Time Travel Romances Boxed Set (108 page)

But Niall wore a pensive frown. His gaze
flicked over her, even as Viviane smiled, and his arms did not
close protectively around her. She might have been embracing a
statue. Viviane stepped back, uncertain what was wrong and watched
as he scanned the room. It was almost as though he was avoiding
looking at her.

He was shy! The realization almost made her
laugh out loud. How could this bold knight be shy after what they
had shared?

Maybe he was afraid she hadn’t been pleased.
Wouldn’t that be just like the hero she knew Niall to be?

Well, Viviane would ease that doubt from his
mind. She ran her hand over his shoulder and smiled. Niall looked
into her eyes, swallowed, then looked away.

Her heart clenched that he should be unsure
of his talents - and too shy to ask. She pressed a kiss to his
shoulder. “I have to thank you, I’ve never woken up that way
before. It was absolutely wonderful,” she breathed.

He didn’t say anything, though his breathing
quickened and Viviane hoped she was making progress. She stretched
to her toes and brushed her lips across his, noting how Niall
closed his eyes. His hands had clenched into fists and there was a
dull red rising on the back of his neck.

Well, this was working! Viviane could feel
the tension building within him and knew she was getting somewhere.
She ran a fingertip playfully around his ear, loving how he
shivered, and knew she had to please him as he had pleased her.

She wasn’t exactly sure how to do that, but
Viviane had no doubt that they’d sort it out. They were destined
lovers, after all.

“
Won’t you come back to
bed?”

“
Nay!” The word exploded
from Niall and he flung himself away from her. He paced to the
window, his agitation obvious, then folded his hands behind his
back. He didn’t turn to face her, though his hands worked, opening
and closing into fists.

Viviane bit her lip. Had something horrible
happened this morning?

Oh, he had been out! This Avalon could be a
perplexing place, Viviane knew from her own experience, and there
was no telling who or what Niall might have encountered this
morning.

Just as she knew that Niall was not the kind
of man who would volunteer any story.

She’d just have to work it out of him.

“
I wondered where you had
gone.” Viviane kept her voice as toneless as possible, hoping he
would confide in her.

“
Even a dog does not soil
his bed,” Niall said grimly and glared out into the rain as though
he was angry with it.

Viviane realized then that he was wet and
that he had only troubled to put on his shirt. She bit back her
laughter in sudden understanding, doubting that he would appreciate
her amusement.

But it was funny that he had gone out into
the rain to relieve himself, unaware of the washroom - or its
purpose - so warm and dry and close at hand.

That would start anyone’s day off wrong!
Viviane stepped closer and ran her hands over Niall’s shoulders,
massaging the knot of tension in the back of his neck.

“
You didn’t really need to
go outside, although there’s no way you could have known.” She
kissed his shoulder blade, surprised when Niall stiffened. “They
have indoor facilities here that are truly a marvel. You can
relieve yourself and wash and groom, without ever leaving the
chamber.”

His quick glance was somewhat less than
romantic, his words even less so. “I am told I must use the toilet.
What and where is this?”

Oh, nature called for the second act. Well,
that explained
everything
!

And once such details were resolved and
Niall was feeling his usual self again, maybe they could have a
nice long shower together and pick up where they left off. Maybe
then, he’d get that intent gleam in his eye, maybe then he’d really
look
at her again.

That was a tempting enough possibility to
re-establish Viviane’s cheerfulness. “A toilet is what they call a
privy here,” she explained, claiming his hand. Niall extricated his
hand quickly, though he followed behind her.

Viviane tried not to read too much into his
gesture, knowing that he had something on his mind.

He grimaced. “And ’tis inside the
chamber?”

“
It’s in its own chamber,
in the washroom over here, which is a room for washing and for
doing other things as well. There’s a wonderful looking glass which
could only be magically wrought, it’s so very clear. I try not to
look into it too much, for my mother always said that there were
pixies lurking in looking glasses, waiting to snare those who
stared too long.”

She cast a smile over her shoulder at Niall
from the threshold of the washroom and his gaze flicked downward. A
reassuring heat dawned in those green eyes when his gaze fell on
her bare breasts. His determined expression softened slightly, and
Viviane’s heart skipped a beat.

But then Niall’s gaze rose to her pendant
and his eyes narrowed. He straightened and once again looked grim
and cold.

Viviane raised one hand to her pendant,
wondering why he was looking at it that way. “Would you rather I
took it off?” she asked hastily. “I can put it away.”

Niall’s eyes flashed. “Nay! You must wear it
at all times!”

Viviane must have looked surprised at his
vehemence, for Niall took a deep breath and pushed one hand through
his hair. His words sounded strained when he spoke. “’Twas a gift
from your parents, after all.”

Viviane smiled. He was so determined to not
take credit for the generosity of what he had done. “And one that
you returned to me.” She kissed his cheek, a little disappointed
when he didn’t even incline his head to touch his lips to hers.

“
You should garb yourself,”
he growled. “There is a chill in the air this day.”

And he pushed past her into the small
room.

Viviane’s shoulders sagged for only an
instant. He was a man with a mission, that’s what he was. She
shouldn’t be disappointed. No, he was just being protective of her.
It
was
cold in here, but Viviane didn’t plan to linger
around naked for long.

She was looking forward to that shower.

Maybe he was still feeling uncertain. Barb
was always saying that men were unbelievably dense about such
things, which Viviane understood to mean that they missed
subtlety.

She discarded subtlety, right then and
there, and followed Niall into the tiny room. She pressed herself
against his back and smiled to herself when he caught his breath.
She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed her hips against
his buttocks, running one toe over his foot and up his leg.

“
Viviane!” Niall whispered,
his voice wonderfully strained.

