Highlander for the Holidays (23 page)

His grip on her hand tightened when she tried to pull away. “You would have done the same thing in my shoes, Jess. I waited for you to tell me, but you were taking too long, considering I’ve known since the night you arrived that I want to make love to you.” His thumb caressed the pulse on her wrist and his eyes took on a twinkle. “I thought I was going to have to fight Duncan for you and then your canine protector.”

Jessie slouched deeper into the chair to lean away. “P-please don’t make it sound like you were plotting to get me.”

“Hey. Hey,” he said, pressing her hand against his chest. “I’m not a stalker. Ye just caught my eye and . . . it wasn’t . . . it
isn’t
like that, Jess.” He suddenly straightened to his full kneeling height. “This isn’t about me; it’s about your dead husband. Eric Dixon was a bully. Did you try to leave him and he threatened you?”

“I was leaving him. That night, actually.” Suddenly feeling stiflingly hot, Jessie pushed the blanket down to her waist, twisting her hand inside of his to grasp his shirt. “I only just remembered that part today when I was walking out the road to meet you. I was supposed to be leaving on a business trip that evening, but I discovered something—only I can’t remember what—and Eric and I were fighting as I was packing my stuff to move out, when . . . when . . .” She pulled her hand away. “The last thing I remember is running into the bathroom when he slapped me. But according to the police detectives, that’s when some guy entered the house and stabbed Eric to death, then broke down the bathroom door and came after me.”

She pulled in a shuddering breath and folded her hands on her lap. “But what they never quite figured out was, considering the severity of my wounds, how I managed to get ahold of the gun Eric kept in his nightstand and put three bullets in the guy.”

“Nobody else was in the house?” Ian asked quietly.

Jessie shook her head. “As far as I know, there was only Eric and me. But Brad is the one who found us and called 9-1-1. He told the police he was coming to talk to Eric about business, and when he heard gunshots he ran upstairs and . . . well, Brad thought the robber moaned or something, and he told the detectives that without even thinking he grabbed the gun out of my hand and shot the man three more times in the head.”

Toby walked over and rested his chin on Jessie’s reclined legs with a concerned whine, and Ian set his elbows on the arm of the chair, rubbing his face. “Christ, no wonder ye have the flashbacks,” he said behind his hands.

Jessie took another deep breath, figuring since Ian already knew a good deal about her past that she might as well tell him what his Internet search hadn’t. She touched his arm. “I had married Eric three months earlier because I was pregnant with his child. We . . . we’d had a week-long affair when he came to a conference in Dallas that I was coordinating, and we kept a long-distance relationship going until the day I called and told him I was five weeks pregnant.”

Ian finally dropped his hands, the anguish in his eyes having turned them a dark, glistening green. “So you were four months pregnant at the time of the attack?”

Jessie nodded. “It was only today I remembered I was leaving him that evening because I’d found out Eric had lied about being sterile in hopes I
would
get pregnant so I’d have to marry him, because . . .” She waved at nothing. “Because apparently I fulfilled some fairy-tale image Eric had of a beautiful home filled with a trophy wife and child. I lost the baby in the attack, and the doctors said I might not be able to conceive again because the knife . . . One of the wounds is . . .” She sucked in another breath and released it slowly. “There’s a lot of scar tissue. And the guy stabbed me in the back when I was trying to get away, and the doctors really didn’t think I would walk again.”

Ian took hold of her hand and pressed it over his pounding heart. “I’m sorry for what you went through, Jess.” He reached down with his free hand and rubbed Toby’s head. “And I’m glad you have this big man to keep you safe now. From what I’ve seen, he’s been doing one hell of a job.”

Jessie ran a finger over Toby’s nose. “I think I would have gone insane without him. Actually, I nearly did the year before he came into my life because I lived in constant fear I’d have a flashback in public. I can’t feel them coming on, but apparently Toby can smell a chemical change in my body or something. And besides buying me time to find a place to hide, he seems to realize how vulnerable I am and stands guard. Because of him, I was able to go back to work instead of locking myself in my condo.”

