Playboy's Challenge (Highlander's Series) (13 page)

His horse was where he’d left him, and with a sigh of relief, they mounted up. Deidra held on tight, her delicious body rubbing against his back as they galloped as far and as fast as they could. He had to stop thinking of her, of that kiss, and remind himself that no matter what he wanted, no matter how sweet her kisses, or delectable her body, he couldn’t have her.

With miles behind them, he slowed their harried pace to a walk.

“I think we’re safe for now,” he said. He looked over his shoulder at the top of her head where it rested against his back. “You still holding up okay?”

“Aye. My head is finally clearing.”

“Good. That’s good.” Hopefully, he thought, with a clear head she’d never mention that kiss or the promise of more again, because he only had just so much willpower.

“Can we no’ stop for a while?” she asked.

“Sure. It won’t be long before we meet up with everyone else anyway.”

“Everyone else?”

“Yeah, we found Aunt Tuck and Uncle Colin, and had just returned when all hell was breaking lose with your disappearance. My mom and dad are there too. So they’re all probably out looking for both of us by now.”

“Then Da and Mum are no’ hurt?”

“Nope. And they had no knowledge of any kidnapping or that anything was wrong.”

“Good, but wait. Did you no’ say your parents were here?”

“Surprised the hell out of me too,” he said with a soft chuckle. “Mom said she’d explain it all later, but I think she’s figured out how to travel whenever they want.”

“Then you could go home whene’er you wish.”

“I guess so.”

He reined in their horse beside a stream and jumped down. “This looks like a good spot to water the horse and stretch our legs.”

“Aye. ’Tis a fine spot.”

Adam ignored the sultry tone of her voice, certain it was his imagination, and lifted his arms to help her down.

But once her feet touched the ground, and her arms slid around his neck, he couldn’t seem to let her go, nor did he want to. He knew it was crazy, that he was risking everything, risking harming the one woman he would walk through fire for, but he just couldn’t stop himself.

Her lips met his softly on a sigh, but he forced himself to ease her from his arms. “I won’t take advantage of you, Dee. That drug has you mixed up—”

“Nay. ’Tis no drug that makes me feel this way.”

She pressed against him once more, allowing her lips to brush against his, and he could no more let her go, than he could speed the moon across the sky.

“You should push me away,” he whispered, trailing kisses along her cheek, to her ear, then to her neck where he pressed his face against her delicate skin, aching to crawl inside her where he was someone better—someone worthy.

“Ne’er could I do such a thing. I have wanted this—wanted you for far too long.”

Lifting his head, he peered into her eyes filled with sincerity. But he slowly shook his head, unwilling to take what she offered. “I don’t deserve—”

“Shh,” she said, pressing her fingers to his lips. “You deserve whate’er I wish to give.”

His heart struck against his chest with such force it felt as though his ribs had cracked. Clamping his lids closed, he took a deep breath. He would hurt her, break her heart, let her down just like so many others.

“Make love to me, Adam,” she whispered against his lips. “I want to feel you, to be with you.”

Unable to bear the onslaught of her soft lips against his skin, her sweet pleas, and luscious body pressed against him, he gave her his answer in a kiss.

Their tongues dueled, their breaths mingled, and a moan tore from his throat. It was too late to stop the pain that would come, too late to keep from hurting her—or himself.

She pulled from his arms, a sly enticing grin on her moist lips, and strolled toward a grassy place at the edge of the wood. Adam snagged the blanket from the saddle then followed. With every step, he told himself to stop, to change direction, to take her back to her family and never touch her again, but his heart refused to allow his good sense to rule his actions.

He spread the blanket on the ground and together they lay down in the shadows cast by the moonlight. With unsteady hands, they rid themselves of each other’s clothes between hot, sweet kisses, and cherished caresses.

The filtered glow of the moon upon her alabaster skin was lovelier than any masterpiece Adam had ever seen or would see. Nothing would ever take this one image from his mind. Not time, not the centuries that existed between them, not even death.

Poised above her on his elbows, he pressed tender kisses to every exposed inch his lips could reach, and she did the same to him. The sensation was a heady mix of pleasure and perfection. Her soft moans as he worshiped her breasts, the subtle rubbing of her thigh against his erection, drove him to the brink, and finally, with one slow but fluid stroke, he entered her tight passage.

