In His Wildest Dreams

by Marie Treanor

  MacDonald wound down the window as he approached. A few more lines, a few more pounds, but just as serious, just as aggressive. Glenn rested one arm along the car roof, but he wasn’t stupid enough to place his body where the car door could slam against it. He let them speak first—a trick he’d learned from the police themselves long ago.

  “Mr. Brody,” the cop said with unmistakable sarcasm. “Quite the laird, I believe.”

  “Call me sir if you really want to, but you know you’ll never forgive yourself. What can I do for you, Inspector?”

  “Chief Inspector,” MacDonald corrected.

  “Congratulations.” He waited.

  “Saw a couple of familiar faces skulking in your driveway,” MacDonald offered.

  “Thanks for your concern, but they were invited.”

  “That’s why I’m concerned. What are you up to, Brody?”

  “Trying to earn an honest crust, well away from Glasgow.”

  “Honest, my arse,” MacDonald sneered. “Who’re you planning to entertain up here? Ally Haines?” The biggest name in Glasgow crime these days.

  “I’m not even on his Christmas card list. And I’m not going back to Glasgow.”

  The cops exchanged amused glances. The one Glenn didn’t know leaned his head forward to say, “That why you hired Fenton to rake up your old murder charge?”

  Glenn shrugged. “Lawyers. Always looking for a piece of someone’s action. There’s none there for him. I didn’t hire him.”

  MacDonald looked him in the eye. “And yet the bastard had the nerve to tell me your conviction was unsafe.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him he was full of shite.”

  Glenn let one side of his mouth stretch upward. “Funny. Must be the first time we’ve agreed on anything. I won’t let it go to my head.” He straightened and walked away.

  He just hoped it was enough.

  Glenn had no idea of the time. Although he knew it had to be pretty late, he didn’t much care. Sitting at his keyboard, adjusting the instrument levels on his computer application, he was lost in musical urban fantasy.

  Getting quite so lost in it had begun as a deliberate ploy to distract himself from Chrissy’s stunt this morning and his subsequent brush with the Glasgow law. He liked Chrissy, and she’d been a good friend to him as well as a bloody useful asset in this project, but he was damned if he’d become her crusade. It wasn’t safe for either of them. There was some comfort in her stunned look of horror when he’d said all she was doing was sending him back to jail. Hopefully that meant she’d now lay off. But he didn’t like feeling guilty for inspiring that look either. She was trying to help him; she liked him for some reason he couldn’t fathom, and hers wasn’t a friendship he wanted to recast in the old mould of fear, dependence and debt.

  And who knew what the hell Izzy thought of the whole business. She’d stood there frozen as if afraid he’d beat the lawyer to a pulp just for being there—or perhaps Izzy for inviting him in. And he was damned sure she’d been listening at the door when he’d spoken to Chrissy in the office, because as he’d stormed out, he’d seen her alluring rear end scuttle into the room next door out of sight. Had she been frightened for Chrissy?

  He hoped she was just nosy and feeling a bit guilty about eavesdropping. He didn’t want her to be afraid of him, and wasn’t really prepared to analyse why. It all added to the churning discomfort, which he was determined to lose in music. And he’d succeeded pretty well.

  When he’d accepted the commission—the largest and most lucrative he’d been offered—he had wondered if it was just too big for him at this stage. But he seemed to be full of music, and the dark, shadowy world of this video game inspired him, as did the kick-ass yet tragic heroine. Sheer escapism. And someone was paying him to play.

  He’d composed his first music in prison. And after he’d got his degree, he’d found the courage to send some of his pieces to an agent—who’d seen its potential in the niche market of computer gaming. When a couple of the pieces had actually sold and interest been expressed by a larger company in more of his work, he’d realized he could actually make serious money out of this. And the idea had begun to form, the one that had grown into Ardknocken House.

  He wanted to get to the end of this cycle while the music was still pumping through his brain, and he was nearly there. Placing both hands on the keyboard, he played the final line until, on the last note, his fingers slipped. The world tilted, and he was staring at Izzy.