“Aye, animals have remarkable abilities,” Ian said, gently smoothing down Toby’s concerned brow. “Given a choice, I could spend the rest of my life working with them.”

“You mean like being a veterinarian?” she asked in surprise.

Jessie saw a different kind of anguish enter his eyes despite his grin. “Can you really see me spending four more years in college at my age, just so I can spend my days taking cats’ temperatures and trying to persuade little old ladies that Fido will survive without his daily pound of treats?”

She gave him an equally serious smile. “Well, honestly, no. But I can see you—even at your advanced age—going back to school so you could spend your days taking horses’ temperatures and pulling baling twine out of goats’ mouths. No, no,” she said, shaking her head and broadening her smile at his glare, “I see you more as a wildlife biologist crawling inside some hibernating bear’s den in the middle of the winter. What was your major in college?”

“Business,” he snapped. “Or didn’t you notice I’m in line to take over running TarStone when the elder MacKeages no longer can?”

She grabbed the front of his shirt when he started to stand. “Isn’t it a
long
line?” She waved at the air with her free hand. “Aren’t there enough young men and women in your clan to keep the resort running without you?”

“Ye don’t understand,” he said, carefully peeling her hand away and rising to his feet. “From the time we were born, it’s been expected that Duncan and I would take over running TarStone.”

“Then why isn’t Duncan working at the resort?”

He turned away and headed back to the kitchen area. “Because he prefers moving dirt to moving people up a mountain on a chairlift.” He looked back at her. “Duncan will take his place at TarStone when the time comes. Meanwhile, he’s learning to run a business by running his own construction company. Now, do ye want chicken or beef?” He gave her a tight grin. “Both out of a can.”

Jessie covered her snort by stretching her arms over her head and yawning loudly. “What I want is for you to ride that big ugly snowmobile back to TarStone and take the kids down the tube run while my pain med finishes putting me to sleep and the anti-inflammatory does its job.” She yawned again. “I’m more tired than hungry, Ian.”

“Do you want me to go get your car and take you home?”

“No, I’m good,” she said, settling deeper into the chair and closing her eyes. “Do me a favor, though? Could you turn off my cell phone that’s in my coat pocket and set it on this . . . crate beside the chair? Oh, and bring over my walking stick, too?”

“Anything else?” he asked quietly—maybe too quietly.

“Yeah, a glass of water would be nice.”

“I couldn’t find your phone,” he said from right beside her, making Jessie open her eyes to see him holding something in his fist. “All I found was this,” he said, opening his fingers.

“Ohmigod!” she yelped, trying to snatch her prosthesis out of his hand.

Only she missed, and the bottom half of her left boob plopped onto the floor. Toby immediately jumped up and had it in his mouth before Ian could reach it. The dog then walked around the chair, reared up on the arm, and dropped it onto her lap.

Jessie scooped it up and then pulled the blanket up over her head again.

“And here I thought tennis balls were the fetch toys of choice,” Ian drawled.

“Go away.”

She heard him walking away but she also heard him chuckling under his breath.

She gasped again, dropping the blanket. “What if
Roger
has my phone?”

Ian came back carrying another cell phone, and Jessie shoved the prosthesis down between her and the arm of the chair before reaching for it.

“You can use mine until we find yours or get you a new one,” he said, handing it to her. “Anyone you might need is programmed in, including the resort. If there’s an emergency or you want to reach me this afternoon, call Alec or Duncan, as we’ll all be together up at the tube run. Do ye want me to help you get settled in my bed instead? It would be more comfortable.”

“No, I’m good,” she said, snuggling down into the chair and closing her eyes again—mostly so she’d stop seeing the laughter in his.

How in hell had she forgotten the prosthesis was in her coat?

Jessie heard him set something on the crate beside her and felt him lay her walking stick on the blanket, then heard him putting on his outdoor gear over by the door. Which is why she gave a startled squeak when he touched her arm and she opened her eyes to find him standing beside her again, dressed in his ski bib and jacket. “You walk like a cat,” she muttered.

