Highlander in Her Bed (15 page)

Her mood darkening, she wriggled across the covers toward the little radio and CD player on her nightstand and punched a button. At once, the stirring theme from
Phantom of the Opera
filled the room.

"I don't think so," she quipped, jabbing buttons until she found Tchaikovsky's
Pathetique
. Satisfied, she rolled onto her back and stretched.

That was more like it.

While she adored
Phantom
, and made a point of seeing the musical every time she was in London, its soundtrack wasn't what she needed just now.

She'd had enough phantoms recently.
Pathetique
suited her mood better.

Much better.

Closing her eyes, she let the music wash over her. And, as always, Tchaikovsky transported her. Straight into a romantic world filled with her most secret dreams.

A place brimming with bold, dark-eyed knights who flashed melt-your-knees smiles and lived their deepest passions. Brave and daring heroes who feared nothing and loved so fiercely they'd face down the devil for the woman of their heart.

Men who would give their last breath for honor.

Or their lady.

Mara sighed. She could swoon for such a man. For now, she'd just listen to Tchaikovsky and dream.

Fantasize about the dashing knight she'd always hoped would come galloping down Cairn Avenue to rescue and ravish her. He'd never appeared, but she'd held on to the dream. And such hauntingly beautiful music helped her conjure his image.

Only, for some reason, his brown eyes had mysteriously turned green.

Sea green.

And they were staring at her.

She sat bolt upright, her own eyes flying wide.

He stood at the foot of her bed.

In full knightly regalia.

Mara's blood froze. "Ohmigod!"

He leaned against the bedpost and folded his arms. "My lady, I sorely doubt there is one."

Her heart galloping, Mara shot a glance at the door.

It was securely bolted.

And the big upholstered chair still blocked the door to the battlements.

She swallowed. "Y-you can't be in here," she rasped, clutching a pillow to her breast. "I'm dreaming. If I shut my eyes and open them, you'll be gone."

"You know that isn't true, Mara."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"You should know," he said, a tinge of reproach in his voice. "I came to prove my word."

She blinked. "Your word?"

"What I told you today was naught but the truth, yet you doubt me." Beneath his helm's raised visor, his eyes narrowed dangerously. "I do not lie."

"I'm not calling you a liar." Her fingers dug into the pillow. "But what you claim is impossible."

He whipped out his sword, let the hiss of steel answer her.

Mara gulped, inched closer to the headboard. "Look, buster, I don't know what your game is, but that thing looks too real for me to argue with you."

"Make no mistake," he said, his eyes glinting like emeralds. "The blade is real and I do not play games. Shall I prove the sharpness of its steel?"

He advanced on her with slow steps and Mara shrieked. His sword gleamed as if lit from within, and even rheumy-eyed Murdoch would be able to see that its edges were razor sharp.

It was definitely not a reproduction or stage prop.

And when he lunged at her, she knew she would die.

Instead, she felt only a lightning-quick current of air at her ear. Before she could even blink, he'd sheathed the thing and returned to the foot of the bed.

A lock of her hair dangled from his gauntleted hand.

He flashed a devilish grin. "Proof enough, wench?"

Mara stared at him, the grin irking her more than the
wench
.

She lifted her chin. "That only proves that you rented an authentic costume," she tossed at him. "And that you're quick on your feet."

His grin vanished. "You vex me beyond endurance. Begone from my bed, woman, and now, or I shall slice off more than a lock of your hair."

Mara flushed, not missing where his gaze rested. Too late, she realized she was scrunching the pillow so tightly, it'd slipped beneath her breasts.

And that one of her nipples had popped above the lacy edge of her bra.

She bristled, pride keeping her from covering herself. "So you're lecherous as well as rude."

His face darkened. "A leprous infidel whore would stir me more than a female of MacDougall blood. But know this: Had I desired you," he vowed, wiggling the lock of hair at her, "I could have taken you faster than my blade claimed its trophy."

"Oh!" Heat shot onto Mara's cheeks. "Get out of here! This instant!"

"As you wish." He made her a low bow, then headed toward the wall next to the fireplace.

"Hey, tin man," she called after him, "the door is the other way."

He kept going.

But after a few feet, he stopped and glanced round at her. "I do not need the door."

He gave her one more bow, a curt one this time.

Then he strode right through the wall.

Chapter 7

Early the next morning, Mara hurried along a narrow footpath through a grove of ancient yews. Worn wooden signposts placed at regular intervals promised that she was heading toward Ravenscraig's stables, but her doubts increased with every twist and dip of the winding path.

Little more than a deer track, it cut through the thick-growing trees, each new turn giving her brief glimpses of the firth and the outline of the Inner Hebrides, endless isles stretched like hazy blue pearls along the horizon.

Mara's heart swelled, the beauty of her new home stealing her breath.

