My Tempting Highlander (Highland Hearts #3) (7 page)

Mairi wrapped the plaid tighter about her shoulders and pulled the hood of her jacket farther over her face. “Food or a mate. I know. I get that.” She squinted against the rain as she turned and scanned the park. “See, that’s just it. I know he’s hungry. I saw it in his eyes. That’s why I left him alone. I went to the market to get him some food.”

I wasna hungry for food.
Ronan motioned her forward toward the narrow path winding through the park. “Come. We’ll walk this place through and see if we can find yer wee dog searching for a meal.” A comforting warmth spread through him as Mairi rewarded him with a grateful smile.

“I really appreciate your help.” She glanced up at the dreary sky, blinking against the sleeting rain, then frowned as her gaze returned to him. “You’re getting soaked to the skin. I can’t believe Eliza didn’t give you one of her umbrellas.” She shrugged the plaid away from her shoulders and held it out to him. “Here. You need this more than I do. My jacket will keep us dry.” The bedraggled wet pup poked its glistening black nose out of Mairi’s shirt, looked at Ronan, and growled.

Ronan took the plaid, shook it out, and draped it back around Mairi’s shoulders. “Nay. The wool of m’colors will keep ye a far sight warmer than yer wee jacket.” How could she think he’d take back his plaid and leave her to the likes of some sort of waistcoat that looked to be thin as a monk’s parchment?

The damning furrow between Mairi’s dark brows deepened. “You’re going to end up with pneumonia.” With one hand, she yanked the plaid away from her body and held it out to him. “Put this on…please. I don’t want to be responsible for your getting sick and ending up in the hospital.” She shoved the plaid toward him again. “I’m already in enough hot water with Eliza. If you get sick, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Ronan stopped walking. Damn, the woman was stubborn. He knew how to end this. “Look. Over there. Is that yer missing dog?” He pointed to a dense cluster of beech trees.

Plaid and weather forgotten, Mairi whirled to look. “Where?”

“I’m certain I saw movement beside yon hedge upon the hill.” Ronan left the path, hurrying toward the indicated spot with long, ground-eating strides. He dare no’ look her in the eye. She’d ken for certain he was telling tales.

Plaid bunched under one arm and the other arm holding the pup tight inside her jacket, Mairi scurried past him. When she reached the hedge, she bent low with a bobbing up-and-down weave, searching the shadows beneath the drooping branches of the bush. “Are you sure? I don’t see anything.” She straightened and looked back at Ronan, frustration and worry etched across her pale features.

Guilt thumped him dead center of his chest. This farce was madness. He couldna keep toying with the lass. ’Twas not honorable. “Perhaps no.” He stole a glance up at the ever-darkening sky. “The day grows short and the weather grows worse. Come. Let us go. We’ll no’ find the lad today.” He reached out his hand, silently praying she’d take it. “Come, lass.”

As if to add credence to his words, a harsh gust of wind shoved against them and the sleeting rain increased to a stinging deluge. Ronan held his hand higher and eased a step closer to the steep incline. “Come, mistress.”

Mairi shuddered with a heavy sigh; her sad gaze focused on Ronan’s outstretched hand. “I guess you’re right.” She carefully picked her way forward and slid her cold pale fingers into his palm.

Ronan gently eased her down the hillside, steadying her as she carefully picked her way down the slope made all the slicker by the frozen rain building up on the grass.

“Shit!” Mairi jerked sideways in an awkward sliding dance and skittered forward.

Ronan caught her up against his chest with a solid thump. “I’ve got ye, lass. I’ll no’ let ye fall.”

Arms pinned between them, Mairi hitched a quick intake of breath, looked up at him, and smiled. “Thank you.” Her gaze faltered lower, shifting to his mouth.

Now.
Instinct urged Ronan on. He must have a wee taste of her or die in the tryin’. “Yer quite welcome, lass,” he whispered. With the barest touch of his thumb, he smoothed a wet curl from her cheek and eased in closer. Mairi’s lips parted, waiting, tempting, filling him with hope.
Aye. I canna stop now.

Mairi didn’t lean in, but Ronan thanked the gods when she didn’t repeat what she’d done earlier and roll free of his arms. He tightened his embrace lest she change her mind. Moving with painstaking care, he brushed the gentlest of kisses across the seam of her barely parted lips.
Such softness. Such sweetness. Divine pleasure in a touch.

