Some Like It Scot (21 page)

“I-I don't know,” she told him, shaken by his intensity. “Graham, it's me. Katie. I—”

“No, it's no' you. It's…I dinnae know who or what you are. Ye've her look, her sound, but ye're no' my Katie.”

My Katie?
My
Katie
?

“Graham, wake up!” she said, her thoughts as jumbled as her nerves…and her hormones. Having two hundred plus pounds of aggressive Scot on top of her was doing all kinds of things to her ability to breathe, and almost none of them had to do with his size. “You're dreaming, or—or something. It's okay, we're in Castlebay, at the inn. You don't have to worry. I understand about your need to do things your way. I'm not going to interfere, Graham.”

He snorted at that. “Interfere? Ye've already done that. I want it to stop, I want—”

She managed to free her hands from his shoulders, and placed them on his face gently, but firmly. “Graham, look at me. It's me,” she implored. “It's okay.”

The instant she touched his face, his gaze sharpened further, and she felt more pinned down by his eyes than she did by his body.

His pupils expanded as a darker desire sprang to life. What had come before paled in comparison. She felt delicate and delectable, about to be thoroughly devoured. She wriggled beneath him in a useless, instinctive attempt to assuage the spear of ache and need arrowing straight through her, which only served to further ignite him.

He angled his mouth over hers, and the minute his lips were crushed against hers, the bed disappeared, the whole room disappeared. She swore her eyes were open, but obviously she'd slipped into some kind of dream world, because she could smell…grass. And flowers. And…sea air. She could feel the warmth of the sun. Feel the uneven ground under her back.

Graham was kissing her as if his very life depended on it. She clung to him, kissing him back, thinking if she closed her eyes and focused on him, it would sort itself out.

But closing her eyes pulled her in more deeply.

She was both in the moment and watching the moment. She was on a blanket, in a field. There was some kind of old, very old, gray stone building in the distance, the bright blue of the sea behind that. He was on top of her. On top of—a woman. Her. She was confused.

The woman had longer blond hair, and wore clothes that looked like she was part of the cast of a Renaissance Fair. The man wore a kilt, same tartan as the one she'd been staring at for two straight days, only it was…different. In the make of it, and the weave. It wasn't as smooth or refined. And it was bunched under a heavy leather belt, the sash a heavier swath over a broad, deeply muscled back. His hair was longer, too. Thick, tangled. Sun streaked. His calves were solid, strong, and his thighs heavily muscled, like his back. There was a sword—sword!—strapped to his hip.

But it was Graham. And that was her. She knew it. Somehow she was also on that woven blanket, in the deep grass, gorgeous flowers blooming like mad all around, the sea in the distance. She could feel the weight of him, his broad hands bracing her face as he took her mouth, took…her.

Katie squeezed her eyes shut, but she couldn't kiss Graham, be kissed by Graham, and make any sense of the rest of it.

So she simply stopped trying. She was tired—worn out from too much thinking. What she wanted was peace, quiet, and some long, uninterrupted sleep.

What she wanted, lusted after, deeply and with such need she thought she might die from the lack of it, was the man who was kissing her—Graham, it was Graham—to please, dear God, take her clothes off and drive so hard, so deep—

“Oh,” she gasped, against his mouth, as he drew one hand down her cheek, trailed strong fingers along her throat, over her collarbone, then cupped her breast. Her aching, swollen, needy breast. She arched beneath his touch, moaning, not caring in the least what in the hell was going on as long as he didn't stop flicking his fingertip over her taut, throbbing nipple.

She moved under him. She growled. A little. Then she turned his face back to hers and took his mouth, devoured his tongue and suckled on it like she wanted him to suckle her. His fingers tightened on her nipple as she took him, and she relished both.

She felt primal, female, and utterly desirable.

His hand moved lower, over her ribs, her abdomen. She whimpered in the back of her throat at the loss of contact on her breast, then groaned with renewed pleasure when his hand cupped her between her thighs.

She took his tongue harder, and he growled and moved the base of his palm over her until she was moving right back against the sweet, perfect pressure of it.

He shifted his weight a bit more, and started dragging the skirts of her gown—her gown?—up, baring her calves, then her knees. She could feel the sun on her skin and it felt so good. She didn't give a single damn about what made sense and what didn't, as long as that hand presently moving up the inside of her thigh found its—“Oh! Oh, yes.”

