Time For A Highlander (Real Men Wear Kilts)

by Maxine Mansfield

  Any Scot worth his salt knew well the stories of the fae creatures and the magic they possessed, and if his little wife had even a drop of fae blood in her, then he truly was a lucky man. For the fae were well known for their powers of seduction, and seducing him beyond reason this night was exactly what his Beth had done.

  His balls ached, not with pain, but with need, and the head of his cock throbbed in a rhythm that matched the pounding in his chest. He was close, so very close.

  Quint slipped a hand between them, and found Beth’s clit, all slick and hard. He kissed her, and she moaned and wiggled as he stroked. His cock responded to the sound by spasming once, and again, and then again. He pumped furiously as his body found its release.

  “Yes, yes. Oh, my God, yes,” she cried as her own tremors of pleasure overtook her.

  He held her close and smothered her face and neck with kisses. “That was…that was amazing,” he whispered. “Ye were right about baths, wife. We should do this more often.”

  She grinned against the skin of his naked chest.

  And even after the water had long turned from warm to quite cool, neither one budged.

  Chapter Seven

  May 1643

  Beth groaned.

  God, what wouldn’t she give right this very moment for a roll of toilet paper and a bottle of mouthwash? And while she was thinking about it, perhaps a good toothbrush, a stick of deodorant, zippers, real forks, a new romance novel by one of her favorite authors, and a lifetime supply of antacids.

  Funny, in the three months she’d been in the year 1643, she hadn’t really missed the cell phone that for so many years had been attached to her like an extra appendage, and she hadn’t even truly missed cars, planes, bikes, TVs, fast food, computers, or even the Internet. But right now, she’d kill for the tummy-soothing and thirst-quenching effects of an ice cold glass of tea with a package of artificial sweetener thrown in for good measure and topped off with a wedge of fresh lemon.

  “So much like ya dear departed mother, ya are, God rest her soul.” Bronwyn sniffed, and smiled. “I’d wager she took the very first time ya Da had his way with her, too.”

  Beth raised her head from the chamber pot she’d been cradling every morning for the last two months. “Took?”

  The maid chuckled. “Lady Elspeth Frasier MacLeod, don’t be trying ta tell me ya haven’t guessed ye’re with child? I know ye are smarter than that. And such a short time after wedding the laird, ta boot.” The woman’s smile suddenly faded. “The babe ye’re carrying ’tis Quinton MacLeod’s get, isn’t he? Tell me the poor little soul wasn’t sired by that horrid Viscount Telford?”

  Beth retched again, even though there hadn’t been anything left in her stomach to throw up for quite some time now. She scowled at Bronwyn. “If I am with child, and I’m not saying I am, and I’d better not hear about you spreading rumors because I haven’t even said anything about the possibility to Quint yet. But if there is a babe on the way, it can only be Quinton MacLeod’s child. I was chaste when I came to his bed.”

  The maid sighed with obvious relief. “Saints be praised. Ye can’t blame a soul for wondering. Back at Frasier Castle before the wedding, ye and that viscount were thick as thieves and had ye heads together more often than nae. It was near scandalous, I tell ya.”

  “He creeps me out.” Beth shuddered.

  “Creeps, what mean ye creeps, my lady,” Bronwyn asked.

  Heat wicked up Beth’s neck and overflowed her cheeks. Her choice of words was simply a slip of the tongue, and she’d have to be more careful. Or she really would find herself tied to a stake and burned alive as she feared.

  She swallowed, hard, and then forced a laugh. “Creeps is a fairly new description I heard being bandied about court. It means, being in the vicinity of someone unpleasant can give one the feeling that something with many hairy legs is crawling upon one’s skin, creeping, so to speak.”

  Bronwyn nodded. “Ah.” And then she laughed. “Ye young people these days. There’s no telling what ye’ll say next. Creeps…I think I like it.”

  Suddenly, she grew serious again. “Well then, my lady, if the viscount makes ye feel as if spiders or some such were crawling all over ye, then why’d ye spend so much time in his company?”