  This time, they weren’t in bed, and she wasn’t naked. Instead, she was slammed against his bedroom wall—not by him but by another man, a big bloke wearing designer jeans and a leather jacket, who thrust his forearm across Izzy’s neck.

  “Bastard, bastard, bastard,” she was whispering.

  The man laughed and said something mocking in return. It was a name, but it wasn’t Izzy’s.

  Glenn flew across the room into blackness.

  And then, with a jolt, he was staring at the computer screen.

  The music had gone. He felt cold inside.

  Housework was not one of Izzy’s natural strengths. In her own homes, she’d only ever done enough to get by—with a little extra for certain visitors. So she found the work at Ardknocken House hard and tiring. Perhaps for that reason, she had little time to feel nervous or intimidated by any of the residents, who, although she caught them gaping at her from time to time, quickly began to treat her as part of the furniture. She got the occasional grin and “Thanks, hen”. Most of them even took their boots off in the hall now without her ever having to ask, but she had the lowering feeling most of her efforts went unnoticed by all except Chrissy.

  Of Brody himself, she saw practically nothing. She wondered, briefly, if he was avoiding her, especially since the incident with the lawyer, but that seemed just as ridiculous as Louise’s theory that he liked her. In fact, she suspected she didn’t actually register on his radar. Which had to be good.

  She cleaned the dining room twice a day and the kitchen whenever she could get into it. She did the communal living room and the shared bathrooms every day and had worked out a rota for the workrooms and the bedrooms.

  By Friday, she’d found that the best time to clean the bedrooms was around lunch. Although everyone ate at different and often odd times, they did tend to congregate in the dining room just after midday. So, on Friday at this time, she finally plucked up the courage to approach Brody’s bedroom.

  His door was ajar, and she made sure to knock and wait before entering, dragging the vacuum cleaner after her.

  As was only fair, he had the biggest room she’d yet seen, and it overlooked the village and the sea. Two doors led off it, one to a clearly visible, untidy bathroom. The other was closed, presumably a cupboard. His bed—a big, wood-framed original, by the look of it—was by the wide open window, and a huge, old-fashioned wardrobe propped up one wall. He had several jam-packed bookcases, a knee-hole desk on which resided a laptop and a musical keyboard. There was a guitar on the half-spread-up bed, and pens and sheets of paper scattered all over the room, including the floor.

  Izzy picked up the fallen pens and the papers. The latter were mostly full of printed musical notation, but despite a sudden desire to look further, she laid them on the desk and immediately reached down to plug in the vacuum cleaner. Before she could switch it on, the sound of running footsteps had her spinning round, for they seemed to come from inside the room.

  The closed cupboard door in the wall burst open, and Glenn Brody strode through it.

  “Fuck,” he said, pulling up short at sight of her.

  Izzy took back control of her dropped jaw. “Were you actually hiding in the cupboard?” From her? Was her ridiculous suspicion right after all?

  His brow twitched with obvious confusion before a breath of laughter escaped him. “God, no, it isn’t a cu
pboard. Look, I’ll show you. Watch the door—it blows shut in the wind.”

  To her surprise, he held the door wide and turned back inside the “cupboard”, which turned out to be a spiral staircase. One hand on the wrought iron rail, he leapt upward. Izzy walked doubtfully to the foot of the stairs and peered up at Brody’s taut rear. Beyond him was sky. Of course. Chrissy had mentioned a roof garden…

  Izzy followed him up the spiral staircase. By the time she got to the top and stepped into the open, he stood to one side, waiting for her. The wind whipped his ponytail about his face, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  A round wooden table and one chair stood a few yards away. Ceramic pots, some bearing plants, were scattered among what looked very old red stone chips. There were even a couple of earth beds. One had a young tree with drooping branches—possibly a flowering cherry. The other, she thought, was a Christmas rose.