He took over the kiss. Driving his tongue inside her as his oh-so-clever fingers found the opening in her laced drawers—she had laced drawers, and damn if she didn't like having them—and teased the sensitive skin at the top of her thighs, tickled the curls he found there, before stroking her right across—

“Holy—” She arched hard and strong against the stroke of his finger, then did it again. And again. Until finally, blessedly, mercifully, he slid one inside her. Her groan was long, loud, as she grabbed his shoulders again and arched violently into his hand.

He moved, she pumped, and climbed swiftly toward a dazzling spark of pleasure that was so sharp, so perfect, she thought when it finally splintered she might splinter right along with it. She'd make not a peep of displeasure if it happened, because each and every sliver of what was left of her would be vibrating in pleasure.

But just as the zenith was in her grasp, at the tip of his finger, in fact, he slid it out. She groaned, immediately reaching for him. “Don't—”

His weight settled on her again, and his broad hands were cupping her hips and pulling them up, and she was blissfully, incredibly, and so powerfully filled with him that any thought of what he'd been doing even so much as a second before was obliterated forever from her mind. She could only encapsulate what he was doing, and how he was filling her. Driving her up, driving himself deeper.

She screamed, and it was a rapturous sound. Digging her nails deeply into his back as she held on, found some leverage, any leverage, to meet his thrusts.

He wasn't silent either. The sounds he made as he took her inflamed her further, and she rose to another level.

Maybe she was already in heaven. That had to be it. Some thread of sanity that still existed in the fringes of her mind clung to that rationale. It would, after all, explain everything.

Because this—he—was nothing if not the most blissful and perfect heaven she could have ever possibly imagined.

She was jerked fully back into the moment as she felt him gather, his grip tightening on her hips as he urged her knees up higher, so he could reach just that much deep—“Oh.
Oh!
”

He growled, so low, so gutturally, she was pretty damn sure she felt the vibration of it throughout her entire body as he came in a thundering roar—thundering…roar—deep inside her.

She clung to him as he shuddered throughout his release. Or maybe she was the one shaking. It was the single most powerful, most intimate moment she'd ever experienced. Even in her heart-still-pounding, breathless bliss, it had the ability to stun her. How…how could she feel…so much? It went far past the primal way they'd mated, almost rutting with each other. It could only feel that way with someone who mattered deeply to her. While Graham alternately captivated, charmed, incensed, and enflamed her, she hadn't been with him long enough to elicit the kind of emotions that would need to be there to experience something like that. To feel something like that. Straight to her marrow.

She held him tightly, as he did her, and he gathered her closely while they regained their breath. It was the time to look into his eyes, to ask the questions that so confused her, to understand what was really happening to her. To them.

He pulled her in, tucking her close beneath his chin, against his chest where she felt the heavy thump of his heart. “Katie,” he whispered, as she felt him press a kiss to the top of her head.

The gesture, so gentle, so sweet, was too much so for the man who'd just taken her in a mating so earthy, so raw, so wild like the land that surrounded them.

As she shifted to lift her head, to look into his eyes, he rolled from her, to his back. The instant his body left hers, the moment his touch no longer connected them she was suddenly slammed straight back into that brass bed, in their small narrow room in the inn. In Castlebay.

She was sprawled on her back, staring up at the faded, watermarked, painted plaster ceiling. She smoothed her hands down her body, all but groping herself as she checked but—fully clothed—in the same thing she'd worn when she'd checked in. She immediately jerked her head to her left. Graham lay beside her. Also fully clothed. He was on his back, eyes closed. His body tense, like a tightly wound coil ready to spring at the lightest of touches.

“Graham…?”

“Shhh,” he said. “Dinnae…” But he didn't finish. His voice was raw.

Hers, now that she thought of it, had sounded a bit throaty as well.

“I can't ‘shhh,'” she said. “I have to know.” She rolled to her side, but at the last second was careful not to touch him. He jerked, as if instinctively driven to prevent the very same thing. That stung a little. While the whole episode had apparently been some kind of rabid hallucination due to extreme mental fatigue and the physical exhaustion of extended travel—sitting upright for two days straight—she was still feeling…those feelings. At least an echo of them, anyway.