  Beth shrugged. “Familiarity, I suppose. After all, I hadn’t been home since Father first sent me to live at the abbey. I knew the viscount better than anyone else present. It was simply easier to spend time in his presence, since we both had England and the court in common.”

  Bronwyn nodded. “I suppose that’s true enough.”

  Beth cringed. When had it gotten so very easy to lie that untruths rolled right off her tongue without much forethought at all? And here she’d always prided herself on being such an honest person.

  If there’d been one tried and true rule she’d learned from her mother, it had been, “Be truthful and honest above all things, and you’ll always come out on top.” Not that her mother’s favorite saying had come in handy in every instance of her life, but it had in most.

  Well, one thing was for certain. Honesty had certainly been the exception to the rule from the moment Beth had found herself in the year 1643 and not the norm. She wasn’t very proud of that fact.

  She made her way back to the bed. The very same bed she shared every night with Elspeth’s husband. She had to think of Quint as belonging to Elspeth and not to her. The baby also. If not, then how could she stand to leave either one of them behind after the child she’d never hold, the child she’d never get to know or watch grow into a man was born?

  And leave them she must. She’d made a deal with Fate, and she’d made a promise to apologize to her dead children for what she’d done, what she’d said. Apologies that were so very much overdue.

  Was it wrong of her to wish it could somehow be different, though? Deep down inside, Beth wasn’t sure. On one hand, she was already more than a little in love with Quinton MacLeod, and she knew it. Never had anyone loved her so tenderly or treated her with such goodwill.

  And last night she’d felt the very first fluttering of his son moving within Elspeth’s body. A stirring that not only reminded Beth that the child to come was truly real but had also brought back memories, both painful and at the same time glorious. Memories of two smiling little faces. Memories she wished she could forget, if for a moment. Because to remember every detail of the last glimpse she’d ever had of those faces was too painful to endure. But then, what kind of mother longed to forget the last sight she’d ever get of her children? Only a horrible one, of course.

  Burt had been right all along.

  Beth closed her eyes and for at least the millionth time, gave herself over to the nightmare that never ended.

  ****

  “For the love of God, would you please stop kicking the back of my seat? I already have a headache.” Bethany Ann Anderson glanced in the rear view mirror and scowled at her eight-year-old son, Brian.

  “I’m hungry,” he whined.

  She sighed. “We’re all hungry, but being obnoxious isn’t going to get you fed any sooner.” Beth turned up the wiper blades on her beat-up compact car yet another notch, in hopes she’d be able to see well enough to at least increase her speed from meandering turtle to donkey crawl.

  Dinner was late, dinner was late, dinner was very late, and Burt was going to be so angry.

  The late July drizzle and the on and off downpour in the Miami, Florida, area had been the reason both little league baseball games had taken so much longer than usual this evening. And it was the reason why, yet again, Burt was going to be pissed, really pissed. He didn’t appreciate his supper being served after six. He’d always been that way. His mother had served dinner at six, not a moment before and not a moment after.

  Beth glanced at her watch. It was six-fifteen.

  “Can we have mac and cheese when we get home?” ten-year-old Ben asked.

  Beth sighed. “Sure, why not.”

  It wasn’t often
she was allowed to give in to the whims of her children, but since Burt was already going to be upset, why not? But then again, Burt’s preferences did have to come first, and she’d already taken a couple of steaks out to thaw before leaving the house. Her husband expected meat of some kind with every meal, and though she’d thought she’d just pop a few potatoes in the oven to go along with the steaks, she supposed mac and cheese would serve just as well, for the kids anyway.

  “Why do you do that?” Brian argued. “You know we can’t have mac and cheese. What’d Daddy say last time?”

  Ben huffed from the back seat beside his brother. “I don’t care what Dad says. He doesn’t have to eat it if he doesn’t want to.”

  Brian kicked the back of Beth’s seat again. “Oh yeah, well, I bet you’ll care when he throws it on the floor or at Mom again. Won’t ya?”

