Time Travel Romances Boxed Set (102 page)

“
I have been thinking of
you ever since that day,” Viviane confided with that smile that
could warm him right to his toes. “Though I never imagined that I
would see you again, and certainly not here!”

Ah, she did not expect a God-fearing mortal
to be able to visit her dark domain. That was telling!

Yet instead of feeling triumphant at this
hint of proof, Niall was disconcertingly aware of the fullness of
Viviane’s breasts pressed against him. Her auburn hair was loose,
obviously designed to ensnare a man in unruly desire within its
tangles, yet her gaze was as clear and golden as he recalled.

And as trusting. Niall’s heart clenched.

“
I
knew
you were a
gallant man,” she breathed, “a true knight if ever there
was!”

Viviane stretched to her toes and granted
Niall his second kiss in quick succession. This one was markedly
more pleasant, though her lips barely brushed across his own. He
told himself sternly that it should
not
be welcome in the
least.

’
Twas only that ’twas from
a woman that reassured him that matters were as they should be.
Aye, that was the way of it.

And he must remain vigilant against
temptation, lest he fail to complete his task once again. Niall
thrust the witch a discreet distance from his side and resolved to
keep his thoughts firmly fixed upon his responsibilities.

Sadly, his gaze strayed over the witch’s
alluring legs, which he could not help but note were bare to
mid-thigh and beguilingly curved. Her kirtle was craftily
constructed to display her charms - which were copious - and
indeed, there was markedly little of that garment. She wore some
flimsy manner of footwear which left her feet nigh fully exposed to
view, and her toenails were crimson.

Blood red.

Niall swallowed, certain he had never seen
any feminine frippery as alluring as those crimson-tipped nails. He
stubbornly lifted his gaze, only to note the wisp of naught that
flowed around her hips. Her kirtle was not only short, but ’twas
uncommonly thin. A man could tear that garment off with his teeth,
of that Niall had no doubt, and he felt an unruly desire to
volunteer.

Of course, that was
not
why he had
come, regardless of how delightful the legs of his prey might
be.

This time, he must keep his mind upon his
task.

With an effort, Niall forced himself to
consider the remainder of the company.

A man there was, besides the one who had
kissed him so fully, and another small woman. Niall scanned his
surroundings hastily - though he did not intend to linger long, he
was curious as to where Viviane had fled.

But Niall could not name this place. Indeed,
’twas so perfectly wrought that it could not be real. It certainly
was unlike any corner of England he had ever seen.

Niall’s eyes narrowed. The archbishop was
right - Viviane had fled beyond the beyond. And this place could
not be all that it pretended to be. Nay, this was but an alluring
guise cast over a the darkness of the netherworld. ’Twas intended
to deceive the unwary.

Just as Viviane’s beauty hid her traitorous
heart.

Well, Niall was wary enough for two. He
skeptically surveyed the sky of vivid blue, the water as radiant as
a glinting sapphire. The land stretched in great curves around
them, though Niall could not guess whether ’twas a morass of
islands on all sides or some single jut of land that twisted like a
serpent.

The trees that clung to the land were
starkly drawn, their boughs drawn to grow in one direction by an
evidently strong and prevailing wind. They gripped the veined grey
of bare rock with great presence and no small measure of stamina.
Seabirds cried overhead as the waves lapped at the sides of their
craft.

For they five were aboard what was clearly a
ship, though ’twas unlike any vessel Niall had yet seen. ’Twas all
wrought of gleaming white, the glimmer of the sunlight upon it so
bright as to make a man wince.

“
You know him?” demanded
that second man. He was as sparse and bedraggled as an unkept dog,
his manner little better. Niall assumed him a servant or a beggar
of some kind, though his tone was most haughty.

“
Well, sort of,” Viviane
acknowledged, with a sly smile to Niall. Her grip tightened on his
arm and her eyes glowed. His heart skipped a beat, though Niall
told himself ’twas only because it had been overlong since a woman
regarded him with such welcome.

Save his sister.

And Viviane herself on that fateful
morn.

