The Highlander's Haunted Kiss (3 page)

“I am sure I'm not interested in the women you have known.” Keeping her sheet securely in front of her, she leaned against an unpacked wardrobe chest at the end of the bed, her thoughts straying back to what might have happened between them if he'd awoken her with the intent to enjoy her body?

Unbidden, wanton images seared themselves on her brain as she imagined the feel of his well-muscled form pressed against her. Her thoughts positively shocked her. She blamed the sight of so much exposed skin.

The man studied her, his chiseled features cast in shadow. With his dark hair tied in a neat queue and his green eyes tracking hers, she could almost pretend they sat in a London tearoom instead of a bedchamber in a deserted castle. Except no man would dare to speak to her of such things when she had been under her father's protection. Or even her husband's, despite the viscount being an invalid. She had never been so vulnerable.

And yet…the Highlander did not threaten her. Or beat her. The greatest risk he presented so far was the way he so captivated her attention. She could not take her eyes off him.

“Who are you?” he asked. “I regret not introducing myself before. I am Iain Darroch, Lord of Invergale.”

“Lillian Roth—that is, Lillian Desalles. I am the widowed Viscountess Broadville.” She allowed herself to trace his muscles with her gaze, although she attempted to be discreet.

“Your maiden name is Roth?”

“Rothmore, actually. And I am not accustomed to entertaining in my bedchamber.” She truly needed to get him out. By now, she was more concerned for her peace of mind than her physical safety. Clearly, he meant her no harm. But his presence stirred her with a restlessness she'd never known.

She put down her knife, hoping to call a truce. She was relieved to have it out of her hand.

“Lillian Rothmore.” He seemed to test out the name.

“My friends call me Lily.” A silly thing to share, of course. But her thoughts were a jumble as exhaustion seeped into her veins. The long journey had taken a toll even before she'd spent two days scouring the crumbling ruin of Invergale.

“Even though we have gotten off to an awkward beginning, I hope one day I have the pleasure of doing the same.” His voice was rather soothing, now that he was not bellowing out his claim to the keep.

“Invergale belongs to me,” she reminded herself as much as him. Her eyelids began to droop, fatigue weighing her limbs.

What if the man was only a dream conjured from a haze of sleep? Heaven knew, no one else had seen him but her. Maybe if she went back to sleep, she would dream him away from here.

“As you said, we can settle that matter tomorrow when you are better rested.” He seemed more agreeable now. Had he shifted closer to her end of the bed where she sat on the trunk?

His powerful masculine form had stirred thoughts of things no maiden would admit. But she was exhausted, her emotions a tangled mess. She could not help it that she imagined what it would be like to share a chamber with a man such as this. Especially when she might never know the pleasures of a marriage bed. Curse Iain Darroch. He'd put those thoughts in her head with his discussion of virginal maids and experienced women.

“Iain Darroch.” She tried out the sound of his name on her lips, the same way he'd done with hers.

“From the most powerful clan in the Highlands.”

“There are no more clans,” she reminded him, recalling her history lessons. “The clan system was outlawed over a hundred years ago.”

Sweet heaven, she wouldn't even lose her virginity in her
dreams
at this rate. Why discuss history with an intriguing Highland warrior so close she could breathe in the scent of pine and musky male?

“Spoken like an Englishwoman,” Iain—she liked thinking of him as Iain—chided her.

“I am an American.”

The hearth fire dimmed and he still watched her intently from his seat upon the tick. Would her sheets hold the heat of him for long after he left? She couldn't deny a high level of curiosity. She had never been so close to a man, her husband having never so much as entered her bedchamber.

Let alone
her.

At the time, she'd been relieved. But if a man such as Iain Darroch had been her bridegroom on that night when she'd been dressed in no more than the frailest of lace chemises, her body washed and scented for a man's pleasure, she suspected she would have been far more…amenable.

“American?” His Scots accent was pleasing to the ear, the lilting syllables a sweet music all its own.

