Time Travel Romances Boxed Set (109 page)

Except apparently Niall. He plunged his hand
into the water there and flicked at the innards with one
fingertip.

“
You shouldn’t touch them!”
Viviane hissed, clutching his arm. “You’ll muck up the magic! Who
knows what will happen to you? You could be struck with lightning
or banished from the realm, cursed for all your days and
nights.”

Niall cast a telling glance her way. “You
fret overmuch. This is no magic.”

Before Viviane could argue, he pulled on
something with a fingertip. The toilet flushed, even though he
hadn’t touched the flushing lever.

This time Viviane jumped backward, though
Niall almost smiled.

He shook his head and pursed his lips,
looking as satisfied as a large cat after a hot meal. “Now, where
does the impulse begin?”

He straddled the seat, both hands in the
tank, water up to his elbows as he explored. Some of the water
splashed on the floor, but Niall was as oblivious to that as he was
to Viviane. A frown marred his brow as he touched and wiggled, his
concentration complete.

She had lost him to a magical garderobe.

His obliviousness to her naked presence was
a startling contrast to earlier this morning and Viviane didn’t
much like the change. She thought she had a good idea how to get
his attention back again, although it was her last real
possibility.

“
Well,” she said with a
breezy confidence she wasn’t quite feeling “if you think that is a
marvel, you will be amazed by this!” Viviane hauled back the drape
over the shower stall, feeling triumphant when Niall glanced
up.

She turned on the torrent of water, making
sure the blend was nice and hot, then flicked a victorious glance
his way. “You see, it’s a small room made specifically for washing,
like standing beneath a waterfall, but right in the warmth and
comfort of this room. It’s perfect! And people here take it for
granted so much that they bathe within it once or even twice a
day.”

Viviane was uncertain how he would respond
to her bold suggestion, but was still intent upon making it. “It
has always seemed to me that the room is large enough to be shared,
but perhaps we could find out for certain this morning.”

Niall stood up and leaned into the stall,
toyed with the taps, eyed the drain, then shook his head.

“’
Tis just as the smaller
one,” he concluded, shook the water droplets out of his hair, and
bowed his head once more over the innards of the toilet.

“
But this one is for
washing all over.” Viviane waited, but to no avail. “You climb into
it naked and there’s plenty of room for two. I’m sure of
it!”

Niall’s brow furrowed with concentration. He
didn’t even answer her. Viviane tapped her toe, she let the steam
fill the washroom.

But Niall didn’t even look up. She danced
her fingertips over his shoulder, but he just shrugged off her
touch.

Well, it was clear enough that just about
anything was more interesting than she was this morning, though she
had certainly tried to set matters to rights. Viviane couldn’t
solve Niall’s mood alone, particularly when he wasn’t helping her
any.

Maybe he just needed some time alone.

Well, she had to go to work anyhow.

Viviane lifted her chin and marched into the
shower, taking great delight in generously using her favorite
shower gel. She wasn’t about to let him forget she was here, that
she was naked, that she was willing, and that this shower could be
shared. The washroom filled with the perfume of roses and Viviane
knew it, but Niall’s shadow still hunkered over the new object of
his affection.

Viviane hummed, loudly and off-key, just to
make sure he didn’t completely forget she was there. She
‘inadvertently’ got him wet, when she had to reach past him for a
nail brush, making good and sure in the process that he couldn’t
miss seeing her naked and wet.

Niall barely glanced up.

She brushed her hip against him, laying a
hand on his shoulder and practically poked her breast in his ear
when she reached for the soap beside the sink. She apologized
prettily, citing the small confines of the room, knowing full well
that she had left a dribble of scented shower foam on the nape of
his neck.

Niall wiped it off without glancing her
way.

And Viviane finally became angry.

How dare he treat her with such disinterest?
How dare he follow her all the way to Avalon, prove himself her own
knight in shining armor, then simply forget about her?

That was not the way any of the books
proceeded and certainly not the way hers was written. No! Niall
should have been right here in this shower with her, running his
big hands over her body, lathering up that shower gel and making
her moan.

Well, it wasn’t as though she hadn’t made
things crystal clear!

Viviane scrubbed with rising annoyance,
wondering what else she could have possibly done. Her temper had
just about come to a full simmer when Niall cried “
aha
!” and
the toilet gurgled as it flushed with gusto.

The water in the shower turned so icy cold
that Viviane screamed.

She jumped out onto the mat, shivering from
head to toe, and earned herself only the most cursory glance from
the man of her dreams.

“
You end this ritual most
hastily,” he commented with an innocence that made her wonder
whether he truly had no idea what he had done. She glared at him,
but he was supremely oblivious, his tinkering fingers back at his
self-appointed task.

He even whistled slightly under his
breath.

Curse him! Viviane scrubbed herself off,
then threw the wet towel at his head. She stormed off to dress for
work without wasting a backward glance. She wouldn’t give him the
pleasure of any more of her attention. After all, few hours of
being alone would show him the delights of her company and remind
him of all he was missing.

Wouldn’t it?

The toilet flushed once more as Viviane
descended the stairs, her anger rising another notch at the
certainty that Niall didn’t even know she was gone.

Men!

*

But Niall knew.

Oh, he knew and he wished he did not. ’Twas
only after the door slammed behind Viviane and the chamber echoed
with silence that he heaved a sigh of relief. It had nigh taken
every vestige of determination within him to not lunge into the
shower after Viviane and take her against that shower wall.

Even now, he was not convinced he could
trust himself to not run after her and beg for another chance to
lay claim to her many charms. Aye, Viviane was a dangerous beauty,
one whose witchery was readily forgotten when she smiled and
chattered with such easy charm.

