Into the Dreaming (22 page)

It tented, too.

Exasperated, he fastened his sporran around his waist. There were sound reasons Scotsmen wore the things so often—and who could traipse about in naught but a kilt otherwise? He didn’t understand how modern-day men managed without them.

The moment his eyes met hers, they’d both tensed like startled animals. An experienced man, he’d recognized it for mating heat, and of an uncommon intensity at that. But there was something else, too, something … deeper.

Och, and for sure the lass found him attractive. She’d all but eaten him up with her eyes.

He rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. Gwen and Drustan wouldn’t be back for days. He was fine with keeping the lovely visitor for himself for a time. Rather like a dying man’s last supper. And blethering hell, the lass was a veritable feast.

W
HEN DAGEUS RETURNED TO THE KITCHEN, THE LASS
startled, then gave him a stiff smile.

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I’m not usually so clumsy. I just wasn’t expecting someone to open the door at that moment and I was off balance.”

So that was the way she would play it
, Dageus thought, amused. Pretend a flash of pure fire hadn’t passed between them. Pretend she’d done nothing more than stumble at his doorstep. He’d permit it. For a time. “I’m sorry I startled you, lass,” he gave her the words she wanted to hear.

He turned his back to her and busied himself retrieving beans from the freezer, putting them in a grinder, and grinding them to a fine powder. Not the imported
cofaidh
he’d grown fond of in Edinburgh, but it would do. He let the silence between them spin out, curious to see what she would
do with it. Would she
haver
away, filling the space betwixt them with nervous chatter?

“As I was saying, I’m Elisabeth Zanders,” she said after a long moment, with a false note of brightness.

Aye, she would
haver
. “I caught your name the first time, lass.”

“And as you know, Gwen asked me to come,” she chirped.

Dageus nearly dropped the carafe at that. He knew no such thing. He placed the carafe carefully on the counter before turning to face her. “Indeed,” he said slowly.
Gwen
had sent her? Was he dreaming?

She nodded encouragingly. “I’m here to help you,” she said gently.

To help him? Och, by Amergin, the gods were smiling on him!
This was the last thing he would have expected of Gwen!

But all of a sudden, a recent conversation he’d had with Gwen when she’d last visited him made more sense. She’d mentioned several times that she disliked him being alone so much. She’d worried that it wasn’t good for him. She’d seemed to be hinting around at something, but had left without disclosing what had been on her mind, as if the subject had been too uncomfortable for her to broach.

This was it then. She’d devised a solution to his loneliness. And yet another way to keep the thirteen in check. With a whore, bought and paid for. Although he’d ne’er have expected it of her, it was, he admitted, a tidy solution. He rubbed his jaw, pondering the fascinating development.

“With your problems,” Elisabeth continued, with another of those little nods.

“Um-hmm.” He eyed her leisurely from head to toe, digesting his bonny fortune. Thinking how he would savor peeling off layer after layer of her clothing.

“I know you might find it difficult to relax with a perfect stranger—”

“Not at all, lass,” he said silkily.

“—but I think you’ll find I’m a good listener.”

Listener? He’d liked his women making noise and a lot of it, not listening.

“So I thought we could start tomorrow, and just get comfortable with each other today.”

Still trying to assimilate that the lass had been sent by Gwen to share his bed, Dageus turned back to the coffee-maker and finished preparing it in silence.

It felt odd to him, he realized. Although he desired her intensely, and had only moments before been planning her seduction, he didn’t care for her speaking of such things so casually. It chafed his pride. It chafed what remained of his heart.

But not so much that he’d send the lass away. Nay, nowhere near that much.

“I see no reason to wait until tomorrow,” he said, coming to a swift decision. His entire body was tense with wanting. He’d been four months without a woman, and this one turned his blood to fire. Once he’d bedded her he’d wager she’d not again speak so casually of
helping him
. Nay, he’d tup her ’til she melted into a dreamy-eyed lass, and free that wild-haired creature he suspected lurked just beneath the proper surface. Then
he’d
help
her
. To a full measure of carnal bliss. And she’d stay with him because she wanted to—not because she’d been paid to do so. Dageus might be certain of little else
of late, but he was unequivocally certain of his expertise with the lasses. When he’d lost his fair Brea, he’d devoted himself to learning everything there was to know about pleasuring a woman, certain that if he’d been better, if he’d been able to make it for her the way it had felt to him, she’d have waited for him. No matter how long it had taken.

