SHADOWLOVE--STALKERS (20 page)

Chad stood up at once. “I’ll take you to your room, lass.”

She was surprised that he didn’t try to persuade her to stay. In fact, he seemed fidgety as his grandmother took her hand and bade her good evening.

Shawna had never envisioned him quite like this. In fact, this was an entirely new facet to Chadwick MacFare’s complicated personality.

Elizabeth called out to Shawna as she and Chad reached the door. “Shawna dear, I can’t tell you what a great pleasure it has been meeting you.”

Shawna wanted to run back and hug the woman. In many ways, Elizabeth MacFare reminded her of her own dear grandmother. She settled for giving the woman her grateful smile. “Thanks so much—it has been for me as well.”

Chad’s father nodded, winked, and added, “Aye, a bonny fine lass ye are, Shawna.” He grinned at his son. “And so I feel I must warn you about my boy…”

Shawna laughed. “I’m up on that, sir.”

Chad scowled, and she followed him out of the kitchen. In the central hall, she reached for her overnight bag, but Chad grabbed it before she could, gave her a challenging look, and waved her forward towards the grand staircase.

A short laugh escaped her lips as she shook her head and went a few steps before him. She waited for him to catch up and took the stairs beside him.

When they reached her oak and heavily molded bedroom door, he stopped, opened it wide, and waved her in before him.

She went inside, exclaiming at the beautifully decorated suite of rooms, and he dropped her duffel bag on the Oriental rug.

“Good night then,” he said as he turned away and started out.

Shawna was baffled, as she half expected him to make a move to kiss her again. She had been planning her style of rebuff, and now it didn’t seem necessary. She definitely felt a contrary sense of pique.

She had already decided that what happened earlier between them was best forgotten; however, now that it was obvious that he intended to do just that—
forget about their
heated encounter
—she was distressed, inwardly embarrassed, irritated, and
damn well fricking
annoyed!

As he started to close the door he turned his head and gave her a wicked grin. “Be comfortable, and sleep well, Shawna lass.”

“Ah, how could I do otherwise?” Shawna returned, feeling like her cheeks were on fire. “You do the same.”

“Oh—I rather doubt
I will
,” he said darkly as he closed the door between them.

* * *

Chad hurried down the stairs, determined to handle this new development. He had not been expecting his family and was taken aback by their sudden arrival. He knew that they did not approve of his plan to draw Pentim out and destroy him, and he wanted no interference from them.

He reached the kitchen and stopped short as the faces of the two people he adored stared up at him with definite disapproval written into their expressions. He sighed and raised his hands.
“What?”

His grandmother answered him by wagging a finger at him. His father, arms folded across his chest, one brow up, said, “Doona ask us ‘what’—what indeed!” The Duke shook his head. “Aye, then, son, having met the bonny lass, I must tell ye that this just won’t do—that’s what,” returned his father dispensing with the illusion of age.

Looking at his father often made him feel as though he were looking at a slightly older twin—until he looked further at the demeanor, which he always saw as totally parental.

Chad wasn’t, at that moment, thinking of his father’s parental authority. He had been his own man for a very long time, and was not used to taking orders. It looked as though both his father and grandmother were about to do just that: issue an order.

His own arms folded into one another across his chest as well, and he took an implacable stand. He would not be told how to conduct his life. However, he did not like to displease his loved ones, and so he had decided to allow them to have their say.

He couldn’t help but notice the glint of anger in his father’s eyes, and he frowned to himself. He had no wish to distress his family and immediately, almost guiltily, dropped his arms to his sides and took another step into the kitchen. He would do what he thought he needed to do. They would not dissuade him in this, but he would be respectful. “You both have known what my intentions were from the start. I went to locate and bring Shawna into the protection of my circle. I mean to train her to use the skills she already possesses and make her aware of the ones she doesn’t know she has. I will teach her a few specific black magic skills…and tattoo her against the inherent danger of those spells.”

He took a tour of the kitchen while they watched him. He turned and his face was still drawn in a scowl. “You knew that was my goal, so why now this attitude?”

“This isn’t new. We never approved of your plan,” his father snapped.

“You never tried to stop me,” Chad shot back.

“We couldn’t, at that point, stop you, Chad.” His grandmother shook her head. “You weren’t listening.”

“And what…now you think I am?”

“Now we think this innocent child that you wish to put out there…might be hurt—gravely hurt—and we know you don’t want that.”

“I don’t intend to allow that to happen, but,
Brea
,
I don’t even have a choice any longer. If Shawna is to stay alive…if I am to keep her safe…I have to kill Pentim. It is no longer about
my
need for revenge.”

His grandmother considered this for a very long moment before she turned to her son, the duke, who threw up his hands as she quietly advised, “He has a point.”

“Then what we need to do is sit and devise a better plan.” The duke’s voice was grim.

“The plan I put together will work,” Chad returned obstinately.

“However, you will listen to your father and to me…because there is something you need to know. There is more than just Pentim out there. We have something else that has entered the mix, and we don’t want to draw too much attention to ourselves at this time.”

“What?” he asked, but he already knew—there was only one real threat that concerned them and their way of life.

“Dracula has been making serious inquiries. He does do that from time to time, but if you make this battle with Pentim too public, he will find us, and that is something none of us need.”

