Courting Carolina

by Chapman, Janet

  “Jane,” he said on a sigh, “if ye need a ring— Wait, are you saying your mother helped ye stage this…;? That she…;?” Alec dropped his chin to his chest. “I can never, ever face that woman again. What mother helps her daughter seduce a man?”

  “A mother who loves her daughter,” Jane said, wrapping her arms around his neck. “And who realizes that sometimes saints and idiots need a little help making up their minds.” She gave him another sassy smile. “But according to a very happy hooker I know of, sometimes all they need is the proper encouragement.”

  “And what…” He cleared his throat when she pressed into him. “What did ye have in mind?”

  Jane lifted onto her toes, bringing her mouth next to his ear. “I stole a can of whipped cream from the restaurant,” she whispered. “And I downloaded a couple of new sex books, and one of them mentioned that men have a particularly sensitive spot right under their—”

  Well, that should teach him to ask, Alec thought with a shudder as he covered her mouth with his—even as he wondered if he shouldn’t start reading more. Jane’s reaction was immediate and no less enthusiastic than he remembered. Damn, it had been a long three weeks.

  “Alec?” she whispered, breaking the kiss and leaning away just enough to look him in the eyes. “Can we finally both get naked at the same time?”

  He started to speak, but stayed silent when the candlelight glittered off the single emerald in the center of her tiara, only to have Jane step away when she noticed where he’d been looking.

  She just as silently pulled her fleece off over her head, took off her bra, pulled off her boots and socks, then took off her pants and panties, her gaze never leaving his. She reached up and took off her emerald necklace and tossed it in the general vicinity of her pack, then reached up again and pulled the tiara out of her hair and sent it sailing past his shoulder toward the beach.

  And then she stood there, completely naked, facing him. “I love you, Alec.”

  And that, he figured, was about as naked as truth got.

  Keeping his eyes locked on hers, Alec shed his jacket, his tie, cummerbund, and borrowed shirt, then lifted one foot then the other to pull off his shoes and socks. He unfastened his pants and pushed them down along with his shorts and stepped out of them, and stood in front of her completely naked. “I guess I love you, too.”

  “You guess?”

  “Okay, I know I love you.” He shrugged. “But I’m going to need a little time to get used to the idea, because I’ve spent quite a few years convincing myself that I shouldn’t fall in love.”

  She crossed her arms under her breasts—which effectively pushed them up and toward him rather provocatively. “When would you guess you first realized you loved me?” she asked in an equally provocative whisper that sent the last firing brain cell he had down to his groin. “Alec?”

  “What was the question?”

  “When did you fall in love with me?”

  He decided to focus on the curl of hair standing up from where she’d pulled off the tiara. Yeah, that was better. “I can’t rightly say. But,” he rushed on when he caught her scowl from the corner of his eyes, “I know when I finally admitted it to myself.”

  “And when would that be?”

  “When I read the note ye left me in the privy,” he said with a grin, only to hold up his hand to stop her when she started toward him. He went back to focusing on that curl. “Do you know the exact moment you fell in love with me?”

  “That’s easy,” she whispered, the sudden gruffness in her voice making Alec drop his gaze to hers. “When you cut my hair.”

  He spread his arms and Jane barreled into him, and Alec lifted her off her feet and strode to the inviting bed she’d set up. He knelt with her still in his arms and pressed her onto her back, kissing her the entire way down, and settled himself between her thighs. Only then did he break their kiss to smile down at her.

  “Would ye happen to know where you tucked that condom?” he asked, deciding he better use one on the chance Titus had gone ahead and magically remedied his little problem about getting her pregnant.

  “I tossed it in the fireplace of my cottage.”

  He reared up. “Why?”

  “Because I’d been carrying that particular condom around for all the wrong reasons. So,” she purred as she reached under the pillow, her hand reemerging holding another packet—that he couldn’t help but notice was already torn open, “I got us a whole box of new ones.” Her sultry smile turned lopsided. “Which I can see was very smart of me, as I imagine making a baby might be a little too much for a man to wrap his mind around if he’s still getting used to being in love.”

  He dropped his forehead to hers with a chuckle. “Are ye sure you weren’t born in this century, lass?”

  “Alec, are you stalling?”

  “Aye,” he said, not lifting his head.

  He felt her go still beneath him. “Why?”

  “Because you’re a thirty-year-old virgin,” he said softly, finally looking at her. “And it’s not always…pleasant the first time.”

  “Then don’t you think we should get the first time over with as soon as possible so we can get to the pleasant second time? And the third and fourth?” she whispered.

  And that, Alec decided, was why he wasn’t afraid to love Jane. “Aye,” he said, just before he kissed her again—which, he quickly discovered, she took as permission to pounce.

  It was more wrestling than lovemaking, with Jane often coming out the victor. Although Alec figured it was only because every last one of his brain cells had fallen under her spell. And he couldn’t really complain, considering that losing to Jane was like winning the foreplay lottery.