The reality was he'd carried her to the bed. In that room. And she'd gone…somewhere else. She was pretty sure he'd been there already before taking her with him. It was why he'd carried her to the bed. He was the man in the reverie, having gone there ahead of her, talking to…her? To someone about her?

She remembered, how it had been Graham on top of her, touching her, kissing her. She'd watched as another man, much like Graham, only not Graham…lay down on top of her. But not her. Except it had been.

“Tell me I'm not crazy,” she whispered, feeling tears threaten again, from abject confusion and fear.

There was only silence. And the sound of his breathing. She didn't dare touch him. But she didn't get up and leave, either.

Finally, after what felt like eons, he turned his head slowly toward her, until he was looking straight at her, straight into her. Then he said, “I canno'.”

Her lips quivered, and her body trembled. Fresh tears filled her eyes. Suddenly, she felt very, very weary. And very, very alone. That felt wrong. Desolately, eternally, wrong.

“I canno' tell you that, Katie,” he continued, never so solemn, never so serious, in all the time she'd known him. “Because I very much fear we might both be.”

G
raham rolled his head away and stared straight up at the ceiling. He resisted the urge to reach between his legs…and make sure. They should talk about it. He knew she knew. Had to know. She'd been there. Kind of. As had he. Kind of.

Only they were in Castlebay.
Back
in Castlebay. Implying they'd been somewhere else. Or…had they? How could they
both
know?

He closed his eyes. But he wanted—needed—to look at her face, into her eyes, see…whatever it was he was certain was there. Had to be there. “Was there a history, in Annapolis, of witches?”

“What?” He felt rather than saw her roll her head to stare at him. “That's Salem. Massachusetts. Graham, we need to talk about this.”

“Oh, aye, that we do.” He turned to look at her. “But what comes of that, Katie? Neither of us can explain it.” He looked away again. His body was still…feeling like the body of a man who'd just had the kind of sex that would have blown the top of his head straight off. And he'd had it with the woman lying next to him…except they were both still fully dressed, and, as far as he could tell, untouched. At least in the way he'd been touching her.

Just thinking that aroused him. He wanted to touch her again—more than before. But it was all wrapped up with the dream Graham taking the dream Katie in ways that…well, in ways he could only hope to take her in actual real life. But damn if his hunger wasn't every bit as strong as it had been while they'd been transported.

“Have you ever…” She trailed off, sighed softly, then rolled to her side, facing him. But not touching him, he noted. “Has this ever happened to you? You're talking witches, but if either of us is from some kind of enchanted, ancient, mystical land, it's not me. Do you have any explanation? Did you…I mean, were you there when we—” She rolled abruptly to her back again, and stared at the ceiling.

“I've no explanation. No, I've never experienced anything like this.” He turned his head, looked at her. “And aye. I was there, when we…” He purposely left the sentence to drift.

Eventually, she turned to look at him.

And that electricity, that pow that socked him right in the gut, was there, just as strong, just as vital, just as demanding, as it was in their other place.

“Did I look like me? I mean, you were you…but not you.”

The memories of her, in his arms, arching hard against him, as he'd slid his hand up her thigh, felt the slippery wetness of her, slid into her—“Aye,” he said, a bit roughly, “it was you. Only…a, somewhat different vision of ye. But…you.”

“That's how I felt, too. Your hair was longer, wilder. And your tartan more roughly woven—not as smoothly worn, more bunched and belted. Y-you had a sword. A big one.”

He couldn't help it, he grinned. He was fairly certain he was going insane, so why not laugh? “I'm glad you noticed.”

She snorted a laugh, then reached out to swat him. His duck and roll was reflexive and he moved away from her touch before he could think to do otherwise. She'd snatched her hand away as well, as if suddenly in fear of getting burned, but he'd seen the quick flash of hurt cross her face. And he understood it. He didn't much like it when she pulled back from him, either.

“I'm sorry. It's no' that I don't want your touch. I was just trying to avoid another trip into the ether until we've had a chance to sort things out a bit.”

She laughed again, but it was a hollow one. “No offense taken,” she said, but he knew otherwise. “I don't know what we can do to make sense of this. Or how we can keep it from happening again.”