~ Thirteen ~

THE SHOWER HAD been just what she needed. It woke her up nicely. She was dressed and ready to face the early morning. She took a quick gander at herself in the wall mirror, smoothed a hand over her faded Gap jeans, wondering if she should wear her hiking boots instead of her sneakers. After deciding to stick with sneakers, she pulled on her sleek navy leather jacket over the pretty blue sweater she was wearing.

She flipped her long blond hair away from her shoulders and decided that she was going to her cottage, collecting her things, and leaving Scotland. She didn’t know where she was going, but she knew she was going to have to keep moving. She couldn’t put Chad’s family in danger, and if they decided to rally around her with her grandparents, that was what she would be doing.
No,
she couldn’t have that.

She had not slept much the night before, and she had given a great deal of thought as to how she was going to handle the problem of the ‘electric entity’ that seemed to be stalking her. Would it follow her to the airport? She didn’t think so. She rather thought it was connected somehow to Stockton. It seemed cowardly to leave it behind when it was capable of hurting more people, but what could she do?

She had to get out. She had to get some air and think. She wouldn’t even stay for coffee. No sense getting any closer to Chad’s family than she already had. A twinge of regret touched her. She liked them, really liked them, and she knew they would wonder at her hasty departure. Sighing off a shrug of regret, she made her way to her door.

The sounds of a cleaning crew busily at work below stairs had decided her that this was as good a time as any to make her escape without too much fuss.

Escape—hmm, good word
. She wasn’t sure how she was going to handle being alone with Chad in his car on the drive home. Just what she was experiencing was too complex for her to deal with, so she shoved it out of her mind. She knew she was devastatingly attracted to Chad MacFare. She was also sure that he had a score of women—she was just one more, and that was not what she wanted to be:
just one
more.

What then did she want? She closed her eyes for a moment. She was sure of only one thing, that she was damned determined never to let him kiss her ever again, let alone…anything like what happened yesterday in his library.

How had that happened? What had she been thinking? Thinking? She hadn’t been doing any of that. She shook off the thoughts that had plagued her and kept her from sleeping the night before. Taking up the navy duffel bag, she slung it over one shoulder and bolstered herself before she was out of her room and making her way down the wide staircase.

Chad chose that particular moment to come back into the house from one of the grand hall’s front double doors. He wore a weathered brown leather jacket and faded jeans. His tawny hair was a mass of windblown waves framing his handsome face. His eyes were bright pools of green.

He looked up at her as she stopped for a moment on the staircase, and his gaze shifted to the bag slung over her shoulder. He frowned darkly as his eyes languidly looked her over. “Are you going somewhere, lass?”

The light from his eyes burned a wide trail over her body, and she had to lick her bottom lip before she was able to speak
. “
Well, I was hoping you might give me a lift home actually?”

She made her way down the remaining steps and came to stand in front of him. She allowed the bag to slip off her shoulder, although she retained a hold on its strap as it sank to the marble floor and fell in against her calf. She needed to use some bravado to get past the moment of looking into his dark green eyes.

“I doona think that would be wise,” he said, lapsing into a deep Scottish burr.

His voice, his accent,
oh man, his looks…
stalled her for a wayward moment; however, Shawna had made up her mind to keep him at a distance. “But,
I do
think it very wise.”

“There is a dangerous ‘thing’ that seems to mean you harm, and we both know that it already got to you in your cottage. It can get to you when you go walking. It can get to you when you need to go to your car. Shawna,
it can get to you
.” His words were clipped, and he clenched his jaw on the last phrase. All resolve to keep him at arm’s length seemed silly.
Why should you do
that
, was a question that loomed large in her brain, and her body agreed—no argument there.

Then logic told her once more
that he
was trouble.
You’ll
be in deep shit if you don’t put distance between you!

She had to come up with an answer, and she did. “Perhaps that thing could have gotten to me, but I kinda think I have its number now, and I also think I know how to create a specific—since there is no way of getting around this, I’ll just say it—
spell
. I think I can create a ‘shield spell’ to stop it from harming me. “ She eyed him for a moment, and as he didn’t say anything as she continued, “You see…I know a great deal about white magic, and I am fully capable of performing a very strong spell that electricity cannot pass through. I have a grandmother as well, and she taught me what to do should I happen across the unknown.” She looked into his green eyes. “But you knew that, didn’t you?”

“I guessed it, but wasn’t sure. So what is that spell?”

“Don’t know yet. This thing is made up of electricity. I have to figure out which shield spell will work against it.”

He threw up his hands with exasperation. “What the hell, Shawna! This is not a game.”

“And yet—it is.” She shrugged. “I mean to improvise.”

“Improvise, eh—why don’t you run that by me if you please, lass, just what sort of improvising do ye intend?”

Again she noticed that when he was distressed, his burr got stronger, deeper, and actually aroused her. Her blood felt tickling fingers…

She looked away from him and would have started forward, had he not stepped in the way. She sighed and relented. “Okay…I’ll tell you in the car…on the way back.”

He had her arm and gently pulled her to him as he bent close, so very close to her lips. “I haven’t agreed yet that I would be taking you back there.”

“Ah, you don’t feel like a drive?” She pulled out of his hold. “Don’t worry about it—I can go home vamp style…”

“You’ll not be doing anything of the sort, lass! Are you mad? Vamp-style, is it? Doona you know your scent would linger in the air in your wake? What are you thinking? Do you
want
Pentim to find you?”

She eyed him doubtfully. “No…but I thought
you did
.”

“
And I do
, but when you are ready—when
we
are ready—
not
one damn minute before.”