Her tensed body relaxed in his arms. With a heart-hammering moment’s hesitation, she leaned into him. Ronan’s hopes soared. He deepened the kiss, opened her mouth wider, and delved deeper.
Mine.
Ronan stroked a thumb along her cheekbone as he tenderly nibbled at her bottom lip, savoring the taste of her.
Mine forevermore.

Mairi’s hand fluttered against his chest and she finally pushed away. She ran the tip of her tongue along her reddened lips as she gripped the plaid bunched in her arms with a trembling hand. “Who are you? Really.”

Ronan swallowed hard then sucked in a deep breath. “I am a lost soul, searching for the other half of my heart.”
Lore, dinna let her cast me away.

Mairi’s dark brows knotted over her troubled eyes. “That’s no answer. Who are you and where did you come from?” Her voice quivered as she took another step back.

Ronan sensed now was not the best time to reveal all. The connection with Mairi was still too tenuous. Damn, he wished ’twas an easier way to win her. He’d never been good at charming women. He’d never known what the hell to say. Ronan lifted a hand and waved it in a slow arc around him. “I am from here. This land gave birth t’me. I have always been…here.” He hastened to continue as Mairi’s eyes narrowed. “I tire of being alone. Are ye no’ weary of loneliness yerself?”

“I have my family…my sisters. And Eliza.”

“Ah but that’s no’ the loneliness I mean. Ye know of what I speak.” Ronan missed the soft warmth of her against his chest. He’d give anything to hold her again.

“I’ve always been alone—in the way you mean.” Mairi shrugged as she hugged the puppy now sleeping against her chest and kept her gaze trained toward the ground. “I’m pretty much used to it.”

“Ye can change it.” Ronan eased a step toward her, keeping his voice gentle and low. “Give me a chance, Mairi. All I ask is that ye give me a chance.” Ronan took another step toward her and snugged the plaid better around her shoulders. “Ye felt the connection when first we met. Do ye no’ wish it to be so—wish it to become stronger?” He held his breath as Mairi looked up at him, studying him as though trying to see inside his soul.

“You felt it too?”

“Aye, lass. I felt it.” Ronan eased her back into his embrace, grateful to his core when she didna pull away. “And I swear t’ye, I’ll no’ be letting ye go.”

Mairi shivered as she glanced up at him then gently turned herself out of his arms. “We need to get home.” She sniffed as she cast one last forlorn look around the drenched chilly landscape. “I hope wherever my dog is…he’s not suffering.” A heavy sigh escaped her as she turned and headed toward the road. “We need to go home,” she repeated. “Come on. We’ll get everyone dried off and fed.”

Ronan slowly blew out the breath he’d been holding. ’Twas no’ exactly the response he’d hoped for but ’twas a start.

Mairi stole a glance at Ronan sitting at the kitchen table. He was scowling into a ceramic mug clutched against his chest, tamping down bits of dried dog food into puppy-size pieces with the thick handle of a wooden spoon. One painstaking nugget at a time, Ronan added more kibble to the mash of meaty canned dog food in the bottom of the cup and crushed it.

He’s…different.
The carefully erected wall Mairi kept around her heart weakened with every crunch of the spoon handle. Ronan’s kiss had already done major damage to the wall—shaking it down to its freaking foundation. Mairi brushed her fingertips across her mouth. She’d never been kissed like that before. It had felt like…
Like what?
Mairi pressed her lips together hard with the memory.
A claiming
. That’s exactly what the kiss had transmitted. Ronan had laid claim to her and that kiss was the first of his markers.

Ronan’s wet shirt clung to his broad shoulders, shimmering dark and powerful in the black silk stretched taut across his chest. They were both still soaked to the bone and cold as hell, but Ronan hadn’t even blinked when Mairi had said the puppy had to be dried off and fed before they tended to themselves. He’d definitely gained major points for that one and demolished a few more bricks in the wall around her heart. The piercing shriek of the teakettle interrupted the tallying of Ronan’s infiltrate-her-heart score.

Ronan stood so fast that the kitchen chair tipped backward and rattled to the floor. In one smooth motion, he slid a dagger free of his boot and stepped in front of Mairi. “What demon wails so?” He stared at the sputtering teakettle as though expecting it to unleash a monster at any minute.

Mairi tucked the towel-wrapped puppy closer and pushed her way back around Ronan. “It’s the steam whistling out of the kettle. It lets you know when the water’s ready.”

Was he serious? Mairi glanced at him as she scooped up the hot pad, wrapped it about the black handle of the kettle, and moved it to a back burner. She flicked the knob to the off position and the blue flames disappeared. When she turned with the kettle in one hand, she nearly dropped it. Ronan was staring at the kettle and stove as though Mairi had just performed the greatest trick on earth.