There was a small moment of silence, and he couldn't have said what devil got into him. The bond they shared because of their supernatural journey together gave him a sense of closeness to her that encouraged the devilish smile he didn't try to squelch. “Are we sure we should be tryin' so hard to avoid it? 'Twas confusin', no doubt, but no' exactly such a bad thing otherwise, aye?”

He saw her mouth twitch at the corners, and found himself curling his fingers into his palm to keep from reaching for her.

“Aye,” she said, in a dead-on approximation of his accent. “'Twas no' exactly a hardship to endure, no.”

“Well, I wouldn't say it wasna hard…”

She snickered then. And so did he. One shared glance later, and they both broke out laughing in earnest. They laughed so hard it was impossible to talk, almost to breathe. It felt good, and cleansing, and blessedly normal.

He managed to calm himself before she did, and watched as she enjoyed a final snort and snicker. There was a warmth in his heart then, one he supposed had been growing since he'd encountered her, swathed in white satin while swearing a blue streak, in the prayer garden. How two days and a single night spent together could have brought him to the point of feeling such an honest affection for her, he didn't know. Nor did he much feel the need to quantify it. Something else lurked beneath the surface of their joint adventures, something that spoke of distant times and paths crossed once before.

Suddenly it all started to make a bit of sense to him. Unnerving and fantastical as the merest suspicion of it was, it did make some kind of sense.

“What is it?” she asked.

“What?” he asked, looking to her again.

“You're frowning. And thinking. What just popped into your mind?”

It was different for him, having someone pay such close attention, and be in tune with him so quickly. He didn't normally wear his emotions so plainly, but he supposed they were well past pretending to employ social proprieties.

“I was just…” He paused, debated giving voice to the thought, but what the hell. He could hardly sound more daft than he already suspected he was. “I've thought there was a connection between us, since meeting you in the garden. That was no' entirely in line with what I'd be thinking after meeting a complete and total stranger.”

She nodded, as if completely understanding the sentiment, and he released the breath he hadn't been aware he'd been holding, which was silly, since he could hardly be worried about wanting her admiration or respect at that point.

“I'm no' sure why I felt compelled to stand up in your chapel, and say the things I did. Of course I wanted you to leave with me, because that was the purpose of my being there, but the way it came out, the intensity of the feelings I had of how wrong it was for you to betroth yourself to another man…none of that was a realistic or normal thing to be feeling. And yet, in that moment, I most certainly did.”

“It was definitely intense,” she said, her lips curving a little, though her expression remained thoughtful and serious. “But it moved me. Called to me, I suppose is a better way of saying it. Something in the conviction you had in your voice, gave me the courage I needed to do what I knew had to be done.” She looked at him again. “I suppose that might answer your earlier question. I don't know that I'd have been able to do it without you. Because then—and I know this sounds nuts, but I'm guessing we're past worrying about that now—because then it would have been just for me. I wasn't ever going to be good at putting only my own needs above those of the people I loved. But when you stood, and…well, laid claim is the best way I can describe it. There was this feeling, this sense of…, finally. That's what it felt like. Finally. Finally, you were there, and I knew the direction I was meant to go. And that direction was toward you.”

She lifted a shoulder, and quickly looked away when he rolled to his side and propped up one elbow to rest his head on his curled fist. He said nothing, hoping his silence encouraged her to continue. He realized he needed to hear what she was saying, needed to know what had been going through her mind throughout their journey. The relief he felt in knowing he hadn't been alone, that whatever the insanity was, he wasn't alone inside it, was comforting…and he wasn't above taking some of that comfort for himself.

“What should have been the most wrenching decision of my life was somehow not. Not at that moment, anyway. I suppose if I'd had the time to sort it out, I'd have told myself I'd been working toward that moment for a very long time, so the sense of relief and rightness wouldn't have been surprising. But that was only a small part.” She paused, took a steadying breath, glanced at him, then looked back to the ceiling, as if it were easier to try and explain if she didn't have to look directly at him while she was doing so.

