Night Games (25 page)

The problem? They
were
working. The orange juice she'd had this morning was driving her crazy. While they were all standing around those steps, she'd done some heavy sensual imaging. If she'd been a snake, she would have slithered up Brian's leg and coiled around his . . .

“We're alone now. Are you making progress with the big guy? What about the potions?” Cap drove away from the castle at warp speed.

Brian suspected Cap had been their hit-and-run driver. If he drove this fast all the time, she could well believe he'd hit them by accident. But then why hadn't he stopped to offer help? How
badly did he want Brian out of the way? Ally shook off the thought. She couldn't believe that Cap, with his phony red wig, picture of his daughter painted on his head, and book of love poems would try to kill anyone.

“They're not working, and I want you to stop making them.”

Cap slanted her a sly grin. “Let's get this straight. You want me to stop making them because they're not working.” He glanced back at the road in time to zip around a terrified flock of sheep.

Ally peeled herself from the door where his unexpected turn had thrown her. “Exactly.”

He shook his head. “I don't think so. I think they're working just fine.”

She shrugged. “Okay, do your thing, but I won't touch any more of them.”

Once they reached town, Ally left Cap to his own devices while she tracked down a phone. After a brief call to her parents, she sat staring at the phone. Dave had been bugging them. She'd have to deal with him now. Forcing herself to do what had to be done, she called him.

“Am I glad to hear from you, Ally. You have no idea how much I want you back. I never realized how weird Erica was. She called yesterday, and I told her it was definitely all over, that you and I were an item again.”

“You told her
what?
” Ally closed her eyes. How could she have ever believed she loved this man? She was so
over
him, and she wished he'd realize it.

“I really miss you, honey. I miss the little things you did for me, like turning down the covers and fluffing up my pillow each night. I gave Erica a list of all the things you did, but she threw it out.”

Good for Erica. Ally wished she could relive her last five years. She sure wouldn't have spent them catering to Dave. Why hadn't she ever noticed what a whiny worm he was?

“Erica said she'd be home as soon as she took care of a little problem. She expects us to get together again. It won't happen. I won't take her back.”

Lucky Erica. “We're finished, Dave. Accept it. And I want you to stop bothering my parents.”

“It's another man, isn't it?” He sounded disbelieving.

Jerk. “Yes.” Ally's eyes popped open. Had she said that? “Yes” was a dangerous word to think, let alone say. She couldn't say “yes” to Brian Byrne because he wouldn't be in her life long enough to give “yes” any meaning.

“He won't be able to compare with me.” Whiny had given way to nasty.

“You're right, Dave. I would never compare him with you.” Quietly, she hung up, then leaned back in her chair. There was no comparison.

Closing her eyes again, she saw Brian's forest-green eyes, his wicked grin, and his buns. Strong, firm, with a dimple on the right one. Buns a woman could get her fingers into. Buns that would always be there for her. Brian Byrne had dependable buns.

His voice tempted her memory: deep, warm, sexy. And she wanted him so badly her teeth hurt. Ally opened her eyes. This was not a good thing. He would leave in a few weeks, and she'd never see him again.

Now she was really depressed. Time to do something to get her mind off inevitable departures. She stared at the phone. Something Eamonn Clancy had said nagged at her. Brian's namesake was supposedly wandering the world somewhere, but Eamonn had said Brian's father, Kieran, had died twenty years ago. If Kieran had been a priest most of his life, a son seemed unlikely.

Just as Ally had felt compelled to research Irish fairies when she'd agreed to go to Ireland with Katy, she now knew she was going to call Boston. Fine, so she was a compulsive researcher. This time, though, she had an emotional stake in the results.

Two hours later, she sat in a restaurant staring at her lamb chop while across from her Cap chattered on about his team.

“I really like our chances if Brian doesn't come back to the Monarchs.”

“Uh-huh.” She'd discovered zip from her call to Boston, so she'd called the only person she knew who could squeeze information from a stone. Mavis. Her agent hadn't disappointed.