  She could hear the fear in her young son’s voice, and it broke her heart. Shivers of dread skittered down her spine. He was right, and she knew it. “Don’t worry about it, Brian. I’ll make your father a nice big baked potato with sour cream and chives. Just the way he likes.”

  The kids were quiet for a few minutes, and Beth was thankful. If possible, the rain was coming down even harder and flooding the road enough that hydroplaning became an issue. She tapped her brakes, then sped up once again, pulled between getting home safely and getting home fast enough to prevent Burt from working himself into a total frenzy.

  He hadn’t wanted the boys to play little league. He’d said it was a waste of time and money. Both time and money that could be used for better means, like a new fishing rod for himself or yet another hunting rifle. Beth had argued her case, though, and after agreeing to teach summer school to make up for the extra expense, she’d won.

  Ben and Brian were allowed to do so little that other children took for granted. She’d wanted to give them this one small thing. And they both thrived at it.

  She glanced in the rearview mirror at her sons. God, how she loved them. Both blond and handsome like their father, with his same dark brown eyes and winning smile, they were the light of her life, her reason for everything.

  Ben was the athlete, again so like his dad except when it came to attitude. That trait he’d gotten from her, along with the freckles across his nose and his ridiculously oversized ears. He was a straight A student with a sweet disposition that melted Beth’s heart, and even at ten years old, already had the signs of a strong work ethic in the making.

  And then there was Brian, the fourth of what Burt liked to call the four B’s. Her little hellion. There wasn’t a point he wouldn’t argue or a cause he wouldn’t champion. She had no doubt her eight-year-old son would someday grow up to be a lawyer, a politician, a preacher, or possibly even a, God forbid, prize fighter of some sort.

  Boxer perhaps? But not a bully. Not like Burt. God, please not like Burt. But then Brian wasn’t cruel, and he only ever fought to protect others.

  How many times during this past school year alone had she been called to the principal’s office because Brian had gotten himself into yet another altercation defending some smaller, weaker kid? And though it probably shouldn’t and she’d certainly never tell him, she was proud he didn’t back away from a fight. He wasn’t a coward like she had always been.

  “Give it back,” Ben suddenly yelled.

  Beth jerked out of the contemplation of her near perfect children and back into reality of the moment mode. Glancing once more into the rearview mirror again, the tension of the day, the weather, the lateness of the hour, and the knowledge that a fight, without a doubt, awaited her when she did finally get home, got the better of her. “Brian, give your brother back whatever you took.”

  Her eight-year-old sounded whiney again. “I just wanted to look at his stupid catcher’s mitt.”

  “How many times do I have to tell you”—the sound of Ben’s piercing screech went right through Beth’s already aching head—“I don’t want your greasy paws on my stuff. Give it back like Mom said.”

  Beth took a deep breath and slowly blew it out. Her normally even temper rising another degree. “Brian, give your brother back his mitt now. I’m not in the mood to listen to you two fight.”

  Instead of doing as she’d asked, though, Brian tossed the catcher’s mitt into the front seat and out of his brother’s reach. It landed on the passenger side floor board.

  “Mom!” Ben wailed.

  Beth seethed with anger as she unbuckled her seatbelt. Everything she did was for her children, and they couldn’t care less they were making this trip home even more miserable than it needed to be. “Just a sec. Don’t whine. I’ll get it.”

  She turned her face slightly toward her children, enough so they could see she was serious. “Why must you two fight all the time? Isn’t there enough of that at home? God, what I wouldn’t give for five minutes of peace and quiet? I swear, there are days I wish I’d never had kids in the first place. Neither one of you appreciates anything that’s done for you. Now, sit back and shut up before you cause us to get into a wreck. I don’t want to hear another word out of either of you.”

  Suddenly, Ben’s eyes became really big and round. Though he didn’t say a word, he made his point with a single pudgy, little finger gesture toward the road.

  Beth turned quickly, fear gripping her heart. There, right in the middle of her lane, coming straight for them, was a dark pickup truck with its headlights blinding her through the driving rain and its tires swerving dangerously forward.

