A Kind of Magic (18 page)

“Love is not an issue.”

“Love is always an issue. It’s important.”

“Not always. It’s not the most important thing. Love gets in the way.”

“In the way of what?”

“Of duty, responsibility. You wouldn’t understand.”

“Why not?”

“You’re a woman.”

“What’s that got to do with it?”

“Women only think of love.”

“No we don’t. And you haven’t answered my question.”

“It’s none of your business.” The bitterness was knife-edged. There was the hint of threat in his tone.

Maddie thought about it. One moment she’d been enjoying this man’s company, the conversation, the intimacy. She’d thought he’d been enjoying it as well. The instant they’d veered into personal territory he’d closed up again, had rebuffed her, insulted her, let her know that she wasn’t welcome, that her opinions weren’t important. She hurt and she didn’t like it. It filled her with a deep, malignant anger.

She finally said, with the same sharp tone he’d used, “I see. We aren’t friends, we aren’t lovers, we’re just husband and wife. No emotion either of us feels is the other person’s concern.” She pulled away from him. She got to her feet and drew her cloak tightly around her. “Good night,” she told him as she turned away. “I think I’ll sleep with the horses.”

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He shouldn’t have let her go. Rowan knew that even as he watched Maddie walk out of the tiny circle of firelight.

That was his first thought as he came fully awake at dawn. It wasn’t the only time he’d thought it in the long hours, but for the first time he allowed himself a resigned sigh as he sat up by the cold hearth. He should have called her back or gone after her.

Perhaps what he should have done was follow his first instinct and taken her. It would have proved to her once and for all that she was his wife.

Or perhaps he should have answered her questions, he thought as he ran his hands through his tangled hair. It wasn’t as if his opinion of his father was secret. Every member of the Murray clan knew how he felt. Mostly they didn’t ask him questions though. Oh Rosemary railed on about what he should do from time to time, but that wasn’t the same as trying to probe the depths of his soul. That sort of thing was for a confessor. Fortunately Father Andrew wasn’t the probing sort.

It appeared that Maddie was. Perhaps wives were supposed to be. He didn’t know.

He’d never been married before. He’d heard other men complain about their nagging womenfolk, but some had smiled fondly even as they complained. He barely remembered his mother. He knew how his father had mourned her loss. He only knew that the fairy wife had never seemed to bring anything but joy to his father. He thought that was just a part of her magic.

She’d also brought nothing but neglect to the people and property of Cape Wrath.

No, Rowan admitted, his father had been the neglectful one, the besotted, foolish one. It wasn’t the fairy’s fault to follow her own frivolous nature. Human concerns were not hers. His father had been entirely responsible. Rowan had been told often that he was very like his father. That was why he knew he had to guard his heart from following the same besotted course. He struggled hard not to let emotions rule him. He felt himself losing that battle since he’d found Maddie standing in the road waiting for him whether she knew she was waiting for her husband or not.

Of course Maddie wasn’t a fairy princess, but that wasn’t the point. His determination not to follow his father’s course was the point. It had stopped raining and thin trails of fog brushed across the ground outside. Oh Maddie was touched by magic, he admitted, but she wasn’t happy about it, didn’t even want to acknowledge it.

She wasn’t a delicate, ethereal, whimsical creature made for dancing in moonlit glades.

She couldn’t run lightly across the wisps of mist outside or dance on the raindrops gathered on the treetops. She was a big girl with big feet and a brash tongue and firm notions. Firm breasts as well and wonderfully curving hips—big, bright eyes and bright red hair. She was very much a creature of the daylight, probably far too practical to go 106

A Kind of Magic

frolicking in the moonlight. She was full of practical notions for all that they required large leaps of thought to follow. He liked it that she made him think.

He wasn’t so sure he liked that she made him feel as well. Feelings were dangerous, too easy to lose control of. He shouldn’t have frightened her away just as they were getting to know each other. She threatened his control. Being a woman, she wouldn’t see showing emotions as a threat. Women liked to talk about their feelings, to pry into other people’s. She’d only been following her nature to ask.