For some reason, that made him smile, and that warmth, that affection he had for her, grew another notch. He'd give her all the sense of security and strength she needed for herself and more, if he could. In fact, whatever was in his power to give her, he wanted her to have. It felt both selfless and selfish at the same time. He knew he'd put her happiness and general well-being above his own. He also knew the feeling was inspired, at least in part, by the knowledge that it made him feel good—no, great—to be the one charged with seeing to her happiness. Selfishly so. It wasn't the altruistic gesture it might seem. Yet, the absolute joy there was to be had in even thinking he could be that for her was both disquieting and quietly thrilling.

In fact, were he to take his thoughts another step further, he'd have said the only way anyone could feel things so intensely for a person they'd just met, was if they'd met before. And he felt as if he'd been charged with seeing to her happiness for a very, very long time.

Insanity.

The moment he allowed the thought to take root, a feeling of calm, of rightness, settled somewhere deep within him. As if he'd finally put the puzzle pieces into place, so the picture was being revealed.

The question—or the next piece in the puzzle—was what was he supposed to do about it? He'd decided—they'd agreed—that he needed to move forward with his original plans. Any scheme that included them marrying for any reason other than love, was wrong. For both of them.

A short pain stabbed him near his heart, as if someone had stuck a pin there. So real was the feeling, he reached up and rubbed a fist over it. Though the prick of pain subsided, the lingering ache did not.

“So,” she said, “we both felt compelled to join forces, as it were. Since then, on several occasions—escalating in nature each time—we've had…episodes, I'll call them, where we've imagined ourselves, or viewed ourselves, or…actually been, uh…involved.” She waved a hand, as if that summed it all up.

He smiled again. He supposed it was as good a summation as he'd have come up with. For some things, there were no words.

“Meaning we have some kind of connection that goes deeper, or began in some other place, some other time, and now that we've crossed paths again, we're caught up in something bigger than ourselves.” She slumped a little as she released a breath. “What does it say that I feel a little relief, because it actually makes sense to me?” She rolled her head toward him. “It says I'm crazy. That's what it says.”

“Join the club,” he said, the smile still playing around the corners of his mouth. He knew he should be far more anxious than he felt. He wasn't exactly at peace with any of it. But the time spent lying on the bed, coupled with the meal they'd had, and the activities he'd internalized in thought, if not deed, were all conspiring to fill him with a sort of languor. It wasn't entirely unwanted or undesirable. In fact, he had an overwhelming desire to tug her across the expanse of bed they'd put between them and tuck her against the larger frame of his body, where she could draw solace from him and he could feel as if he were in his rightful place…and they could both find escape in a blissful night's sleep.

Of course, he could do none of those things. They didn't fully understand what would send them hurtling back to that other place. But just as he thought keeping each other safe from another unplanned journey had to be his uppermost concern, another equally strong need was driving him. “Katie,” he said, his voice gruff. She looked at him and he held out his hand. “Come here.”

She looked from his face, to his hand, then back to his face again, her expression a mixture of fear and…longing. It was the latter that sealed his decision.

“If this is the only night we'll share, I'd like to share it without fear of touching you. I'd like to hold you, here, in this bed, in this room.”

“But…what if—?”

He lifted a shoulder, and his lips quirked. “I dinnae think it will. No' now. But if it did…was it such a bad thing?”

Her mouth dropped open, then snapped shut as a pretty pink blush stole across her face.

He wiggled his fingers. “I'm no' intending to try and replicate anything, have no worries. I just…” He reached for her. “We've one night. Spend it here,” he said, and tugged her close, folding her against his chest. “With me.” Their bodies twined with the ease of two people who'd wrapped themselves around each other for many long nights. He didn't question it.

She tipped her chin up to look at him, as he ducked his chin to look at her. “Still with me?” she asked, trying for a teasing tone, but clearly searching his gaze for any telltale signs.

“I'm here.” He tipped her chin up further. He would not take advantage, that much he'd meant and would hold to his word. But it didn't mean he had to end their brief time together without tasting her one last time. He lowered his mouth slowly, giving her time and space, to move back if it was a step she wasn't willing to risk.

So it took him aback, and, more disconcertingly, made his heart stutter, when instead, she reached up and cupped his cheek, and drew him down the last inch so she could lay claim to him first.

The brush of her lips was soft, gentle, though not tentative. She paused, broke off enough to look up at him, then smiled so beautifully it fully illuminated her eyes. “Still here,” she murmured. Then those eyes drifted shut, and she went back to kissing him.