Ally now knew that Father Kieran Byrne couldn't have fathered a child because, according to everyone who'd known him, Father Byrne
was the closest thing to a saint St. Joseph's parish had ever seen. He never would have broken his vow of celibacy. She believed Mavis.

Ally didn't want to think what the implications were for her Brian.
Her Brian.
She liked the sound of that.

“Within the next ten minutes, Earth will disintegrate and life as we know it will end.”

“Uh-huh.”

Cap laughed, and Ally blinked, wondering what she'd missed.

“I give up. It's no use trying to talk to someone in love.” He winked at Ally. “Let's head home.”

“I'm not in love with Brian. Your potions aren't that good.” She was
not
in love. She was sensually attracted and personality-positive to him, but she didn't love him. Ally was glad she'd gotten that straight.

By the time they returned to the keep, night had fallen. Ally wasn't sure how she felt about that. She'd be better off not seeing Brian until morning, especially since he'd acted a little strange today. But she wanted to see him. Cap's potion must not have worn off yet.

Ally watched Cap walk to his shelter. She looked at the wagon and sighed. The lights were on, so Katy was still up. No doubt waiting to grill Ally on what she'd done, said, and thought. Putting off the inquisition, she strolled up the hill until she was sure no one from the wagon or shelters could see her, then gazed at the keep. Moonlight spilled over it, turning the scene into a silver fantasy. Through the opening in the wall, she
could see the area that had once been the great hall bathed in pale light.

Ally sensed movement behind her, but relaxed almost immediately. She knew who it was, felt the recognition in a part of her that needed no sight. She turned to look at Brian. “It's a terrible kind of beauty. The moonlight makes it look pure, untouched, yet so many people have died violently inside its walls.”

“Beauty doesn't have to be pure to be beauty.” Brian moved to her side, but didn't touch her.

It didn't matter. He touched her in ways he didn't know. His scent: crisp Irish air mingled with the smell of the sea that clung to his hair, his jacket. And warm male, along with something that was essentially his alone. His voice, deep and as cool now as the light filtering through the ancient stone keep his family had built so long ago. But she knew his voice could touch her with heat, and she held the memory of that warmth close inside her.

“In my fantasy, the gypsy woman dances naked for me in my great hall, for me alone.”

His breath fanned the side of her neck, and she shivered.

“Would you dance for me there, Ally O'Neill?” His voice was low, husky with his promise that all would not end with her dance.

Ally shook her head. Not even for him would she dance in that place of death. “How could I dance there after what we heard, felt? There's so much sadness there. Can't you feel it?”

“We'll give the old place a new memory, a
happy one. Perhaps years from now, people will stand where we stood and see us dancing in the moonlight.” He took her hand then, pulled her into his arms, and danced.

She laughed as she allowed him to guide her across the silvered grass, felt his arm tighten across her back as she tripped on a stray rock.

If she listened carefully, she could almost hear the music, wild as the Celts who once wandered this land. Joyous music with penny whistles, fiddles, and bodhrans. No quiet harp for her.

He held her close as he swung her in the moonlight. She should have a gown on, one that swirled around her, lifted high in the sea breeze.

His body moved against hers, hard muscle and heated flesh. Her breath quickened, her heart beat faster.

“What would it take to get you to dance in the great hall?” He slowed, then stopped, but he continued to hold her against his body. Putting both arms around her, he ran his palms slowly up and down her back.

Ally relaxed into his rhythmic motion, thought about what he'd asked. It would take something extraordinary to make her dance in that place where so many people had been murdered. “I would dance as a gift of love, if I had nothing else to give, if I wanted to give something that would live forever in someone's memory.” She grinned at him. “Memories are portable.”

He nodded. “A gift of love, huh? Not much chance of that.”

Beneath his low words, Ally sensed bitterness. Why?

“How about for lust? That's a good reason. You'd have something really exciting to put in your book.” He abandoned her back and buried his fingers in her hair, lowered his mouth to hers. “What could I do to change your mind?”