  She slammed on her brakes and tried to veer out of the way, but the guardrail to her right and the already occupied lane to her left, prevented her from making any adjustments that mattered. She threw her free arm over the backseat in hopes of somehow shielding her children from what was about to transpire

  In the end, it didn’t matter.

  When the collision happened, the force of the unstoppable pickup truck coming in direct contact with her equally opposing compact car and combined with the fact that the glass of her car door window shattered on impact, Beth’s unseatbelted body was flung free of the wreckage.

  She didn’t remember landing, but when she came to, she was lying on the side of the road. Beth wasn’t sure how long she’d been unconscious. It could’ve been moments, or it could’ve been hours. All she knew was every bone and muscle in her body hurt horribly, and she could barely breathe or move.

  She scanned the near total darkness for her car, and there it set, twisted about the guard rail with the front of the pickup truck embedded firmly within the compact’s engine compartment.

  There was no movement, only deathly silence.

  Beth panicked. She blinked back the rain and blood fogging her sight and started crawling toward her car, toward her children. Pain ripped through her lower extremities, but she ignored the odd angle her legs lay in and the fact that she could no longer feel sensation of any kind below her knees. Inch by excruciating inch, she made her way closer to the wreckage, closer to her children.

  Then she saw it. A small round fist pounding upon the glass of the backseat window. Brian, thank God, he was still alive. Faster she crawled, every movement threatening to take her consciousness from her once again. She saw Ben’s frightened eyes, his face pressed up against the window beside his little brother’s fist, and she heard both of their screams.

  That was the last sight she ever had of her children before the car suddenly exploded into a ball of fire. Though their excruciating screams pierced the night as they burned to death right before her eyes.

  It was the last thing she remembered before totally losing consciousness, and the first thing that came to her mind five days later when she finally woke in a hospital bed.

  Two days later, Burt came to see her. It was the first and last visit she’d get from him the entire six weeks of her hospitalization or the subsequent three-month stint in the rehabilitation center in order to learn how to walk again. He’d stayed less than a minute and had only two words to say. “They’re b
uried.” He turned, walked away, and didn’t even bother to come when the rehab center phoned for him to pick her up. Instead, after waiting another twenty-four hours, she’d simply called herself a cab and made her own way home.

  He didn’t look at her when she’d hobbled through the front door on legs that, though once more functional, would never again be quite the same. Instead, he popped the top on another beer. “I’m hungry. Get supper cooked. And this filthy house needs cleaning.”

  “Don’t you even want to know what happened?” she asked.

  Burt shook his head. “I know everything I need to know. My kids are dead, and you aren’t.” He shook his head again. “A real mother wouldn’t have let that happen. If she couldn’t have gotten them out of the car, she would’ve had the decency to die with them.”

  Beth didn’t have anything else to say.

  For days, she’d wondered around the silent rooms of her home, within her own mind, begging her children to forgive her as she picked up and washed the glasses they’d drunk milk from while munching cookies before the game that day. She silently pleaded with them to understand she’d gladly take their place if only she could as she collected two small sets of jeans and T-shirts they’d discarded at the foot of their bunk beds before donning their black, white, and green Miami Gator uniforms.

  She’d even prayed for death as she picked up and put into boxes little toy trucks and cars, story books, baseball cards, and well-loved stuffed animals.

  But Beth didn’t say another word out loud, and neither did Burt, at least not until a few months later. For the longest time, they both wandered through the days like a pair of strangers being forced to share the same space. It hurt that Burt acted like she didn’t exist, but at the same time, Beth hadn’t realized how preferable that sentiment was to what lay ahead.

  Chapter Eight

  June 1643

  God in heaven, she was beautiful to behold.

  Quint watched his Beth walk across the bailey and felt guilty. Instead of not being able to draw his gaze from his wife whenever she was anywhere near, he should be paying closer attention to his men’s training, pushing them harder, making sure they were prepared for what he feared was coming.