  But feeling she’d worked herself into a heady steam of passion, Alec finally slipped on the condom while she was busy looking for the particularly sensitive spot her new book said he was supposed to have, and wrestled her back beneath him and settled between her thighs again. Then he had to pin her hands down beside her head, and finally got her to quit squirming when he slowly pressed into her slick warmth.

  He also stilled and smiled down at her. “Will ye be my girlfriend, Jane?”

  “Aye,” she drawled in a surprisingly good mimic of his burr, the candlelight reflecting the passion in her eyes. “Forever, Alec.”

  He pressed slowly but steadily forward, watching that passion ease slightly for the merest moment just before it flared with renewed fire and she lifted her hips into him with a moan. He withdrew and pressed into her again, sliding a little deeper and pulling a longer moan from her—which he answered with a groan of pleasure. Feeling her legs growing restless against his, and sensing her muscles beginning to tighten as she sought the pleasure she knew was hers for the taking, Alec increased the rhythm of his thrusts, only to lose himself in the storm with her.

  He’d swear fireworks boomed overhead when she crested, even lighting up the sky behind them as Jane took him right along with her to that magical place they’d spent ten days craving to visit together. Hell, Alec thought as he lowered himself to his elbows to keep from crushing her so she could breathe—which they both were working very hard at, he couldn’t help but notice—he could still hear and see fireworks.

  “S-sweet Athena,” she said in rasping pants, “if that was supposed…to be unpleasant…I can’t wait…for the second time.”

  Alec carefully rolled away, and was about to tuck her up against his side when she sat up and yanked him up beside her just as another burst of fireworks broke over the fiord, causing him to sigh in relief that he hadn’t been imagining the storm gods were rejoicing that he’d just devalued a princess.

  Because personally, he felt she’d just added a whole lot of value to him.

  “Oh Alec, could this night be any more perfect?” she said, slipping her arm through his and leaning into him with a sigh.

  “Well, a bottle of my ancestors’ liquid gold and a big juicy steak might help it a bit,” he said, stifling a grin when she
straightened away—to better gape at him, he figured. “Seeing how I spent the day dealing with your last two suitors, I only had a couple of donuts on the ride back from Pine Creek and missed lunch and supper.” He looked over, and nope, she wasn’t gaping but glaring. “What?” he said, pulling her back down just as another burst of fireworks broke over the fiord. He rolled on top of her, threaded his fingers through hers, and held her hands beside her head. “You want times two and three and four to be anywhere near pleasant, you’re going to have to feed me.”

  Damn. Alec knew that smile she suddenly gave him, and he knew this really wasn’t going to end well. But he’d trade having that goddamn bus off his chest for a thousand years of loving Jane any day of the week.

  Jane turned from watching Kitalanta and his pod-mates, the rising sun glistening off their wet orca backs as they darted in and out of the cove playing keep-away with a large piece of driftwood, and saw Alec slowly fold the letter she’d given him ten minutes ago. Not knowing what to make of his silence, Jane guessed she probably should have thrown it in the fireplace the day she’d taken it back from the privy. Sweet Athena, forget that she’d declared her undying love for him; she had asked him to marry her.

  “It would mean changing at least your last name again,” he said quietly, sliding the letter back into the envelope, “and possibly never having children if an operation to reverse the vasectomy I had nine years ago proved unsuccessful.”

  Jane sucked in her breath. “You had a vasectomy? Why?”

  She saw him also pull in a deep breath and let it out slowly as he turned to her, his eyes unreadable. “Because I didn’t feel I had any business being a father.”

  “But why?”

  “Because while on a mission for my government, I killed a fourteen-year-old boy. He’d just killed my partner—a woman who also happened to be my lover—and was just turning the gun on me when I broke his neck.”

  Jane’s skin tightened at the utter lack of emotion in his voice and guarded way he was holding himself. Sweet Zeus, did Alec think he was a murderer? Or that she would think he was? “Alec,” she said, only to have to clear her throat when she realized he believed they shouldn’t marry because he might not be able to give her babies. “That was self-defense.” She snorted, determined to make this into nothing. “Do you think the six men Daddy brought to Nova Mare hadn’t killed anyone?” She touched his arm. “Did my father know that you’d had a vasectomy when he gave you his invitation?”

  “Aye,” he said, still staring out at the cove. “And he knew about the boy, and he also said it was self-defense.” He looked at her. “But that doesn’t change the fact that the boy was just a kid.”

  “Who’d just murdered a woman and was trying to murder you, and who would have gone on to murder others. Alec,” she said softly, “you can’t judge yourself for something you did in the line of duty any more than I wouldn’t have judged myself for marrying a man I didn’t love to fulfill my duty. And I don’t care if you can’t give me babies. I love you.” She smiled. “And anyway, if we decide we want children but can’t have our own, we’ll just adopt them. However many you want.”

  She saw his jaw slacken. “You’re willing to adopt?”

  “Of course. Nicholas was adopted, and look how wonderful he turned out.”

  Alec shook his head. “He told me his mother is your family’s healer and that his father is your royal gardener.”

  She laughed. “That’s because he was only about a week old when he was found on the beach, and Maude immediately took him in. Everyone thought it ironic that the island’s midwife was childless, but apparently the moment Maude set eyes on Nicholas, she claimed him as her son.”

