Defending Destiny (The Warrior Chronicles) (4 page)

“Daisy,” Magnus called. She swatted at him without really paying attention. He needed to be quiet. She needed to think.

“Daisy,” he said again.

She ignored him.

“
Daisy
.” This time he grabbed her arms as he said her name. “Listen to me.” He gave her a little shake. Something in the way he was holding her, looking at her, made her stop mentally mapping Scotland for possible sword sites and pay attention. Magnus was scared. Maybe scared wasn’t the right word, but he was definitely concerned for her in a way that had nothing to do with their personal history and everything to do with here and now.

“Lauren heard rumblings about a portion of the Druid’s Scroll. You know your sister is the best asset the Council has when it comes to finding the scroll, but they don’t trust her or any of you.” When she opened her mouth to comment he shook her. “The Arm-Righ is lusting after that particular artifact like Cronos after gold. He’ll stop at nothing to get it, and he’ll eat and spit out anyone who gets in his way. He’ll use you to find it, but the second you do, he’ll kill you just to watch your family suffer.”

“I’m not afraid of the Arm-Righ.”

He shook her again. “Then you’re a fool.” Magnus looked at her with a pleading heart and she understood he was afraid for her. That took all the heat and the excitement out of her. Suddenly she was very tired. He dropped his forehead to hers. “The King is making threats, lass. It’s no’ a matter to be taken lightly.”

“So you’re my bodyguard?”

“Amongst other things.”

“What other things?” Daisy said, more sharply than she intended. Magnus immediately let her go.

“I’ve made a life of my own over the past ten years. You haven’t spoken ten words to me in as many years. You don’t need to know everything about me in the ten minutes you’ve let me talk to you.” He slipped into his native Orkney cadence and cant, one Daisy found particularly appealing.

Daisy shut down. She wouldn’t let him worm his way back into her heart by Highlandering his way there. She wasn’t that far gone.
Yet
.

“Get out of my suite, Magnus. I can take care of myself without your help. I’ve done marvelously well so far.”

Liar.

“Not a chance, lass. I’ll no’ be goin’ anywhere without you.” He pronounced “you” like the sheep:
ewe.
A long, drawn-out sound that threatened her resolve to push him away.

“Bring out that brogue again, Highlander, and I’ll drop you where you stand.”

He had the audacity to wink at her. “I wish you’d try, lass. I really do.”

Daisy grabbed her notebook, along with the small neatly folded towel, and as regally as her oiled feet would carry her, walked to her bedroom. With a quiet calm she didn’t feel, she closed the slatted wooden doors, trying and failing to lock Magnus out.

CHAPTER FOUR

She shut the door on him more than three hours ago, after tossing one of the pillows and an extra blanket at his head. Magnus could hear her through the slatted door, tossing and turning. He was a light sleeper by necessity. Magnus was relatively certain he was the one keeping her from her dreams tonight. He was the reason Daisy was alternating between flopping from side to side and punching her pillow. He smiled in the dark, resting his hands behind his head. She was probably imagining him with horns
and
a tail by now.

The chemical scent of the pool permeated the dry air in the suite, mingling with the scent of apples and the peppermint-infused oil that must have soaked into her skin. He contemplated calling out to her. He almost did several times. Then he’d hear her punch her pillow again, sigh heavily, and go back to flopping. Magnus didn’t think his voice or his presence invading her space any more intimately than he already had was going to get him anywhere. The gentle hum of the central air didn’t completely eradicate the night soun
ds of the active Sedona resort.

Magnus actively slowed his breathing, shifting his intention from sleep to meditation. He wouldn’t sleep until Daisy did, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t calm his mind. He’d just about gotten to that sweet spot where thoughts flowed through but didn’t stay, when Daisy’s quiet but clear voice broke the calm he tried to create.

“We never talked about it, but you should know why I left and didn’t follow through with the wedding; especially if we’re going to be joined at the hip. I don’t want any misunderstandings between us.”

She could have phrased that a little better, in Magnus’ opinion. He was already imagining her naked, their hips joined as they slowly moved together. Time had taught Magnus caution. He kept his mouth shut.

“I know you’re awake, Magnus. I can
feel
you out there, lying in the dark, thinking.”

He doubted she knew what he was thinking or how dark his thoughts ran with need and want. The air around him was thick with it. At least she still felt his desire, even from a distance. That was no small thing.

“I left because I didn’t want to force you into a life you didn’t ask for and definitely didn’t want. I know I should have thought of that before I came to your bed.”

She paused and her breath caught audibly in her throat. Magnus thought he heard her whimper, but the sound was so faint and so out of character that he couldn’t be sure. He ached to hold her, but knew instinctively that if he approached her now, before she said what she’d been holding in all this time, he’d do far more damage.

When she started again, her voice was controlled. So much so, had he heard that tone from anyone else he would have thought it devoid of emotion. He’d say one thing for her, she’d perfected that I-don’t-care-anymore tone that resonated like nails on a chalkboard. The hair at the back of his neck stood on end and all he wanted to do was un-hear it.

“I knew what would happen when I came to you that night, and I came anyway. I meant for us to get caught. I knew your parents would push you to marry me and I knew you’d do it because you’d see it as the honorable thing to do. I knew, Magnus. Every step of the way, I knew what I was doing.”

Magnus searched for some of the old anger and resentment he’d felt the morning after he’d made love to Daisy, but there wasn’t even a hint of it anymore. Life, and the friend he’d lost as a result of his own actions that morning, had swept all that away, leaving only emptiness that he still didn’t know how to fill.

He said nothing. Mostly because he didn’t know what to say that wouldn’t make the situation worse.