“Don’t try to stoke the stove when the fire dies down,” he said through his smile. “The furnace will take over. Are ye sure you wouldn’t prefer the bed?”

“No, your chair is really quite comfy and easier to get out of it I have to use the bathroom,” she said, eyeing the tall bed. She reached over and took the remote control off the crate, pointing it at the opposite wall. “And I might feel like watching some television.” She grinned. “You get any porn channels?”

He snatched the remote away and shoved it in his pocket as he strode toward the door, but not before she saw his cheeks darken. “You need anything, call Alec,” he growled as he opened the door, then stopped. He turned to her, his expression making Jessie go perfectly still. “And don’t worry; I’ll be stopping by my truck before I drive your car home.”

Jessie blinked—several times, actually—because she couldn’t imagine why he thought she needed to know that. But then she suddenly gasped at the closing door and pulled the blanket up over her head again even though he was gone.

The condoms were in his truck!

 

 

IAN UNLOCKED JESSIE’S CAR AND SLID IN BEHIND THE wheel, unable to believe he’d been kicked out of Camp Come-As-You-Are; first by Alec when Ian had sent three of the tubes down the mountain with no one on them, then by Duncan—who actually took a swing at him—when Ian had accidentally sent his cousin careening toward a tree while they’d been skiing over to the beginners’ slope. Then, before he even made it inside the lodge, his mother had also sent him packing when she’d asked where Jessie was and he’d explained she’d hurt her back again and was recuperating in his recliner.

But instead of starting the car and heading home to wait hand and foot on Jessie per his mother’s heated instructions, Ian sat staring out the windshield. What in hell had made Jess ask him if he wanted to make love to her? Had she really forgotten the rules of engagement and truly couldn’t tell how much he wanted her, or was he the one who was out of practice when it came to engaging the opposite sex?

He glanced over at his dented old pickup sitting at the far end of the parking lot, the plow making its front end sag. He really did have a box of condoms in the glove box, unopened from when he’d optimistically tossed them in there about a week after he’d come home from Afghanistan. He then glanced up at TarStone, its looming weight palpable as it cast its long shadow over the resort. He’d literally grown up on that mountain, and in all likelihood would probably die on it an old man—assuming Jessie didn’t kill him first.

Ian finally started the car with a snort, remembering her saying she saw him as a wildlife biologist. Megan was the biologist in the family, as none of Greylen’s daughters were expected to take over running TarStone. Grey and Morgan and Callum and Michael MacBain might have been living in this century for over forty years, but they still held on to their eleventh-century identities as highland warriors with the tenacity of a . . . well, of a rottweiler determined to protect his mistress.

First-generation MacKeage and MacBain men were expected to serve at least one stint in the military, and if they didn’t make a career of it, they were then expected to come back and serve the clan. The women, however, were only asked to choose their husbands carefully while pursuing any career they chose—and having a little heathen or two was an added bonus for everyone.

Ian didn’t feel there was anything intrinsically wrong with holding to tradition, as it grounded everyone in a loving and secure environment. But he didn’t like that the men were held to a different standard than the women—although the price the girls had to pay was butting heads with their overprotective male family members.

Ian gave a humorless chuckle and started out of the parking lot. His mom, his grandmother Charlotte (who was Callum’s wife and Duncan’s mom), his aunt Grace, and Libby MacBain had spent the last thirty-odd years walking a fine line trying to turn stubborn eleventh-century warriors into twenty-first-century businessmen while somehow managing to love them despite their antiquated beliefs. As a result, the elders’ personal ethics, strong sense of justice, as well as their code of male conduct were at once both comforting and restricting to the younger Scots.

Ian turned down the Frog Point Road with a sigh, guessing it would take several generations before the MacKeages and MacBains and Gregors learned to successfully straddle both worlds. That the combined clans were rife with members who could manipulate the magic—some being actual
drùidh
s—was on the one hand a plus, but also the very reason they had to stay so tightly bound to the old ways. Magic and modern society were not conducive to each other, and probably the largest hurdle the clansmen of any generation had was finding twenty-first-century mates who could wrap their minds around something that couldn’t be seen, much less explained.