“Are you certain? I mean, you feel comfortable with me already?” She beamed up at him, looking inordinately pleased by the thought.

“Och, aye, lass,” he said, feeling inexplicably irritable. “More than comfortable enough to tup.”

“Toop?” she echoed blankly, her smile wobbling a bit.

“Er …” Dageus rummaged about for another word from her century that she might be more familiar with, and seized the vernacular he’d picked up recently. The word had confused him at first, being used for such a variety of reasons. “Fuck,” he clarified.

The smile fell right off her face, and she blanched. “FF—Oh! Who said anything about
th-that
?” She snapped so abruptly straight in her chair that it clattered against the stone floor and nearly toppled over.

He blinked, startled by her reaction. “You did.”

“I did
not
!”

“You did too,” he said patiently.

“Oh, absolutely not!” she practically shouted.

Dageus blinked. “There’s no need to shout the roof down about my ears, lass.”

“There is if you think I came here to-to—” she broke off, sputtering. She skittered backward in her chair, scooting it bumpily across the stone floor. “Just because I gawked at you doesn’t mean I-I—” she broke off again, cheeks flaming.

Dageus studied her closely. She looked shocked, appalled, and mildly guilty. “Have I misunderstood you, lass?” he asked carefully. “You said Gwen sent you. Why did she send you to my home?”

“To
talk
to you! To
talk
about your problems! I’m a
psychologist
!”

Psychologist? Puzzling over the strange word, one of hundreds he’d encountered during his time in the twenty-first century, he deconstructed it into base parts: psyche and logos—a study of the mind? Gwen had sent some wee young lass to study his mind? What the blethering hell did she think that might accomplish? Disappointment that he wouldn’t be bedding her (at least not at the moment, he thought, with dark amusement) mingled with pure relief that she wasn’t bought and paid for. He hadn’t liked thinking of her, or “tooping,” as a commodity bought and paid for. Ne’er had Dageus MacKeltar exchanged coin for bed play. He’d not liked the feel of it.

Then the absurdity of his foolish assumption struck him, and he made a choking noise, trying to swallow a burst of laughter.
When a lass is fashed, a wise man doesn’t laugh
, his da, Silvan, had oft reminded him. Such advice had long stood Dageus in good stead with women.

Och, what a fool he’d been, thinking Gwen had sent him a woman to warm his bed!
This
was what Gwen had been hinting at during her last visit. That she’d be sending him some modern-day mind studier for him to
talk
to.
Talk, my arse
, he thought, eyes narrowing.
Talk her naked, mayhap
.

“Why did you
think
I was here?” she said stiffly.

“If you haven’t figured that out, lass, leave be,” he warned, rubbing his jaw to hide the smile he couldn’t quite tame. Nay,
definitely not bought and paid for. Spitting furious with him at the moment. And lovely as could be, all temper-flushed and sparkly eyed.

“Oh, I’ve figured it out. And I don’t believe for a minute,” she hissed, “that Gwen would send someone to you for
that
.”

“Verily, upon reflection neither do I, but ’twas a rather glorious moment while I did,” he said easily.

Elisabeth scowled at him, firmly ignoring the tiny voice inside her that was saying,
“A glorious moment?” Me? Really?
The thought that a man like him might consider her a glorious moment did funny things to her stomach.

His eyes were glittering with amusement and he looked like he was trying not to laugh. If he did, she was afraid she might throw something at him. The man didn’t possess an ounce of civilized embarrassment. He should be mortified, not calmly admitting that he’d found the thought of doing
that
with her glorious.

And that word! When he’d said that word, it had sent a jolt of pure energy to her, er … parts of herself she shouldn’t be thinking about. She’d been terrified that she’d made a classic Freudian slip. Mentally reviewing their conversation, she hadn’t been able to isolate just how or when, but it had definitely been on her mind, and what woman wouldn’t be thinking such things while looking at him?

A professional, Zanders, which you clearly are
not.

How on earth was she going to regain control of the situation?

“Has Gwen ever sent a woman to you for such a thing before?” Elisabeth asked tersely, wondering if she really knew Gwen as well as she thought.