“I’ll say this once. Then never again. I
am
sorry. For all of it. Mostly for thinking only of myself and what I wanted. You were right that morning. You’ve been right every day since. I was a pampered, petty little rich bitch who didn’t know a bloody thing about real love or desire and wouldn’t recognize either one if they bit me on my skinny
arse.
”

It took Magnus less than three words to recognize the fact that she’d memorized every word he spat at her that morning. She remembered every bloody word. There was no inflection at all when she started talking again. It was as if in reciting his words back to him, they’d lost all their power over her. He felt more than heartsick. He wanted to go back in time and kick his own arse.

“Rest assured, I learned my lesson. We didn’t belong together. I was ridiculous to ever think we did. Let’s forget it ever happened and try to get through however long we need to be in each other’s company without killing one another.”

He wanted to tell her she’d never been ridiculous and apologize for being the cruel bastard he was then, but her next words stopped him.

“I don’t love you anymore, Magnus. I haven’t for a long time. I won’t be slipping into your bed with love on my lips and my heart on my sleeve ever again. You’ve got nothing to worry about on that front. I’m over it. And I’m over you.”

Daisy said the last words with the kind of definitive finality that said
Back the fuck off,
like a swift kick to the balls. Her words echoed through him painfully. He could barely breathe as his insides turned to melted iron ore, decimating everything inside him.

Magnus replayed the morning of their wedding back in his mind, finding the words she’d just repeated were accurate. He’d meant them then. Lord and Lady, he’d been so angry and so afraid he’d killed the only thing that made him feel important.

He was so angry with himself for taking advantage of Daisy. Her vulnerability, her sweetness, and her quiet strength in openly coming to him with her desire had been so damned empowering all he could think about was sinking into her and taking everything she so innocently offered. She could say she knew what she was doing until she believed it, but Magnus knew better. Had he cared more for her than he did for his own need he would have covered her up, kissed her forehead, and sent her away so he could jack off the rest of the night. But he didn’t. He jumped on her instead.

He’d known she loved him. He’d known it since she was twelve. The rest of their family knew it too, because she announced it on her thirteenth birthday along with her intent to marry him. He’d smiled condescendingly and kissed the top of her head, already worldwise and full of himself at eighteen. He’d gotten laid that night. He couldn’t remember the woman’s name or even the color of her hair. He did remember Daisy’s golden eyes staring up at him from her freckled thirteen-year-old face, beaming her unconditional love at him. It was her eyes, albeit in an older version of herself, he saw in his mind’s eye that night, not in the young grad student’s he happened to be fucking.

Hell, he still saw her eyes in his mind every time he got off.

Daisy’s love for him then had been as pure and hot as the sun and so blinding, he felt scorched by its intensity.

I don’t love you anymore…

Remembering the morning of his wedding cut him now like it hadn’t then. Then, he’d been numb. He’d stumbled upon her as she was finishing her hair. It was long then and she’d fashioned it back away from her face with some kind of white flower comb. She looked improbably delicate and sweet and so beautiful it made his teeth hurt to look at her. Then, the thought of spending the rest of his life with her came crashing down on him with the impact of a giant meteor threatening to end life as he knew it; scorch and burn into oblivion. He’d blamed her with a white-hot purifying hatred for being exactly what she was then, young and in love.

I don’t love you anymore…

He watched the light leave her eyes as he rained down on her every hot emotion coursing through him. He blamed her for his own lack of restraint. Hell, he blamed her for the sun shining on a day better fitted for funeral weather. He watched, coldly satisfied as the tangible goodness and light left her and something heavy and dim took its place. As much as he hated himself for it, he still couldn’t stem the spewing vitriol coming from his mouth. He was like a man possessed and he’d meant every soul-killing word of his self-righteous rant. Then. Then he wanted to kill her love for him so completely it wouldn’t follow him wherever he went.

More the fool he. All he felt every bloody day since, was its loss.

I don’t love you anymore…

Magnus heard Daisy snore softly from the bedroom. It was as if now that she’d said the words aloud she’d purged the memory. He wasn’t sure if she meant what she said, but he was sure about what he felt and what he meant to do about it. If she decided to hand him his heart on a stick, well, he guessed he deserved it. But he wasn’t about to let this chance to have her back in his life go without one bloody hell of a fight.

“You will love me again, lass. I’ll no’ stop ’til it’s so.” Twice more he said the words, willing them to come true, hoping the Lord and Lady were listening and in a forgiving frame of mind.

CHAPTER FIVE

Lauren MacBain decided long ago to live his life filled with doing what he loved every day. Somewhere along the way, doing what he loved morphed into an intensified existence that had grown increasingly lonely. Most of the time, he didn’t think about that. Most of the time, he was too busy finding the next Celtic or Viking antiquity on his list.

He was on a mission, doing what he loved doing, looking for artifacts in one of his favorite places on earth, Scotland. Argyll, to be precise. Scotland’s rainforest. Most men his age would choose the Caribbean or Bali, Lauren smiled to himself, or at least eastern Scotland, preferably St. Andrews with its famous golf course. Lauren played, but only when the situation required it. His preferences lay in the cosmic pull of discovery and the bone-deep satisfaction of recovering objects thought to be only legends.

He was well known in some parts of Scotland, but not in Kilmartin. No one recognized him here. Just another bone-kicker among bone-kickers and new-age weirdoes looking for the meaning of life in myth and magic and things long buried. While the last bit was true, the rest was nothing more than a pleasant disguise.

Lauren ordered Magnus to bring Daisy to Kilmartin to find one of those long-buried things. At least, that was what he told Magnus. He’d ordered Daisy there for more than one reason. On the surface, she’d be shooting a short documentary produced by MacBain Enterprises for his IMAX museums about Celtic myth and history.