He should have followed his—and her—into the stable and brought her back to sleep beside him. Well, he hadn’t. He’d spent the night in a fevered doze while his dreams and thoughts ran wild with visions of what might have been. He only hoped that she’d been just as miserable, just as restless and needy. With a feral smile he got up to go see.

Maddie felt like she’d spent the night sleeping on a dirt floor in a stable.

“Probably,” she muttered as she shook out her rumpled clothing, “because I did.”

“You talk too much.”

Since she doubted either of the horses had acquired a voice during the night, she could only assume the husky voice behind her belong to Rowan.

“You sound like you’ve got a cold,” she said. She didn’t turn around. She concentrated on running her fingers through her hair then plaiting it into a thick braid.

She heard him come up behind her as she worked, close enough so that she could feel his body heat, but she still didn’t turn around.

He put a hand on her hip. “I’m not cold.”

She moved away and finally turned to face him. Rowan didn’t look as if he’d slept any better than she had. “If I had to time travel,” she addressed the unknown agent that had brought her to the past. “Couldn’t I have ended up in the lap of luxury in Renaissance Venice? Or maybe a Turkish or Moorish palace where they had running water and hot baths? No.” She gestured around the primitive surroundings. “Do I end up somewhere where I could be an exotic, pampered beauty? No. I end up as one of my own starving peasant ancestors. There is no fairness to this.”

Rowan put his hands on his lean hips and gave her one of his narrow-eyed, icy looks. “What makes you think life should be fair?”

“Why shouldn’t it be?” she shot back.

“Make the best of what you’ve got.”

She nodded. “Oh I agree with that. Having been given peanuts I might as well make peanut butter, cooking oil and crush the shells for fertilizer. I’ll make do, I’m just tired and whiny. It was a rough night.”

A sudden grin transformed his face. Lord, but he was handsome when he let himself be! “You missed my company in the night.”

It wasn’t a question. Maddie snorted. “You wish.” No way was she going to let him know he was right. Sleep had come in fits and starts, mixed with speculation and 107

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questions. And anger, lots of anger. Some of it had been directed at Rowan Murray, some at herself and most of it at the fate that had been thrown her way. She’d even cried a bit, which was not like her at all. She’d been tempted a few times to march into where Rowan was sleeping and demand a hug. It wasn’t like her at all but she couldn’t deny that she was feeling pretty vulnerable and emotionally needy.

It wasn’t just emotional need either. She’d craved Rowan’s physical presence as well. She’d craved his touch. She still did, even though she’d automatically moved away when he put his hand on her just now.

She was terribly confused.

It had just sort of happened.

She wanted him. Physically and emotionally wanted him.

That night when she’d beaned him with the basin, she’d been certain she’d never want him touching her. Now she couldn’t think of anything else. Not that much time had passed, not that much had happened, but something was different. Was she reacting to his having saved that little boy’s life? Okay, that had been a fine act of heroism, very manly and all that. Rowan was all sinewy muscles and sweat and steely-eyed determination to do what a man had to do. In theory, these were not bad qualities.

Except possibly the sweat but even it had a certain masculine appeal under the right circumstances. Rowan Murray was all man.

The problem was, she wasn’t much of a woman. She didn’t know how to be a woman. She suspected he could teach her. But how could a man teach a female how to be womanly? All she knew was that she felt more as she thought a woman was supposed to feel when he looked at her—all warm and alive and aware, all the way down to some part of her that had never been touched. It was ironic that Mr. Stern and Stoic was the one who made her feel all Soft and Squishy.

Besides, he wasn’t exactly Mr. Perfect. Hell, she didn’t even think Toby Coltrane was Mr. Perfect anymore. She didn’t know what she thought. Except that she wanted something to eat and a bath. And maybe a kiss. No, she wasn’t going to think about that.

“Maybe there is no Mr. Perfect,” she muttered, and sidled past Rowan to go to the door. There was a light fog covering the ground but the sky overhead was mostly clear.

The day promised to be warm and somewhat sunny. Maddie took deep breaths of the clear mountain air, appreciating it until her stomach began to rumble. When Rowan followed her outside, she looked back at him and asked, “Where’s the nearest lake?”