  Intrigued, Izzy walked forward. Taken in conjunction with the background scenery of sea and hills, it looked stunning. She touched the back of the single chair, knew an urge to sit in it and just enjoy. But that would be sacrilege. Brody himself hadn’t moved, just stood there. His very stillness made him seem almost—vulnerable, and suddenly, she understood.

  “This is your haven, isn’t it?” she said. “You’ve got everything else here—privacy, open space, big house, music, company when you want it, and purpose. But this is your haven.”

  She spoke without thinking, saying just what was in her head because the surroundings were so beguiling. But as soon as the words stopped, she flushed with embarrassment and did him the courtesy of turning to face him before she muttered, “Sorry.”

  His intense gaze was already on her, but at least he didn’t look angry or disparaging. Of course, it could be he hadn’t heard her. She wasn’t on the radar.

  She took a deep breath and walked back toward the door and work.

  “For what?” he asked as she passed him, and she paused, trying to remember what she’d last said. Sorry.

  “For intruding,” she said, “with a lot of half-assed bollocks.”

  He blinked. “Don’t think that’s possible.”

  “What isn’t?”

  “Half-assed bollocks. But I’m not a doctor.”

  She laughed before she meant to, a quick, breathless chuckle that lightened his face just as Jack’s grin had the first time she’d met him. Or at least, not quite like that. This too was almost a smile, but his eyes were too…warm.

  For a moment, she couldn’t breathe. And it wasn’t fear, let alone revulsion. Her body heated as if from the power of his eyes alone, reminding her of all the parts that had been inactive for the last three years. She’d thought they’d stopped working, or at least fallen into semipermanent slumber, which suited her just fine. But they’d wakened now with a vengeance and clamoured for attention.

  Oh no, not Brody’s… Why does he have to look at me like that.

  But the truth was, he didn’t have to look at her at all. When he did, it was just harder to bear, but something about him had always got to her, even just watching him from the tea shop window.

  Now what the hell do I do?

  Run. Resign.

  Drama queen. You’ve been too long without sex. Ignore it, and it’ll pass.

  “I should get back to work,” she mumbled. Still, he didn’t release her gaze, just reached one arm to the side and held open the door. She nodded thanks and brushed past him. Even through the baggy sweater, his arm seemed to radiate strength. She tried not to look at it, at the veins standing out in his big, scarred yet elegant hand. She wondered how those arms would feel around her, whether those hands would be rough or gentle on her naked skin.

  Oh Jesus. She tried to blink the vision away, to concentrate on reality.

  “Is it all right to clean your room just now?” she managed.

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  He was following her downstairs. Her whole spine tingled, spreading butterflies deeper into her stomach. He could grab her now, draw her back against his hard body with those muscular arms, and if she twisted around, he could kiss her mouth.

  God, I’d let him. I’d melt. What the fuck is the matter with me?

  Nothing. Momentary distraction. She’d start by cleaning his bathroom—surely guaranteed to cure a woman of all but the most blind of crushes. She’d be safe if only his sink was blocked with hair clumps, and his toilet just a tad unsavoury…

  They weren’t.

  When she heard him leaving the bedroom, she closed her eyes.

  She’d just grabbed her rain jacket off the peg in the hall and was shoving her arms into it as she ran toward the front door, when Chrissy poked her head out of her office.

  “Ah—glad I caught you, Izzy. Can I ask you a favour?”

  “Sure.”

  “Any chance you can do an extra couple of hours tonight? The bloody TV people are turning up, and though they’re not staying here—at least not all of them all the time—they’re going to need to eat and drink while they get set up. And most of the guys are off on their weekly binge to Fort William. The ones who’re staying can cook, but they’re shite at clearing up. Give us a hand?”