“From New York,” she added, trying desperately to focus on their conversation and not the way Iain's nearness made her feel.

“No wonder. You have the fire of a colonist in your blood.” He shifted to one side, creating room for her on the bed he'd commandeered.

“Thank you. I'm fine.” She feared sitting close to him in his state of dishabille would not help the fire in her blood in the slightest.

“Take your seat where it's comfortable, lass. You are weary and I have disturbed your slumber.”

True enough. She'd been sound asleep before she'd awakened to find him at her bedside. He'd barged right in…right through a barred door, she realized as her gaze moved to the door. She'd lowered the bar herself before she'd lain down to rest.

“Iain.” She came fully alert.

His broad chest rose up and down slowly with deep, relaxed breaths.

“I like hearing my given name on your lips.” A wry grin lifted one corner of his full, sensual mouth. “Shall I call you Lily, then?”

“How did you get in this chamber?” she demanded. “The door was bolted from the inside.”

If she tested the barrier now, would it still hold fast? And if so, wouldn't that mean he was not real? Was she truly going mad and this attractive, compelling man had been conjured by her lonely heart and agitated mind?

Panic made her breath come faster even as she neared the proof she sought.

“That does not always stop a determined visitor. The main doors of Invergale were barred to you when you arrived and you simply let yourself in another way.”

What other way? She peered around the room, seeing no possible entrance.

“You could never have scaled the walls to a tower room. Not without equipment and men.” She held up the light of logic to chase away foolish tricks of her mind.

He frowned, straightening to meet her gaze head-on.

“If you must know, I took advantage of a secret passageway.”

Her jaw fell open as she peered around the chamber.

“I don't believe you.” A nervous trembling took root inside her.

The warmth of his body felt all too real. The sensible explanation for his presence caught her off guard.

“I'll show you.” He rose to his feet, a veritable tower of a man. “Come.”

Her heartbeat jumped wildly as he edged past her and moved toward a far corner of the room. Tugging aside a threadbare tapestry, he revealed a plank door on one wall. He would have to duck to enter. Yet, pulling up on an iron ring, he cracked the opening so she could see inside. The scent of stale, earthy air floated toward her as a shadowed tunnel was revealed.

He'd entered through a secret corridor.

“But you can't be real,” she protested, unwilling to relinquish the explanation that fit this situation best. “My footman couldn't see you when I did. Then, when I looked away for only a moment, you disappeared into the forest.”

Perhaps when she awoke tomorrow the hidden passageway would be gone and she could go back to thinking this had all been a dream. At this point, she would prefer to think she was going mad than that she had entertained wanton ideas about this virile stranger in her bedchamber. How far would she have let those brazen thoughts take her? Perhaps she really was losing her grip on her sanity.

“Aye.” He did not deny his vanishing act earlier. “Nevertheless, I am very real.”

He released the passageway door, allowing the tapestry to fall back over it. They stood staring at each other in the firelight, his green eyes locked on hers.

Sweet, merciful, heaven, she wore no more than her night clothes. In her haste to see the hidden passage, she had left her armful of linens on the bed, so she no longer had that added concealment. Her nightcap had long since abandoned its task and her unbound hair fell around her shoulders, a sight for no man save a husband.

“This cannot be.” She did not trust her instincts anymore. “You are naught but a thought in my mind's eye.”

Her whispered hope seemed to lure him closer.

“Is that how you explain it?” His gaze grew bolder, dipping lower to her mouth. Her shoulders. Her breasts.

She felt it as sure as a touch and her body reacted instantly, a tight ache making her breath hitch.

“A ghost, perhaps.” If this were a penny novel, he would most certainly be a wraith of some sort. A dark figure conjured from maidenly fears.

His eyes lifted to hers again as a hint of amusement twitched one side of his mouth.

“Tell me, Lily Rothmore Desalles.” He moved so close she stopped breathing. “Could a phantom do this?”