Niall released a shuddering breath. He could
nigh see her with the torrent of water pouring over her lovely
breasts, her neck arched back, her hair in a wet rivulet against
her neck. He had glimpsed her silhouette through the curtain and
clenched his teeth; he had smelled that potion she used within that
place, and known that he could not endure the temptation much
longer.

But he had.

And she - sorceress that she was - guessed
his torment and sought only to make it worse. She leaned herself
against him, ensuring that he felt the ripe perfection of that
breast, no less the way the nipple beaded with the cold. She left a
dollop of that infernally seductive mixture upon his own flesh to
torment him with the knowledge of what could have been his own.
Even now, Niall could smell it and, with each inadvertent turn of
his head, he was inundated with a desire that weakened his
knees.

Aye, Viviane had cast a spell upon him and
addled his wits. Though it took all within him to not take what was
offered, Niall of Malloy still ached with desire denied.

How was a man to think sensibly when a
beguiling woman stood naked before him and sought to tempt him?
What was a decent man to do when he tried only to keep his pledge,
and hurt flashed in the eyes of that same woman as a result? Even
if that hurt must be feigned, intended to twist his heart with
guilt, ’twas no less effective for all of that.

How was a man to forget the way that very
woman writhed in his arms, how she trusted him, how she tasted, how
very innocent she seemed?

Niall turned the taps and concentrated on
them, desperately trying to push the lady from his thoughts. On and
off, hot and cold. Up and down, flush and fill. These devices were
not nearly so interesting as he would have had Viviane believe.

But they had kept his hands busy.

Aye, the way she pressed those breasts
against him, the way she kissed him, the way she persistently
invited him back for more - ’twas enough to drive a man of
principles mad with desire.

A desire Niall dared not fulfill.

He had no place taking pleasure from the
woman he had sworn to return to the executioner’s block. ’Twould be
wrong, ’twould make his task even more difficult. Niall reminded
himself of that, even as his body argued the lady’s own case.

The very fact that she desired him was
telling. Aye, ’twas not the way of women to seek out such intimacy,
unless they were in the trade of earning a living that way.

And Viviane was no whore.

Nay, she was a witch, which meant she sought
to seduce him for other nefarious means, for her own means. There
was one tale of witches that Niall recalled, for ’twas the one that
chilled him to his very bones.

There was a token they desired, these
witches, one that made men fall thrall to their twisted will. Aye,
’twas a token that must be won willingly from a man, then could be
used against him and all his brethren with dreadful power.

For a mortal man to plant himself willingly
within a witch was a daunting prospect, by the telling of this
tale. To be sure, there was a part of him that Niall would prefer
did not shrivel and fall off. Whether ’twould be mounted and used
as a powerful talisman thereafter or not.

Niall would simply prefer to keep himself
intact.

Viviane must have guessed his true objective
in pursuing her and sought to turn matters to her own advantage.
Indeed, Niall recalled little of what he had said the night before
beneath the assault of Paula’s potion. He might well have told her
of his mission himself.

One could never be certain. Viviane intended
to render his quest a failure, ’twas as simple as that.

’
Twas far from reassuring
that the better part of Niall was more than prepared to surrender
to the lady’s ardent demands, the consequences be damned. Aye,
’twas not reason guiding his impulse here!

Indeed, he had come dangerously close to
joining her as she laved herself so close beside him. So great was
his distraction that Niall had barely been able to distinguish what
was before his own eyes. He had not found the flushing lever on
purpose, though in hindsight, he was glad he had. Niall had been
close to succumbing to the lady’s allure, her exit saving him just
in time.

He was honest enough to admit that he was
disappointed, however foolishly. Niall toyed absently with the
water device, watching the water flow when he turned the handle one
way, then stop when he turned it the other.

’
Twas only then he realized
the import of what was beneath his hands.

He was no sorceror and yet he readily made
the device conjure the water. Hot and cold, on and off. Niall could
see the hand of man in this. Though he could not fathom what made
the water run, he knew that he controlled its temperature and pace
with perfect precision.

No spells, no rhymes, no incantations or
slaughtered poultry were necessary to ensure the device did its
task. The good sense of a clear-thinking man was behind this or
Niall would eat his armor.

Ha! A reasonable explanation!

It made perfect sense. Niall had heard of
marvels of the East in many matters - men of afar oft had other
ideas, other cleverness that could be understood once
explained.

But that did not make those marvels
magic
.

Aye, he could not explain the mechanism of
the mill that ground the flour, though he knew well enough that it
did. And he had not the skill to make ale from water and yeast,
though he knew it could be done.

What if no magic governed doings here at
all?

He straightened, stunned by the next clear
step in his thinking. What if this was
not
Avalon? What if
Paula was not a pixie and none of the others were sorcerors? What
if they were but
people
, albeit people of some unknown and
exotic locale, people with skills beyond those of the archbishop’s
court?

Foreigners. With foreign ways and advanced
mechanisms.

Niall dropped the lid and sat down heavily,
his thoughts flying like quicksilver. ’Twas perfectly reasonable,
an explanation that deeply appealed to his sense of how matters
should be.

And, if he could learn some of the marvels
of this exotic place, then he could bring new prosperity to
Cantlecroft! He would be like one of the old crusaders, returning
from an arduous quest with exotic marvels that dazzled those who
had remained behind!

And vastly improved their lot. Oh, had they
not learned much of the machinery of war from Outremer? And what of
the marvel that was silk? The spices they now used to flavor meat,
the cloves and pepper, both once unknown on England’s chilly
shores.

Then, he truly would be a hero.

Niall turned on the shower as Viviane had
done and watched the water flow, an even more appealing possibility
taking shape in this thoughts. People like the archbishop would pay
dearly for this marvel in their homes. Aye, the man who held the
secret of this cleverness would be in high demand.