the pillow and blanket, all the while giving her his signature glare. “Time for ye to go into the bedroom.”
“I haven’t agreed to sleep in the bedroom. And isn’t it a little early for bed?” She met his turbulent gaze with a pleasant smile. “Why don’t we sit and talk a while?”
“Talk.” The word was laced with disgust. “Blethering on. Is that all ye do?”
“No.” She waved at her camera perched on the windowsill. “I take photos, too. Would you like me to take some pictures of you?”
Now the disgust filled his snort. “Not on your life.”
“Why not?” Gamely, she pinned her gaze on his manly perfection, sure she could handle the draw. After all, even if she wasn’t a fashion photographer, she had done a few shots of gorgeous men. Her work tended to focus on people and landscapes. In the course of that work, she’d met several stunning people.
Not quite as stunning as Iain McPherson, her body reminded her.
He stood close and the scent of his soap surrounded her. Sharp and fresh, like a pine forest she’d walked through in upper Canada last year.
“I’m not into photos.” He grimaced, his face tight with rejection. “I don’t want my picture being taken.”
“Really? Why not?” She tried to keep her mind on the conversation, but it wanted to drift off. Off into the contemplation of how beautiful his skin was.
She didn’t think of men having beautiful skin.
Women had the flawless, white skin her mother had spent most of her life trying to obtain. Her milk baths, oatmeal masks, and skin bleaching had never achieved what Sandra Howe Graham Dimon aspired to. Instead, like her daughter, she had to deal with skin that whispered of a colorful past.
But it had been drummed into Lilly at a young age.
Porcelain skin was the best.
“I enjoy my privacy,” the man with the beautiful skin said. “In case ye didn’t get the message last night and all day today.”
His blue gaze blazed with ire and the contrast of his skin to his eyes caught her attention once more. She’d love to take thousands of photos of this man. Satisfying her own wishes wasn’t important though, at least for right now. Maybe when she’d fixed his problems, he’d be more agreeable. “Okay.”
His frown deepened at her sunny acceptance. “What are ye planning now, ye donas?”
“Huh?” She cocked her head. “What did you call me?”
“Never mind.” Throwing the blanket and pillow onto the leather couch, he circled the low table, slamming the cover closed as he went. “Now, go away.”
Lilly ignored him again and took over his favorite chair. Sinking in, she gave him a grin. “I want to know what you called me.”
“Do ye plan on seeing the show?” It appeared he was just as good as her at ignoring. His hands went to the first button of his jeans. “I sleep in the nude.”
“Yeah, I know.” She managed a nonchalant wave even though her heart began to bang in her chest. “I’ve seen it before.”
“Yeah, I know.” He singsonged, imitating her flat drawl. The first button snapped open. “So I guess ye won’t mind if I get naked.”
“Actually, I think we should—”
All the lights went dark. Even the last, smoldering ruins of the fire couldn’t light the cavernous room.
“I guess there won’t be a show tonight,” she teased.
“Shite.”
She heard the slap of his bare feet on the stone floor.
“Where are you going?”
Ignoring her once more, he walked through the arch to the kitchen, his shadowed form disappearing.
She jumped off the chair and went after him, curious to see what his plan was.
The kitchen’s fire had simmered into ash and she could barely see the cedar island in the murky gloom coming from the window. Her imagination whipped right to work, providing her with a vivid picture of an old castle ghost with long, stringy hair and lots of chains.
Maybe an ax.
“Where are you?”
The shadow of his shaggy head popped around the edge of the door leading into the laundry. “Don’t fash yourself. I’m right here.”
Her quivering nerves settled in one second. Something about his bigness, his solid, deep voice, his presence calmed her completely. “What are you planning on doing?”
“If you’d give me a moment without asking all your questions, I’ll show ye.” His head disappeared into the gloom.
The edge of irritation in his voice couldn’t conceal…was that affection she’d heard? Her heart galloped in her chest with a happiness way out of proportion to what she might have detected. She wrapped her arms around her, trying to stuff down the absurd notion. But her optimism shot forward with the thought that if the McPherson was falling for some of her charm, then she was inching closer to her goal of helping him.
She just needed to remember.
Friends, not lovers.
The lights flashed on, flooding the kitchen with welcome warmth and banishing any old ghosts with their axes.
“There.” He stepped from the back room with a look of satisfaction on his face. “That’s fixed.”
“I’m impressed.” Giving him a relieved smile, she dropped her hands. “Did you get training as an electrician when you were in the Marines?”