Adam lifted his gaze to hers, and she smiled. Slipping her hand to the base of his neck, she pulled him down for a long, delicious kiss, as he stroked her heated core. Higher and higher they rose, and just after she found nirvana, he pulled from her to do the same.

“Why did you do that?” she asked, her voice broken with quickened breaths.

Collapsed beside her, he turned his head to face her. “I won’t leave you with a baby, Dee,” he said, his own breathing heavy.

“Oh,” she said, and shifted her gaze to the night sky.

He rose up on his elbow to better see her face, and even in the dark, he could see regret in her eyes. There wasn’t any doubt he’d taken her virginity, and he was leaving the first chance he got. He should’ve kept his hands to himself and his pecker in his pants.

With a disgusted sigh, he got to his feet and snatched up his clothes. “We need to get going. Last thing I need is for your father to catch us like this.”

“Aye,” she said, her voice hollow.

He’d known this would happen, that he’d blow it, that he’d hurt her, but he did it anyway. When would he ever learn? When would he get it through his thick skull that he was no good for anybody?

As he continued to silently damn his soul, they finished dressing in silence. Deidra could barely stomach it. She wanted to say she loved him, but after he reminded her that he was only a visitor in her time, she didn’t dare. Their coming together for this single moment would have to be enough.

He worried about leaving her with a child, not wishing to burden her in such a way, and she didn’t wish to burden him with her heart. She had doubts that he would accept it, in any event.

But none of it mattered, she realized as she took her place behind him atop the horse. He would leave, and she would never see him again. This she knew with all her heart, a heart that was breaking.

How could such an organ survive so many beatings in one day? First she thought him dead, then he was alive, then he was loving her, and now—now he was gone again. He’d pulled away from her, his manner and tone cool. He’d not wanted to lie with her, thinking himself unworthy, but she knew it was more than that.

She was not a woman men wanted. She’d learned that years ago. But she had hoped, if only for a moment that Adam would be different, that he would want her for always.

Her arms tightened around his waist as new tears sprang to her eyes. Oh, how she wished he had left her with a babe. Then she would have part of him with her when he left. But it was not to be. She would grow old alone, for no man would ever take his place in her heart or in her bed.

Chapter Eleven

Adam pasted on one of his false grins as they came upon Colin, his father, and several guards. He didn’t dare let on what had transpired between him and Deidra, but it had been a close call. It was a good thing they’d gotten dressed when they did or his ass would be in a sling about now.

Colin pulled up beside them and gave Deidra a good once-over, his eyes a bit glassy. But Adam wasn’t about to comment on that. The old Scot would happily knock him clean off his horse for the slightest suggestion of womanliness.

“How do ye, daughter?”

“I am fine, Da.”

Colin’s jaw clenched then he looked to Adam and gave him a terse nod. “I am grateful, lad.”

Adam managed a nod in return, but felt like slime. He didn’t deserve any thanks, not after taking his daughter’s virginity only to leave her behind in the past.

“Macconach has plans to meet with Gorin at the ruins,” Deidra said.

“Before,” Adam interjected. “Now, when he finds her gone, he may change his plans.”

“Nay,” Ian said.

That one word, echoed in Adam’s head, drowning out the conversation happening around him. It was one of many words that slipped from his father’s lips every once in a while, and upon those occasions he’d usually grimace then quickly correct himself. But not this time.

It was his life
, his mother said. The reality of that statement hit him square between the eyes. His father was a seventeenth century English nobleman. He’d learned how to ride and use a sword because it was the only way to survive.

All this time he’d been playacting, pretending to belong in the twenty-first century. Trying to be what he was supposed to be, when deep down he was nothing like the man Adam thought he knew.

“Are you going to sit there all night?” Ian asked.

“What? Oh, um, no. No, just thinking,” he said, and slid from his horse. Stunned to realize that Deidra had already dismounted and crossed to where her brother and the others were discussing their next step.