“Ye control the flame too.”

“Have you never seen a gas cooktop before?” Mairi poured a bit of the steaming water into a shallow bowl. How could a chieftain of a clan be unfamiliar with something as simple as a gas stove? The most likely answer nudged at the back of her mind then sank like a weight to the pit of her stomach. Mairi returned the kettle to the stove and ignored the worrisome voice whispering what she didn’t want to acknowledge.
He’s from the past. You know he is.
Mairi shook away the thought. He couldn’t be from the past. Unless…Mairi paused as the sacred creed of the time runners clicked through her mind.

Bloodline holds the gift to dance across the ages.

From mother to daughter the gift shall pass.

The eldest daughter of each generation shall control the most power.

A loyal familiar, a guardian, shall join the eldest daughter at birth.

Males shall only travel the web when chosen or sent forth by a runner.

A male chosen or sent forth by a runner. Mairi studied Ronan closely. Eliza couldn’t have pulled him from the past, but Granny, Trulie, or Kenna damn sure could’ve sent him forward to twenty-first-century Edinburgh.

Ronan cleared his throat as he straightened and slid the dagger back inside his boot. “There is no’ such stove in the kitchens of Draegonmare.” He fidgeted beside the kitchen chair as though angry with himself for his reaction.

“Is that the name of your keep?” She’d give him the benefit of the doubt.
For now.
At least until he either confirmed or condemned her suspicions. She stole another glance at him. Maybe she was being too lenient. Right now, he looked guilty as hell.

“Aye. Draegonmare is m’keep.”

Mairi took the cup of crushed kibble and mashed dog food from him and added it to the shallow saucer of warm water. She stirred it about with one finger until the gruel warmed and blended. She lowered the puppy to the table, where he promptly splatted both front paws into the middle of the mushy pile of dog food then buried his nose in the softened food and started gobbling. When she looked up, Ronan was staring at her with a pained expression. “Are you all right?”

“Aye.” He quickly nodded as he appeared to force himself to stand in a more relaxed form of readiness. With legs widespread, chest thrust out and the muscles of his arms bulging, he clasped his hands behind his back. Ronan looked about as relaxed as a caged panther.

An impatient yip followed by a warning clatter pulled Mairi’s attention back to the puppy currently bouncing the now empty china saucer across the table with stiff-legged bounces against the plate’s rim. Mairi scooped the dog up and fluffed her fingers through his much drier fur. “No. You’ve had enough for now. You can have more later.”

Wiping the pup’s soggy feet with a towel, she kept it cradled in the crook of her arm as she retrieved two more cups from the hooks underneath the cabinet. She glanced across the room at Ronan. Time for tea and interrogation. “How about some nice hot tea while you tell me about your keep?”

Ronan huffed out a deep breath as he righted the kitchen chair he’d knocked over during the attack of the screaming teakettle and plopped down into it.

“So you don’t want to tell me about your keep?” Suspicion heightened her senses. What was Chieftain Ronan Sutherland hiding? Mairi set the cups on the table along with a box of tea. He was acting so strange. Correction. He was acting stranger than before.

Mairi tried to ignore the distinct feeling she was on the verge of stepping off a high emotional cliff. “Where exactly is Draegonmare?”

Ronan jerked, staring at her as though she’d just zapped him with a jolt of electricity.

“What is wrong?” Mairi pushed the puppy into Ronan’s arms then pressed her palm to his forehead. He didn’t seem to have the beginnings of a fever. “Do you feel like you’re getting ill or something? You seem…unwell.”

Ronan reached up, took hold of Mairi’s hand, and pressed it to his cheek. A heavy sigh escaped him as he shook his head. “I am quite well. Better than I have been in a verra long time. I dinna wish to risk my current state.”

What the hell did he mean by that? An excited shiver rippled through Mairi at the unspoken emotions reflected in Ronan’s eyes. She wet her lips, took a deep breath, and eased her hand out of Ronan’s grasp. “So where is Draegonmare?” she repeated. She needed facts before any additional bricks crumbled from the wall around her heart and made her even more vulnerable.

Ronan placed the puppy on the table, then leaned back in his chair. A troubled smile pulled one corner of his mouth up while at the same time the other corner pulled down. “ ’Tis north of here. Along the shores of Loch Ness.”