He cupped her jaw in one warm, broad palm, his thumb lightly caressing her cheek. Her eyelids fluttered in shock at the intimacy. The irrefutable proof that he was very much a living, breathing man.

“Or this?” His voice hit a deeper note.

Tipping her chin up to his, he sketched a touch along the fullness of her lower lip, the action so blatantly sensual she felt an answering touch in the most private of places. Her whole body tingled in answer.

She was all but swaying on her feet when he dipped his head to capture her mouth in a kiss not even a fevered imagination could have conjured.

Chapter Three

He'd stolen the kiss by surprise.

Iain guessed Lily would recover herself in a moment and he'd have to contend with some form of maidenly outrage. A backhand to the face, perhaps. Or another round of shrieking until her aged servant finally roused from his tired stupor and came to her rescue.

Until then, Iain took unfair advantage. What healthy male, abstinent as long as he had been, would lay blame at his feet? She hadn't refused.

Her parted lips were soft and yielding, the tentative kiss of an innocent. Even more innocent, in fact, than he'd imagined. He had thought her a virgin by her stunned surprise when he'd warned her that he wanted her. She'd been utterly unaware of the spark between them.

Of course, he hadn't known she was a widow or he wouldn't have guessed as much in the first place. But he'd been right about her innocence. Her marriage had obviously been a sham. She even kissed like an untried maid.

Now, cupping her chin, he angled her face for better access to the sweetness of her mouth. The scent of cinnamon and exotic spices clung to her skin and her night rail. The softness of her curves was unfettered by the complicated garb women wore during the day. He kissed her carefully, slowly, so as not to startle her. He wanted to draw out the moment for as long as possible. If only he could take her away from here, out into the misty forests where time seemed to stand still.

She sprang away from him suddenly, her hand lifting to her mouth as if she could take back the kiss. Or stifle all future kisses.

With wide eyes, she studied him, her color high. Her gaze tracked his. The scent of her filled his nostrils.

“You will leave this chamber and not return,” she ordered, her voice steady even though her hands shook as she wrapped her arms around herself. “You must not take such liberties again.”

“No woman commands me.” He needed to remember his duty to his clan. Discover if she was a nuisance visitor or if she posed a real threat. “You may stay in my chamber only by my leave. I protect the entrance to this doorway always. I keep you safe from it, as I do every other soul who comes near it.”

“I am sure I can have the door sealed.” She frowned, having no idea what might come through that door if he wasn't on guard with his brothers at all times. “And I have a legal right to these lands,” she argued in that charming accent he now understood was American.

“Then we will meet tomorrow to discuss it.” He would learn her purpose and test his theory about why she could see him clearly when other trespassers of her era could not.

She had been surprised to learn that he was a real man and not a ghost. Yet he had been equally stunned to find out she was a flesh-and-blood woman herself. Lily Rothmore Desalles was not a
Sidhe.
That didn't mean she wasn't his enemy. But what if his foes had started using mortals to carry out their unholy work?

“Where?” she asked, hugging herself tighter, her dark hair catching the firelight in a way that made copper strands appear. “I will bar the trap door so you cannot return that way.”

“I want you to bar that door like your life depended on it, Lily. And we shall meet at the forest's edge just before sunset, where you first saw me.” He had more options for dealing with her there. Close enough to his clan to call for help should she plan an ambush. Near enough to
Sidhe
lands that he could step into a magical place between realms where time did not follow the usual law of nature.

If he had a chance to kiss Lily again, he would ensure they were in a place where he could draw out the moment for hours. Days even, without her knowing.

His body responded to the thought instantly, his hunger for her roaring to life with new fierceness.

“When?” Her voice quivered a little, and he wondered if he'd somehow betrayed the direction of his thoughts.

“Sunset.” He would learn everything he needed to know from her then. “We may speak without reservation on neutral terrain.”

Her eyes dipped to the floor for a moment before returning to meet his gaze with new determination.

“Fine. But first, how did you know about me?” She clenched her teeth for a moment. “What made you think I was an innocent?”