Better yet, the cold waters winking back at her looked as smooth as slate. Dark and undisturbed. And none of the mist wraiths curling across the rippled surface could be called
man-shaped
.

Grateful for that small miracle, she shook her head, chiding herself for even considering the possibility.

It was a fine misty morning. Nothing more.

Somewhere nearby, she could even hear the pleasing rush of a fast-flowing burn. She could smell its sweet cold water, sensed that its track paralleled the path.

As did the uncomfortable sensation of being watched.

She frowned, unable to deny it.

She'd only miscalculated the direction. Hottie Scottie wasn't out over the Firth of Lome, floating about in drifting curtains of sea mist. He was here, much closer. Angry, dangerous, and maddeningly masculine, his presence eddied all through the grove.

Taunting and teasing until her pulse ran wild and goose bumps rose on every inch of her.

She blew out a breath, swiped at her hair. "
Bunk and rot
," she muttered, repeating Murdoch's assessment of the unholy as if the three words were a mantra.

"Utter bilge," she added for good measure, borrowing that one from a soured shrew who'd lived at the corner of Cairn Avenue.

Not even topping five feet, the tiny woman with her sharp tongue and fierce stare packed a blistering quip for everything under the heavens.

But well-aimed barbs or not, Mara's ghostly Highlander seemed unimpressed.

Certainly not intimidated.

Far from it, the powerful essence of him kept swirling around her. Tantalizing and proud, his awareness of her shivered across her every nerve ending, penetrating her shields and barriers. Forcing her to believe.

To question when he'd become
her
ghostly Highlander.

Not wanting to know, she slid a glance into the trees, preparing for the worst. Judging by his past antics, he might well be leaning against a yew trunk, arms folded, and glaring at her.

Invisibly, of course.

Since last night she knew he could be anywhere.

Do anything. Even seduce her.

See right through her clothes.

"Dear God, I'm losing it," she breathed, skirting a spongy-looking patch of moss. "I'm being stalked by a
ghost
."

A damned sexy one.

She groaned, clamping her lower lip between her teeth as she quickened her pace. So long as she only sensed him and didn't hear him striding after her or spy a sudden flash of weaving steel arcing through the mists, she'd be fine.

She hoped.

Determined to prove it, she inhaled deeply of the tangy air. Fresh Highland air thick with the woodsy scent of damp earth and ferns. Rich, pungent smells that would've delighted her were this an ordinary morning.

But it wasn't, and tearing through an eerie-looking yew grove didn't help.

Especially knowing that the trees lived over a thousand years.

Her mouth went dry at the thought. Large as the Ravenscraig yews were, they'd surely been around in tin man's day, may even have witnessed his treachery. Stood by as he thundered along this very path in the dark of night, the famed Bloodstone of Dalriada tucked securely in a pouch at his belt.

Tin man, indeed.

Apparently so!

She shuddered, drew her jacket tighter against a cold wind knifing past her.

With the wind, the grove seemed to creep in on her, growing darker and more impenetrable-looking with every step she took. Even the firth slipped from view, its sudden absence leaving her hemmed in by the yews' low-spreading branches and her own ill ease.

Equally disconcerting, some of the larger trees appeared hollow, their empty interiors crowded with blackness. Dark shadows demanding exploration.

But not now.

"No-o-o, thanks," she declined, hurrying on.

Thomas the Rhymer came to mind. The great thirteenth-century mystic supposedly slept in just such a hollowed yew, awaiting his rebirth in a similar grove somewhere in the vicinity of Inverness.

If such a hidey-hole was good enough for him, a sword-swinging, MacDougall-hating ghost surely wouldn't hesitate to use a hollowed tree for his own shady purposes.

And it wouldn't be sleeping.

No, he'd be spying on her.

Plotting his next move or maybe even laughing at her.

Certain she wouldn't appreciate his humor, Mara glanced round, scanning the ancient twisted trees and wishing her imagination wasn't quite so rich.

Where were the stables?

Half running, half stumbling, she tripped over a root, her arms flailing. As she righted herself, she grumbled, "The devil was in that," borrowing another of the Cairn Avenue shrew's choice quips.

If only she had a thimble of that besom's vinegar. Instead, she pressed a hand to her hip, breathing hard. Cold winds whipped around her, icy gusts that tossed her hair and tore at her clothes. Almost like unseen hands trying to strip her until she stood naked and shivering on the peaty path.

But the notion steeled her and she straightened her back. "You don't scare me," she vowed, lifting her chin as the wind slackened. "And you'll never see me naked!"

Ahhh, but I already have
, a rich Scottish burr echoed behind her.
And closely enough to know your flaming MacDougall tresses are not tinted
.

Mara's eyes flew wide. "You bastard!" she cried, whirling around.

But nothing greeted her except the empty grove and a lingering trace of his voice, silky deep and disturbing.