He looked at her suspiciously. “Why?”

“I’m going to go fishing and take a swim.”

Rowan frowned. “I didn’t come up into the hills to take a holiday. I’ve got work to do.”

“Well then, go do it.
I
want to go for a swim.”

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Rowan considered her intentions. He liked fish and he didn’t doubt she’d find a way to catch some. If she were going for a swim, she’d have to shed her clothes to do it.

He’d like to see her shed her clothes. “Aye,” he agreed. “We’ll do what you want, just this once. Come on, help me saddle the horses.”

* * * * *

While Rowan gathered firewood, Maddie stood in the water and tickled fish. Once she’d lulled them into her grasp, she tossed them out of the water. She let Rowan take care of cleaning and cooking. So far she’d coaxed four trout from the stream that flowed out of the small mountain lake he’d brought her to.

They shared a fairly comfortable silence until they settled down to eat. Then Maddie looked around, sighed, and said, “It’s really beautiful here. So peaceful.”

Rowan chewed thoughtfully and followed Maddie’s gaze as he picked bones out of his teeth. “Beauty? ’Tis just rocks and trees and water, the same as always.”

Maddie laughed. “It may be just home to you but a few hundred years from now this is going to be a tourist’s idea of paradise—Northern Grandeur variety. Tourism,”

she explained as he gave her a puzzled look, “is something I think the Vikings probably invented. You know, going off on summer cruises to faraway lands and doing a little shopping before heading home to the fjords for the winter.”

Rowan grunted. She was joking, he could tell by her tone, but he had no idea what the joke was. He answered, “There’s many a Norseman who settle in the lands they invade.”

She shrugged. “That’s true. I’ve got a Clan Anderson in my Scottish background.

The point is, darlin’, this place is beautiful and I’m enjoying the beauty of the day.” She wiped her fingers on damp leaves then stood and stretched.

Rowan watched her, though not as openly as he had when she’d stripped down to her underdress, pulled it up around her knees and waded into the stream to fish. He rubbed a hand thoughtfully along his jaw. It was rough with a day’s growth of beard.

Unlike most men, he liked his face smooth and hairless, though a beard was less trouble than having to take a razor everywhere he went.

“This tourism,” he asked as he considered her. “Does it have something to do with looking at things?”

She smiled at him. It was a smile so bright he felt like he’d been hit by a brilliant shaft of sunlight. “Yes it does.”

She was wearing little more than her underdress. Her luscious body was wonderfully outlined by the thin linen. He recalled the sight of her breasts very nearly spilling out over the top of her shift when she’d been bent over the water. Now
that
had been a beautiful sight. It was a pity she kept her breasts covered in an odd, twin-pouched sort of band of cloth or he would have had a proper view of them then.

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He got to his feet. “There are some things in the Highlands worth looking at.” He stepped closer to her. “I’m looking at one of them now.”

Maddie had no idea what Rowan was talking about but there was a disturbing glint in the man’s eyes. Actually, it wasn’t disturbing, it was more compelling. It was as if he were
really
looking at her as opposed to
merely
looking at her. She wasn’t sure what the difference was but it sent a warm shiver all the way through her.

She pointed at herself. “You talking about me?”

“Aye.”

“You feeling all right?”

Her brows were drawn down suspiciously, her generous mouth thinned in puzzlement. She’d looked at him like this before, but this time he found it adorable. He didn’t know why. “You’re a difficult woman,” he said. “Can you not recognize a compliment when you hear one?”

“I didn’t know you knew how to make them.”

“I don’t.”

“But—” Maddie shook her head in frustration. “I’m going for a swim,” she announced. She moved toward the lake, kind of hoping Rowan would grab her and start some kissy-face stuff on her way past, but he didn’t.

Rowan didn’t know why he let her go, maybe he wanted her to come to him, to offer herself as she had on their wedding day. He wanted her to let him know what she wanted instead of letting him guess. He thought he should just grab her but Rosemary’s admonition to court his wife held him back. That is, until she paused by the edge of the loch, glanced provocatively back at him and pulled off her shift.