“Ye mean in between doing raids and shooting at bad guys?” He snorted, yet instead of disgu
st, the sound was filled with amusement. “Don’t be daft.”
Affection. Satisfaction. Amusement.
Sucking in a deep breath, she congratulated herself. In one short day, she’d taken this man from drunk and depressed to this. “So what did you do?”
“I might not be an electrician, but being a soldier teaches ye one thing if nothing else.” He walked to the sink and washed his hands. “How to be prepared for the unexpected.”
“Like the lights going out.”
“Which isn’t unexpected in this old place.” Flicking off the water, he turned to face her from across the island. “I installed a generator first thing when I got back here.”
He was talking to her. Like a regular person who had his wits about him and wasn’t going to pull out a gun to do away with himself. Her heart surged with joy. “Did you do all the work on this place when you got back?”
His gaze followed her waving hand, surveying the kitchen. A frown crossed his face as he came to the dirty dishes still littering the table. Though the frown wasn’t the black, scary scowl he usually put on for her. Instead, the frown and the sky-blue eyes beneath them held a tease. “What’s this?” Ignoring her question, he stomped to the table. “Didn’t I assign ye this duty?”
The stomp was a mocking jest. She’d bet her life on it. “Maybe you did. However, I didn’t accept.”
He whipped around and scowled at her again. “I cooked.”
Definitely a teasing scowl. Lilly grinned in defiance. “We could do them together? I’ll wash and you can dry.”
A jitter of caution, something she rarely experienced, ran through her. Them together. Right next to each other at the sink. His big shoulders and arms brushing against her sweater. His scent encircling her. His powerful presence enrapturing her, pulling her and tugging her and luring her into a mistake.
Friends.
“Never mind.” She frowned as she waved a hand in dismissal. “I’ll take care of it myself.”
Chapter 9
She changed like quicksilver.
As a child, she’d done the same thing to him. Gone from an enchanting fairy to a nosy kid in a flash. A flash so fast it had stripped away his teenage honor and left him devastated. And her, too.
Is your mom dying? That’s what everyone is saying.
Her childish words echoed from the past, along with the punch of the memory of his actions after the words were spoken. Actions he’d regretted for years. He’d been fifteen to her ten. He should have been more responsible and in control of his emotions. Another ache of regret sitting at the bottom of the pile of regrets he’d accumulated during the course of his blighted life.
“I can help ye with the dishes.” Knowing he’d not be falling asleep with thoughts of his mum’s death and his past actions running through his brain, Iain paced to the table and began to stack the plates.
“No, really.” She fluttered to his side, her hands still waving. “I’ve got this.”
“What’s your problem?” He stopped and glared at her. “First ye want my help, next—”
“I changed my mind.” Her pouty lips tightened. “I have a right to do that.”
“Naw.” He leaned in closer, trying to figure her out. “Ye have no rights here. This is my castle and all rights belong to me.”
Her brows lowered and her sea-green eyes went dark. “I have rights wherever I am, Iain McPherson.”
He’d meant it as a tease. She took it as straight truth.
This wee lass came off as cheery and bright, sunshine and happiness. Yet, clearly beneath the annoying optimism beat a stout, stubborn heart. Something inside him tingled to life. But he didn’t want to analyze it too close. He didn’t want to analyze any signs of life in him too close.
“Ye have a right to help me in my kitchen, I’ll give ye that.” He lifted the stack of plates and walked toward the copper double sink. The color fit well with the dark-grey granite he’d chosen for the counters when he’d thought he might eventually care about where he lived, how he lived, and if he lived. After burying his da and coming back to the castle, he’d gone through the motions of living for a few months before deciding it wasn’t worth the effort. Long enough to make this place livable.
She puffed a sigh of exasperation behind him. “Don’t you ever listen?”
“No more than ye.” He placed the dishes in the deeper sink and turned on the water. “Guess that makes us two of a kind.”
A stillness swept into him and his fingers tightened on the edge of one plate.
“Don’t be stupid.” Marching to his side, her body bumped his own as she wheedled her way to the front of the counter. “We’re as much like each other as chalk and cheese.”
The still, sudden shock slithered away. “Is that so?”
“Yes, that’s so.” She stuck her hands into the bubbling water.
With an instinctive move, he turned to the island and pulled out a wide drawer. He stopped and grunted in surprise when he found exactly what he was looking for. “How’d ye know where to put the hand towels?”
Lovely Lilly gave him an odd glance. “I just put them where it was logical for them to go.”