  “So brotherly Nick isn’t an Atlantean? Then what is he?”

  Jane shrugged. “Nobody knows. From what I’ve been told, everyone figured he’d been in a shipwreck when Leviathan found him and brought him to Atlantis.”

  Jane saw Alec take another deep breath and look down at the letter he was still holding. “I’m still just a ski bum.”

  “Then how come a ski bum owns a tuxedo, dances better than any man I’ve ever danced with, and appears to be as comfortable in a ballroom as in the wilderness?”

  He tossed the letter onto the sand and wrapped his arms around his knees to stare out at the cove. “Have you ever heard of James Bond?”

  Jane slipped her arm through his and leaned against his shoulder. “I have a couple of the older movies on my iPad, when Sean Connery played James Bond.” She nudged him with her elbow, determined to lighten the mood. “Mostly because I love his Scottish accent. But what’s that got to do with your owning a tuxedo?”

  “For eight years, I was an American James Bond for my government. No one in my family knows; not my parents or brothers or sister, or even Duncan. Everyone thinks I was in the marines and served three tours of duty overseas, but…” He lifted his arm to wrap it around her, and then held her head against his chest as he took another deep breath. “I was known as the Celt, and it was my job to get in, get out with whatever information or person I was sent after, and not get caught or implicate my country. And sometimes that meant skulking around in dark alleys, and sometimes it meant attending formal functions at embassies and palaces.”

  “You mean like a spy?” She lifted her head in surprise. “You were a real-life James Bond?”

  “I was an idiot,” he said, pulling her back against his chest. “I was barely twenty-one when I signed up and twenty-nine when I finally wised up.” He ducked his head to look at her. “It’s not nearly as romantic as the movies, Jane, and it doesn’t always turn out well in the end.”

  Jane straightened away in surprise as everything finally made sense. “Sam knows who you were. That’s why he told me to go to you if I got in trouble.”

  Alec hesitated, then merely nodded.

  “And you said Daddy knows, too.”

  He nodded again. “I think that’s why he decided to let me court you, figuring I could probably do a better job of keeping you safe in this century, which he knew is where you want to stay.”

  She leaned against him again with a sigh. “Why couldn’t he just tell me about that stupid pact he made with the gods? He created more problems by keeping it a secret.” She snorted. “Which shows how little faith he has in me.”

  “Even though it involved you, keeping it a secret really didn’t have anything to do with you, Jane,” Alec said, twisting to push her down onto the feather mattress. He settled beside her, propping his head on one hand and cupping her hip with the other. “Your father thought he was protecting your mother from worrying herself sick. Did you know that he nearly lost her when you were born?”

  “I know. But having a difficult birth doesn’t make a woman weak; it just happens sometimes.” She laughed. “Mama’s the least weak-minded woman I know.”

  “But your father is a man,” he said, giving her hip a squeeze, “and an ancient one at that. And being one myself, I know for a fact that our first instinct is to protect the women we love, which is why we become weak-minded at the thought of losing them.”

  Jane twined her arms around his neck and pulled him down until their noses were touching. “Promise that you won’t ever keep secrets from me.”

  “Only if you remember that’s a promise that runs both ways, Ms. Smith.”

  “Then I promise, if you promise I’ll always be Jane to you.”

  “Aye, if you promise never to use your magic on me.”

  She snorted. “I’m fairly certain we’ve established you’re immune to the magic. But,” she said in her best sultry voice as she slid a hand down between them and wrapped her fingers intimately around him, “I’ll promise to try not to, if you promise to always use your magic on me.”

  “Not a problem, lass,” he said thickly, moving over her and slowly easing himself inside—without a condom this time, she noticed. He captured her moan of delight in his mouth, and Jane once again found herself in that wondrous place where time stopp
ed and the world receded until only their passion for each other existed.

  And her last coherent thought before Jane surrendered to the pleasure was that she’d give him a week to get used to loving her before she proposed again—in person instead of a letter, and definitely with both of them naked at the same time.

  LETTER FROM LAKEWATCH

  Autumn 2012

  Dear Readers,

  I would imagine that from reading my books, you’ve figured out by now that magic is my vehicle of choice for bringing you along on my journey into the realm of possibilities. I often compare telling a story to packing an SUV with my hero and heroine in the front seats, the back seats filled with a large cast of characters as they all head off on a road trip through a particular segment of their intersected lives. What’s going on outside the vehicle—the weather, terrain, other travelers they might encounter—certainly has an impact, but the real story is what’s happening inside that truck.

  Ever find yourself trapped in a vehicle with someone you didn’t particularly like? Someone who scared you? Someone you hadn’t realized didn’t like you? How about being trapped with someone you thought you absolutely adored only to discover they weren’t exactly what they seemed? Yes, there’s nothing like a nice long road trip to slowly melt away the masks we hide behind. (Trust me; Robbie and I spent five weeks trapped in an SUV and small camper with two teenagers headed from Maine to Alaska. We made it as far as the Canadian Rockies and turned around; my dear sweet husband saying Alaska would still be there when the boys finally moved out.)