Adam fell in step beside his father, crossing the small clearing to where Colin was drawing out a plan in the dirt. He’d sent two men on ahead to watch for Macconach and his men.

Deidra wasn’t happy about his edict that she would return to the keep, flanked by guards and Erin.

“But I wish to ride with you, Da,” Erin said.

“And that you will. But I need ye ta see that the keep is secure first, and then bring more men. I doona wish ta give the whoresons any chance of escape.”

“I have every right to see the man dead,” Deidra said, her lips pulled into a deep frown.

Adam was distracted all over again as he remembered how she felt, how she tasted. How her lips glistened in the moonlight, wet from his kisses.

“’Tis no’ a discussion, Dee. Ye will go back ta the keep with Erin,” Colin said, and returned to his planning. “And once ye arrive home, ye are no’ ta tell your mum about any of this.”

She folded her arms with a huff, but didn’t exactly agree. Stubborn didn’t begin to describe her, and regardless of the wrong he’d committed, Adam couldn’t contain his smile. She was such a beautiful sight.

“I mean it, lass. She isna’ ta be told. ’Tis for her safety and yers.”

With a sigh, she dropped her arms. “Verra well.”

Satisfied with her answer, although Adam wouldn’t put it past her to have something up her sleeve, Colin continued with his plan. Once word returned of Macconach’s movements, they would intercept him at the ruins and put an end to Gorin’s schemes once and for all.

With some murmured agreements from the guard and Adam’s father, Colin put Deidra atop a horse and pointed her in the direction of home. She glanced in Adam’s direction, but it lasted barely an instant before she was riding away.

He shook his head with a sigh. When he screwed up, he screwed up royally. The regret he’d seen in her eyes would turn to revulsion, and what little friendship they might be able to muster from the debacle would turn to dust. It was a good thing he was going home soon, back to his own time.

A hard slap to Adam’s back, nearly toppled him to the ground.

“I am proud of you, son,” Ian said.

His gaze flew to his father’s. “Um, yeah, well, I had a hunch and went with it. But knowing Deidra, she would’ve found her own way out eventually,” he said with a forced chuckle.

His father squeezed his shoulder and grinned. “No doubt, but ’twas your quick thinking on the matter and that you acted, regardless of the danger, that should be applauded.” He glanced in the direction Deidra had ridden.

“Although, I suspect, your mother is likely to take a few strips off your hide for taking on the task alone. But today, you showed the world what I have known all along. That you are a good man, a good son, and I could not have asked for better.” He pulled him into a quick and hearty embrace, forcing the air from Adam’s lungs.

For the first time in more years than he could remember, Adam hugged his father and hid the happy tears behind his lids.

Another slap on the back and hearty chuckle echoed around them, and he and his father broke apart.

“Well now, you two Sassenachs,” Colin said, a bright smile on his burly face as he squeezed the back of both Adam and his father’s necks. “Are ye up for a bit of a battle?”

With a hoarse chuckle and a wide smile, his father replied, “A bit of sport sounds like the very thing, old friend.”

“Sport?” Adam shook his head with a rough laugh. “You two are nuts, but…count me in.”

****

Deidra bit back her tears as she rode home. Now was not the time to wallow in self-pity. Macconach and Gorin had to be stopped, and she was determined to have a hand in their end.

Setting her teeth, she twisted the pain and loss in her heart into the need for vengeance. She refused to be any man’s pawn.

Once she arrived and was released from her mother’s powerful embrace, she explained what had happened, leaving out the details her father forbade her to divulge. But her mother was no one’s fool.

“Why that sneaky old Scot,” Tuck said with a huff. “As if I wouldn’t know exactly what he was up to.”

“I didna’ think it was worth the effort to conceal it, but he demanded that I do so,” Deidra said.

“I’ll just bet he did.” Her mother put an arm around her shoulder and the other around Jenny’s. “So, ladies, are we up for a little subterfuge?”

“Why do I feel like that was too easy?” Erin asked no one in particular.

With a light-hearted laugh, the women entered the castle leaving a group of perplexed men standing in the bailey.

Usually when her father behaved in such a way, her mother would bathe the air with curses upon his head. But this laugh, this look, was much more lethal and her poor brother had no idea.