Loch Ness. Mairi frowned as she added hot water to the teacups. The only keep she knew along the shores of Loch Ness were the ruins of Urquhart Castle. “Where exactly on Loch Ness? I’ve been there a couple of times to visit Urquhart Castle and the visitor center, but I’m not familiar with any other keeps in that area. Is Draegonmare too secluded to see from that part of the loch’s shoreline?”

“Aye.” Ronan’s smile completely disappeared. “Draegonmare is verra secluded. Few know of its existence.”

Well, that explained it and made her feel a great deal better. At least Draegonmare was in this century. Mairi added a plate of shortbread biscuits to the table along with a jar of honey and a tiny cow-shaped pitcher of cream. “After we finish our tea, I’ll show you upstairs, where you can grab a hot shower and get warmed up before you return home or wherever it is you’re staying while in Edinburgh. Eliza has a closet full of men’s clothing—” She held up a hand at Ronan’s arched brow as she continued, “I don’t know why she has a closet full of men’s clothes. That’s none of my business.” Mairi lifted the plate of cookies out of reach of the exploring puppy. “All I know is that she’s got them and I’m sure she won’t mind your borrowing something to wear to get you home.”

Ronan slurped in a gulp of hot tea, made a face, and slid the cup to the center of the table. “Did Mistress Eliza no’ tell ye? She extended an invitation for me to stay here for a few days.”

Mairi nearly choked on the buttery bite of shortbread she’d just shoved in her mouth. What the hell was going on? Eliza knew Granny wanted Mairi to return to the past and yet she was doing her damnedest to firmly implant Ronan Sutherland into her life? Mairi swallowed hard, forcing the shortbread down past the sudden lump of
what the hell
knotted in her throat. “Actually, no. I wasn’t aware you were an overnight guest.”

Where were they going to put him? The second floor belonged to Lilia and the fourth floor was Eliza’s domain, which she had declared off-limits to everyone except by invitation. Was Ronan Eliza’s next benefactor? Mairi rubbed a finger across her suddenly tingling lips. Ronan’s kiss sprang back to the forefront of her mind. No. Ronan Sutherland was not interested in Eliza MacTavish.

Ronan smiled and leaned forward. He tickled a fingertip across the back of Mairi’s hand, which was currently curled around her cup. “Aye. Many nights.” The look in his eyes said much more.

Mairi rose, rubbing the top of her tingling hand against the roughness of her still extremely wet jeans. “You can shower first. If you’re finished with your tea, come on and I’ll show you the bathroom as well as where you can find the clothes.”

Ronan slowly rose to his full, heart-stopping height and smiled. “Aye, lass. Lead the way.”

“I think not, my fine chieftain.” Eliza’s singsong voice chirped loud and clear, punctuated by the sharp clicking of her heels against the hardwood floor of the hallway. The swinging door to the kitchen popped open and she toddled into the room. “I’ll be more than happy to escort ye to yer room for the evening so my wee Mairi can see to her own shower. I’ll no’ have either of ye catchin’ yer death from traipsin’ about in a feckin’ rainstorm with no proper
protection.
” As Eliza stressed the word
protection,
she turned to Mairi and signaled her with a slow meaningful wink.

What the hell does that mean?
Mairi stole a glance at Ronan then subtly motioned to Eliza and mouthed
What?

Eliza cleared her throat, turned her back to Mairi, and motioned Ronan toward the back stair. “I’ve a private suite of rooms on the fourth floor. Off wi’ ye now. Let’s get ye settled for the evenin’.”

“The fourth floor?” Mairi scooped the puppy up from the table and hugged him close.

“Aye.” Eliza nodded. “And still yer wanderin’ mind. This gentleman is no’ destined for what yer thinkin’.” Eliza leaned in close and rested a perfumed hand atop Mairi’s arm. “This one is all yers, dearie, but he and I must have a long chat afore he claims the grand prize.”

“I am not the prize pig at the fair,” Mairi whispered through gritted teeth, glancing across the kitchen at Ronan to ensure he couldn’t hear.

“Shall I leave the two of ye a bit of privacy so ye might discuss whate’er ye wish?” Ronan carefully slid the kitchen chair up to the table then lifted his chin as he folded his arms over his chest. His body language transmitted his thoughts loud and clear. He’d heard every word.

Eliza smiled and hugged an arm around Mairi’s shoulders. “Nay. Our discussion is quite finished.” She pecked a quick kiss to Mairi’s cheek then toddled across the kitchen. When she came even with Ronan, she nodded once more at the back stair. “But you and I have much to discuss. On wi’ ye now, m’chieftain.”