Niall scowled, hoping the witch would be
dissuaded by the fierce expression that had sent warriors fleeing
from before him in the past.

But Viviane was unaffected.

“
He
did
save my
life,” she purred and nestled yet closer to Niall. “Just like
Gawain, from King Arthur’s court, who so nobly saved the besieged
lady in his adventures.”

A murmur of appreciation echoed across the
deck. The drenched man nodded and the other woman smiled. The
bedraggled man folded his arms across his chest and looked
displeased.

Niall felt the back of his neck heat beneath
their admiration and felt the need to correct the witch’s false
conclusion. “’Twas naught…” he began to protest, but the witch
interrupted him.

“
You see, he’s so
wonderfully modest.” Viviane sighed and treated him to a smile so
warm it could nigh melt the bones of a man unprepared against her
allure. Even Niall’s resistance wavered. “He
did
save my
life, he did!”

“
And now you’ve saved his,”
the tiny dark-haired woman declared with approval. She clasped her
hands together and sighed rapturously. “Perfectly closing the
circle and sealing your entwined fates. How wonderfully
romantic!”

The man who had hauled Niall from the ocean
cleared his throat pointedly. “
Some
others were involved,”
he commented with a sharp glance to that woman.

They were a pair, Niall immediately
concluded, for the woman’s eyes widened and she scampered to the
man’s side to make amends. “Oh, of course! You were
heroic
,
Derek, just the way you dove over the rail…” She sighed as though
much enamored of the man’s deeds and Derek exchanged an amused
glance with Niall.

He winked and Niall knew not what to do.

In ordinary circumstance, Niall would have
assumed they shared a manly jest over a woman’s approval, but still
he could feel the imprint of this Derek’s kiss.

’
Twas a situation rather
outside of his experience.

And one of little import. Niall had a
mission to fulfill. As Matthew insisted, ’twould be prudent to see
matters resolved with all haste. Sooner begun, sooner finished.

Niall caught Viviane tightly around the
waist, refusing to consider the price she would pay upon their
return. ’Twas sympathy for her that had led him awry in the
beginning and Niall was not a man to make the same error twice.

Niall closed his free hand around the
moonstone pendant and took a deep breath, trying to compose a verse
to wish them back where they belonged.

“
Oooh, you’re soaked and
cold,” Viviane complained as she pulled away from him with a
shiver. Niall was temporarily disconcerted by the bold display of
her nipples, taut beneath the thin and now wet cloth of her
chemise.

Nay! He would not be tempted! Niall gritted
his teeth and made to wish.

But the witch crowed with delight before he
could summon a verse to his lips.

“
You brought it!” She pried
the moonstone free from a startled Niall’s fingers as her eyes
widened in awe. “Oh, you wonderful man! I just knew that you had a
good heart, I just knew that you were a true hero.”

She flung her arms around his neck and
kissed his cheek yet again. Niall caught a disconcerting whiff of
the scent of her skin, more feminine than anything he had smelled
in years. The wind and sun had filled her hair with the smell of
outdoors, yet a perfume reminiscent of the finest flowers teased
his nostrils. His eyes closed, his hands fell of their own accord
to the neat indent of her waist.

How long had it been since he tasted a woman
fully?

Niall inclined his head to kiss her fully,
his eyes drifted closed before he consider the wisdom of his
impulse. But Viviane lifted the chain of the pendant over his head
with nimble fingers and proudly dropped it over her own.

Niall gasped but she had turned away to show
the others.

“
You see? Isn’t this just
perfect? First, he saved my life, then he returned my pendant,
then, oh -” she turned a shining glance upon Niall “- you show up
just when I’m thinking about you and wondering about you, almost as
though you heard my thoughts!” Viviane rewarded him with yet
another dizzying kiss.

Clearly she had discerned that he could be
twisted to her will in this way, for this kiss fell leisurely upon
his mouth. Niall tried to fight his response, knowing ’twas no
coincidence that her soft lips so adeptly coaxed his response, that
her tongue nudged against his own lips.

But he lost. His fingers tightened,
gathering a fistful of that bewitchingly sheer cloth and brushing
against the ripe curve of her buttocks.