  Izzy opened her mouth to say regretfully that she couldn’t—and then she remembered she could. Jack was going to his first-ever sleepover with his friend Sean. Izzy hadn’t been sure about letting him do it, but he’d been so keen she’d agreed. And then prayed Louise wouldn’t blab this to Harry, because at his house last night for tea, she was pretty sure that if she hadn’t kept turning the conversation into safer paths, Harry would have asked her out. She harboured the suspicion that he’d even already enlisted Louise’s cooperation in babysitting offers. But Izzy had kept it all pleasant and even asked Harry for tea in her flat next week, although she had every intention of inviting Louise and Morag too.

  “Okay, I’ll try, but I might have to dash off at a moment’s notice.” If Jack got homesick…

  Chrissy grinned. “Thanks, Izzy, you’re a pal!”

  Glenn was in the garage, about to climb into the Land Rover when Izzy ran past in the rain. Rushing to pick her kid up from school. She must be late. He opened his mouth to call to her that he’d give her a lift—then closed it again. He’d freaked her out enough on the roof by staring. When all she’d given him was an understanding as sweet as it was unexpected. If he offered her a lift, she’d think he was stalking her.

  She’d never look at him as she would a normal man. Whatever he did here, he could never undo his past. Her obvious fear the morning he’d confronted the lawyer in the hall had confirmed that. Women like her didn’t have anything to do with men like him. Not that he’d ever socialised with many “respectable” women, even before he went inside, but he knew enough to understand that fucking Izzy in his dreams was as close as he’d ever get to her. He wouldn’t think about the other vision, but he would look out for her…

  “All right, Glenn, let’s go,” Dougie said cheerfully, striding over from the house. “The women of Mallaig await!”

  “You mean the sausages and frozen peas of Mallaig,” Glenn said dryly, remembering a couple of random items from the shopping list.

  “Well, maybe the women who sell us the frozen peas and the sausages,” Dougie amended. “Is that the lassie Izzy tearing down the drive there?”

  Glenn grunted and climbed into the car.

  “She’ll be picking up her lad from the school,” Dougie observed, joining him and slamming the door. “Word is, she brings him up herself. Lives at the B&B. No one knows who the father is.”

  Glenn cast him a look of annoyance as he turned the key in the ignition. “How do you learn all this stuff? I’m damned sure the locals don’t confide in you.”

  “Ah well, she’s not local either, so she’s fair game. Plus she’s suspect now for working up here with us. According to gossip, she doesn’t ev
en claim her child benefit for the boy—that’s not right, is it? And none of the local lads have any luck with her. What do they expect? Bloody teuchters.”

  Glenn eased the car out of the garage. “Aye, well, we can’t all be sophisticated and cosmopolitan like yourself, Dougie.”

  “Fuck off,” said Dougie amiably.

  It was only meaningless banter to pass the time, but for some reason, it set Glenn’s teeth on edge. He didn’t want to talk about Izzy, and yet he wanted to know everything about her. He wanted to know why he dreamed about her. And he didn’t want Dougie or any of the others even trying to chat her up.

  Internally, he curled his lip. Just in case she fell for one of them instead of for him? He shifted uncomfortably and turned the wheel to avoid the largest of the bumps. Around the next corner, he saw Izzy hurrying out of the gates and down the road toward the primary school. For some reason, in her well-used raincoat, hood up against the relentless rain, she looked lonely. And yet still, somehow, sexy as hell. Before he could divert his brain, he imagined screwing her in the rain, perhaps under some tree, with rivulets of water running between her breasts, just begging to be licked up.

  Dream on, arsehole…

  Chapter Five

  Anxiety niggled at Izzy as she walked back up to the big house that evening. Although Jack had remained positively gleeful about staying with Sean and had been quite happy to be left there, he had given her an uncharacteristically big hug to say good-bye. He’d never been away from her at night before, and although the time had long passed when she’d wake up in a cold sweat in the darkness and have to run through to his room to check he was still there, she still wasn’t immune from unease.

  In the dark, Ardknocken House was lit up like a Christmas tree, its windows glittering against the darkness of the hills and the woods. With its turrets and fake battlements, it looked like a fairy-tale castle—although perhaps the one where the wicked queen hung out rather than one where the beautiful princess lived happily ever after.