Viviane decided subtlety was over-rated. She
flattened her hands and ran them over his chest, closing her eyes
as the thick pelt of hair ran through her fingers. She felt the
outline of each rib, she inhaled deeply of his scent, she felt her
own desire stir once more.

“
I think we should return
to bed,” she whispered. “I think I should touch you the way you
have touched me, I think we should spend this morning learning all
there is to know of each other.”

But when Viviane looked past his shoulder
into the mirror, fully expecting to have the man’s avid attention,
Niall was frowning at the sink basin as though it was personally
offensive. He didn’t even glance up at her reflection, his lips
were drawn tight, and he stood as taut as a bowstring.

“
This is no garderobe,” he
said tersely, reminding her that he had other priorities. “There is
no course of water, no means of disposal…”

First things first.

“
Yes, it is! You see?”
Viviane reached around his waist and turned on the taps with a
triumphant flick of her wrist. Niall features brightened and he
hunkered down before the taps, moving easily away from her and
stepping out of her embrace as though he was unaware of
it.

Her presence was apparently forgotten and
Viviane didn’t welcome the change.

It was absolutely no consolation to recall
that she had spent half a day herself playing with the taps when
she first arrived. Theirs was a fearsome magic - yet one that in a
mere month, she had come to take for granted.

Viviane folded her arms across her chest, a
very feminine part of her not liking being upstaged by plumbing,
however marvelous it might be.

Niall tried to peer up the spout. “From
whence does the water come?”

So, he hadn’t
completely
forgotten
her! “It’s conjured up by magic.”

Niall cast her one of those skeptical
glances she was starting to associate with him. “Magic,” he
muttered, then snorted, his attention on the taps again.

Viviane waited, but Niall might as well have
been alone, for all the attention he was going to give her.
Clearly, she was going to be part of this discovery only if she
explained things.

Well, she could do that. Viviane stepped
forward, summoning her best smile, and put herself firmly between
Niall and the current object of his fascination.

“
You see, you just turn
these knobs. On and off, hot and cold. This one plugs the hole -
see? You just pull it up and down and it holds the water as long as
you like. There’s the most wonderful soap right here -” she passed
it under his nose for him to smell “- and behind the looking glass
- you’ll never believe this! - there’s a secret cavern.”

She opened it with a gesture. “It opens with
only the merest touch of the fingertips. Obviously, it’s there for
offerings for the pixie of the looking glass. She doesn’t seem to
be interested in my offerings, though.” Viviane removed the wilted
flower left there a few days before, as well as the piece of
chocolate that she had been so sure the pixie would like. She
frowned. “Maybe it’s a boy pixie, or maybe what I leave there isn’t
good enough for an offering. What do you think?”

But Niall’s eyes narrowed as he leaned
closer to the taps. He was busy, turning the water on and off, on
and off, his attention fixed on the changing flow. He played with
the plug, he peered up the spout, he watched the basin fill and the
water spill through the overflow.

Viviane waved the piece of chocolate at him,
just to get his attention, but Niall ignored her. Her shoulders
slumped as she wondered whether he had heard anything she had
said.

And then she wondered what she could have
done to have so lost his attention. If only her mother had told her
more about things between women and men, this would have been a lot
easier. Viviane wondered whether there was something she should
have done this morning to please Niall, and hated that she didn’t
know the answer.

Just when Viviane thought the taps couldn’t
occupy him any longer, he opened the little cabinet beneath the
sink.

“
Aha!” Niall murmured at
the array of gleaming metal there, and fell to his knees. He tapped
and listened, managing to fit his head into the tiny space to study
the pipes.

Viviane might as well have been part of the
wallpaper. She thought rather longingly of the way they had begun
the day, not to mention the way that she’d like to pick up where
they had left off. Well, maybe she could solve the basic problem
and get them back to where they had started.

It was worth a try.

Viviane cleared her throat pointedly, though
Niall didn’t look up - at least not until she lifted the lid of the
toilet. He bumped his head on the top of the cupboard and winced,
though that didn’t seem to affect his interest.

In the toilet.

Viviane flatly refused to believe that any
magic serving bodily functions was more interesting than she was.
At least not for more than a few moments.

“
And this is the toilet you
were looking for. You see, it really is very clever, you sit and
well…” She felt herself blush. “Well, you can guess that part,
but then it all goes away.”

“
Aye?” He peered at the
bowl, then looked behind it.

“
Like this!” Viviane
flicked the lever, pleased with her showmanship when Niall jumped
backward at the noisy flushing of the bowl. A heartbeat later, he
swatted beside it, unceremoniously laying claim to the lever and
flushing it himself. He chuckled to himself, repeating the
deed.

Then he leaned close to listen and did it
again. And again. And one more time.

He might as well have been alone. When he
murmured to himself, that was enough.

“
You’re not supposed to
flush it unless you have to,” Viviane said a little more snippily
than she had intended. “Barb says it’s bad for the water table,
though how you could make a table of water, I don’t know. It must
be some kind of magical trick they do here in Avalon and the
flushing affects how well it works…”

Viviane’s words caught in her throat as
Niall’s fingers fell on the lid of the box at the back. Before she
knew what he was about, he had removed it, displaying the innards
of the magical device to the eye. Viviane cried out in dismay,
certain some vengeful being would retaliate for the intrusion, but
Niall took no notice of her whatsoever.

And the toilet didn’t seem inclined to take
vengeance for Niall abusing it so.

Viviane crept closer and looked at the array
of bars and balls submerged in water there, curious despite
herself. She couldn’t see any sign of a being in charge, vengeful
or otherwise, but then, it had probably hidden away in the blink of
an eye, once it had known that Niall was going to expose it. The
fey didn’t like to be spied upon or have their dwellings invaded.
Everyone knew that.