That was the thing, though. The top drawer in an island wasn’t the logical place for towels to go. They should be placed near the sink or over, like his mum had done. But he’d found a new way when he’d observed the precision of a Navy galley and kitchen. He’d yearned to join that team, yet by the time he’d managed to accept that reality, it had been too late.
But he’d watched and learned.
“Do ye cook a lot?” He yanked one of the fine linen towels he’d ordered from Italy out of the drawer.
“Not much.” Another puzzled look crossed her face as he took the clean plate from her hand and dunked it into the clear water filling the other sink. “Still, I did okay this morning, didn’t I?”
The memory of the first good meal he’d eaten in ages sifted through him. The scrambled eggs and Lorne sausage. The hot coffee and ripe tomatoes. “Ye did okay.”
She laughed her husky chortle. “Thanks. I think.”
A surprisingly contented silence fell between them while they washed and dried the dishes together. When he’d placed the last plate in the upper cabinet and closed the door behind it, he realized how much he’d missed having everything in its right place. The way he’d learned in his years with the Marines.
She’d worked hard today, cleaning his place.
Now be a good dear, Iain, and mind your manners, his mother scolded from his past.
He coughed, keeping his gaze on the rich maple wood cabinet. “I guess I owe ye a thanks. You did a good job cleaning this place.”
“Is that another sorry attempt at giving me a compliment?” Amusement laced through her words.
Iain glanced her way and met her dancing eyes with a quirk of his lips. “Did ye want me to fall to my knees with thanks that ye barged into my home?”
“Barged into your home and cleaned it from top to bottom.” With a casual move, as if she’d lived in this kitchen for years, she grabbed a hand towel of her own and wiped her hands.
Something inside him trilled, making his gut queasy. He realized with an abrupt shock—he stood half-naked right next to her. The room seemed to zero in, sucking out the air.
She arched her blonde brows. “Nothing to say to that? Struck dumb by my kindness and efficiency?”
Snorting, he paced out of the kitchen and into the den. He fiddled with his stack of records and finally picked one of his favorites from the last few months. Mozart’s Requiem in D minor had fit his mood. He slipped the vinyl circle onto the turntable.
“I didn’t know people had these things anymore,” she chirped from his side.
He glanced down to meet her curious gaze. Giving him a quick smile, she went back to looking at his collection. “I thought everyone had iPods now.”
“Ye can’t hear good music digitally.” He gently slid the tone-arm to the beginning ridges of the record and realiz
ed his hand wasn’t shaking like it usually did.
“Really?” She shuffled closer as if ready to jump into the music when it started.
Her eagerness made him smile, even through the knowledge his hands weren’t shaking because he wasn’t drunk.
He still wanted to be drunk.
Needed to be drunk.
Her scent came to him again—lemony, fruity spice. She moved her head and she was so close, her curls swished every so lightly across the skin of his shoulder. His suddenly sensitive skin.
He stumbled back.
She didn’t seem to notice his retreat as the first mournful strains of violin filled the room. “Oh, no.”
“What?” He strode over to the safety of the windowsill.
“This is all sad and stuff.” She turned to look at him, her face screwed in distress.
“So?” Leaning on the cold stone sill, he was grateful it started to cool his lust. “I like all sad and that kind of stuff.”
“This is Mozart.” Her sea-green eyes narrowed. “The one he wrote for his own death.”
Shock rippled inside him. She didn’t strike him as the type to spend a lot of time studying the classics. “How do ye know this is Mozart?”
“My stepfather loves classical music.” She made a moue of clear distaste. “We got dragged to concert after concert when I was a kid.”
“We?”
“My sisters and I.” She glanced back at the stereo, like she was hiding something.
“Ye have sisters.” Iain didn’t know why that surprised him. Her life hadn’t frozen in place the moment she’d run away from him. Although, sometimes over the years, he thought his had.
“Two. Half-sisters.” She moved with a restless gait to stare into the dead fire.
The forlorn chorus of male singers boomed into the room, competing with the strains of the violins.
“This is horrible,” she stated. “This is not the kind of music you should be listening to.”
His irritation at her meddling ways reared its head. “What kind of music do ye think I should be listening to? Some kind of rubbish from the States where ye can’t even understand what they’re saying?”
“You can’t understand what these singers are saying, either.” She waved her delicate hand at the large black speakers he’d placed high in the corners of the room. “They’re singing in Latin, and don’t try and convince me you know Latin.”