She fit perfectly against him, her lips soft
and alluring beneath his own. Aye, his blood was roaring, though he
fought to remind himself that she sought only to manipulate
him.

Charm or nay, he
wanted
. Niall might
have tightened his grip upon the temptress’s waist, slanted his
mouth possessively across hers, intent on thoroughly sampled all
she offered.

But Viviane danced suddenly out of his grip,
taking her talisman distinctly out of his reach. Niall
instinctively snatched after her and the pendant, and she
laughed.

Zounds, she was more unpredictable than
Majella!

Viviane’s cheeks flushed prettily as she
shook a finger at him, clearly savoring his frustration. “Not in
front of everyone!” she chided, mischief in her eyes. Her kirtle
lifted in the breeze, as though ’twould tease him with a greater
glimpse of her slender thighs. Their gazes locked and a heat rose
between them, a heat that Niall longed to turn to his own
advantage.

How he wished he could show this sorceress
the fire she awakened!

And how he wished he yet had a grip upon
that talisman. He took a deep breath. Somehow Niall must win it
back from her, and with all haste. ’Twas clear enough that he could
not trust even his own response in this woman’s presence.

But Viviane seemed intent on reminding him
that ’twas she who would call the tune. She held the pendant out
for the perusal of the others, the chain dangling from her
fingertips, the stone winking in the sunlight.

“
Look? You see?” She was as
delighted as a child with an unexpected sweet. “My mother gave this
to me, it was a token from my father, but I lost it on the way
here. I was so disappointed.” Viviane turned a dewy smile upon
Niall. “But my very own knight brought it back to me. Just like an
old tale of lovers true.”

It seemed that ’twould be churlish to snatch
at the woman in this particular moment and be gone. Niall folded
his arms across his chest and resolved to await his chance.

“
What a guy,” the
disreputable-looking one said sourly. “You should have told me
you’d lost it - I would have found you another one.”

“
But not
this
one,
Monty,” Viviane insisted. “You couldn’t have brought this one. He
had it, he kept it safe for me. There’s a special bond between
us…”

Monty of the poor grooming grimaced. “So,
does
he
have a name?”

Viviane blushed so demurely that Niall felt
his own flesh heat.

A maidenly temptress. ’Twas an intoxicating
combination. He resolved in that moment that he would have one
thorough kiss from this woman before he returned her to the
archbishop.

’
Twas only fair, after she
had kindled such a flame within him.

One kiss. Just the prospect tightened his
chausses.

“
Well, I…” Viviane
hesitated, casting a glance Niall’s way through her
lashes.

“
I am Sir Niall of Malloy,”
he declared with resolve, “and I am pledged to the service of the
archbishop of Cantlecroft.”

“
Niall!” Viviane echoed
with a smile that made Niall’s belly warm. “The champion of
champions. You see, it suits him perfectly. My champion,
too.”

But Monty rolled his eyes. “And who is this
archbishop? And where is
Cantlecroft
? I’ve never heard of
it! And where the hell did you even come from?” He snapped his
fingers. “People don’t just like pop out of thin air, you
know.”

The other couple eyed him with undeniable
curiosity and Niall knew none would let him evade this question.
“The witch brought me to her side with the power of her magic,” he
said slowly, feeling the explanation was hopelessly inane, but not
wanting to reveal the truth of her token when it was out of his own
grip.

“
Magic! What a bunch of
crap!” Derek flung out his hands in obvious exasperation and Niall
warmed to the man immediately. The world could not have enough men
of good sense! “Witches! Circles closing and entwined fates.” He
shoved a hand through his hair. “Jesus! Spare me the rest of this.
It’s all a little too familiar for my comfort level.”

“
But Derek…” the tiny woman
protested.

“
But
nothing
, Paula.
I tell you, when the talk turns to magic, angels and horoscopes and
who knows what kind of garbage can’t be far behind.” He made a
sweeping gesture with one hand and glared at the small woman. “I’m
over my threshold for this stuff for the year, maybe for the
decade.”