“Nay,” he replied smoothly. “But you know how newly
wedded couples are. They think everyone should be experiencing the joys of wedded bliss. Gwen has been trying to matchmake for me, and I merely thought you were her latest effort. There you were saying you wanted me to relax and get to know you, and I thought you were, er … an unusually forward lass.”

“Didn’t Gwen tell you I was arriving yesterday?” Elisabeth asked, frowning. Perhaps Gwen had neglected to mention his psychologist’s gender, and he’d been expecting a man.

He shook his head.

A sudden, terrible thought occurred to her, a thought that positively made her cringe. Reluctantly, she voiced it. “Mr. MacKeltar, did you know that Gwen had hired me to work with you?”

He shook his head. “Nay. Verily, she ne’er mentioned a word of it.”

“You didn’t have any idea that she’d hired a psychologist for you?” Elisabeth repeated, as if rephrasing it slightly might make him change his answer to the one she wanted to hear.

He didn’t. “Nay,” he replied. “Nor have I any need of one, lass.”

Elisabeth closed her eyes, stunned, belatedly understanding why Gwen had wanted her to wait until she returned from the hospital. She’d assumed from Gwen’s letter that Dageus MacKeltar knew Gwen was arranging professional help for him. She’d
assumed
.

And you know what assuming does
, her id needled,
makes an ass out of u and me
.

She groaned inwardly. A man like him probably had a different woman throwing herself at him every day of the
week and two on Sundays. It wasn’t as if she’d shown up on his doorstep waving credentials and looking doctorish. No, she’d shown up in jeans and hiking boots, ogled him from head to toe, and blathered vaguely about helping him with his “problems.” It was no wonder he’d thought she’d been coming on to him.

Completely off kilter, she tried to smooth her hair, only to encounter her cap. She fought the urge to tug it off, toss it down, and stomp on it in frustration. She desperately needed a few minutes to regroup, clear her head, and figure out how best to proceed.

They would simply have to start over, she decided swiftly, and she would do all in her power to salvage what she could of the situation. Failure was unacceptable. Elisabeth opened her eyes and met his gaze levelly. “Mr. MacKeltar—”

“Dageus,” he corrected.

“Mr. MacKeltar, I am going to walk out that door—”

“Please doona be doin’ so, lass—”

“—and knock,” she continued firmly. “You’re going to wait until I knock this time. Then I’m going to introduce myself and explain why I’m here. You’re going to say good morning and offer me a cup of coffee. I’m going to drink the whole thing. Then we’re going to start over and pretend none of this ever happened. Got it?”

He added sugar to his coffee and licked a few grains from the spoon. “Aye.”

Damn him, but he was
still
trying not to laugh, she realized. Under other circumstances, she, too, might have found it amusing—like, if the horrible ordeal had happened to someone else.

“Okay. Here I go.”

Elisabeth stalked out and slammed the door so hard that the frame rattled.

Dageus saw her jump a little bit out on the stoop, as if she’d not meant to slam it
quite
so hard.

Leaning back against the counter, he finally let himself laugh. At her display of temper, which he found promising as it hinted of buried passions scarce restrained. At his absurd assumption. At the pleasure of having a woman in his cottage. At feeling like a man—plain and simple. Had she glanced back in the window he was watching her through, she would have seen the picture of relaxation and composure.

Except that every muscle in his body was tensed to spring.

He suspected that if she ventured out into the yard and looked to be running off, he would be tackling her after all. But he’d give her a few minutes to cool off. By Amergin, he needed them, too.

He also needed a few moments to come up with a plan. Fortunately, he’d thought swiftly enough to deflect her question about why he’d assumed she was there to share his bed. It hadn’t been as if he could say,
Because it silences the thirteen demons that inhabit me
. Nay, that wouldn’t have worked at all.

He couldn’t fathom why Gwen had sent her to talk to him, for Gwen surely knew that no amount of poking about in his mind was going to yield solutions or lay the thirteen to rest. He wondered if Gwen had actually told the lass anything about his problem. He doubted it. Although he’d been in the twenty-first century for only five months, he’d read voraciously and had spent many long hours staring in fascination at television. People from Gwen’s time didn’t believe
in anything they couldn’t hold in their hands. Nay, Elisabeth Zanders didn’t look to be a woman who would readily put her trust in things such as Druids and curses and stones that opened gates through time.