Right now, with his mouth so close, she had no mind to change. “Why do I have to dance in that particular spot?”

“Because I want it, babe.” His voice was soft, intense. “It's about family. Once in my life, I want to feel that connection, to know that this was where my ancestors danced . . .” His lips touched hers. “Loved.”

Loved.
The word touched her with warm breath. She opened her lips to it, and he covered her mouth with his.

His lips moved lingeringly over hers, and she savored the feel, the taste of him. His tongue slid across her lower lip, then explored her mouth, and she met him with an eagerness that would have been embarrassing if she were thinking more clearly. She slid her arms around his neck, felt the warmth of his nape beneath the heavy fall of dark hair. She cataloged every sense, so it would be there whenever she took out her memories of Ireland.

He abandoned her lips to place his mouth over the spot on her neck where her pulse beat hard and fast. Finally, Ally understood Katy's fascination with Black Liam.

Brian lifted his mouth from her neck. Gazing into her eyes, he reached down and pulled up her sweater. Without thinking, she raised her arms over her head to allow him to strip off the top. It seemed she had no shame where he was concerned. She needed his touch. Everywhere.

She waited for him to finish pulling off her sweater. He didn't. He merely lifted it until it covered her head, then stopped.

“What're you doing?” Her voice was muffled by the sweater.

“You need another fantasy to take the place of my gypsy one.”

He captured her wrists above her head and held them there with one large hand while he deftly unsnapped her bra. She felt it slide off. She should stop this, but she couldn't, any more than she could stop the pounding of her heart, her rapid breathing. Ally moistened her suddenly dry lips with the tip of her tongue, savored her anticipation.

Thank heaven for loose-weave sweaters, or she would've used up her supply of oxygen in one frantic pant. But the cool night air still touched her parted lips, moved across the rest of her face.

“When this keep was new, slavery was a way of life in the world. We're back there now, and you're for sale to any man who can pay the price. You're head remains covered so that you won't see the many men who touch you, because it's only your body they're interested in.” He unsnapped her jeans, yanked the zipper down, then slid them over her legs along with her panties.

Ally didn't step out of them, only stood there, feeling the chilly night air flowing across her exposed body, cooling her heated skin. There was pleasure in her total stillness, allowing his words to weave a sensual spell as real as the sweater's weave touching her face.

“Feel their hands on you, testing your firmness.” His voice was a dark murmur of seduction as he clasped her breast, gently kneaded it, then rubbed the pad of his thumb across her nipple.

Without sight, all her other senses were heightened. Her nipple, hard beneath his stroke, grew so sensitive she thought she'd scream. He had to touch it with his mouth or she'd die right here in front of his precious keep. The ruling would come down: dead from sensory overload. They would add a footnote, though, that the deceased died with a smile on her face.

“They would test your softness.” He slid his fingers over her stomach, up the inside of her thighs.

She sucked in her breath, wished he had ten hands so he could touch her everywhere at once. You'd think five hundred years of evolution would have taken care of that little problem.

“Your readiness.” He pushed her legs apart and without warning slid his finger into her.

Ally moaned and pushed against his finger to drive him deeper. She wanted to tighten herself around him, hold him there forever. Kick her if she ever again whined about Nebula's clenching exercises.

But she couldn't focus on Nebula or anything else as Brian pulled her into the fantasy.

“Finally, a buyer chooses you, paying a price that draws gasps from those around him.” He slowly drew his finger from her.

Gone. She felt deprived, as though he'd stolen something that belonged to her. But she wouldn't beg. Not right away, anyway. “How much did he pay?” No matter how strong she tried to make her voice, it came out wispy.

Ally sensed rather than heard the slide of his zipper. She had a great memory for detail. Last night. No boxers. Breathlessly she waited.

“The price of ten camels. You must work hard to please one who values you so highly.”

“Ten camels?” She was insulted. “I'm worth a lot more than that.”