Heart of the Highland Wolf (11 page)

He told himself it was foolish. That it meant nothing. Yet the situation reminded him of something that had occurred in their past. But he couldn't recall what exactly; he'd have to ask his Aunt Agnes, the repository for all their history.

“Have to go, Maria,” Julia finally said. “See you later.”

“Tonight, right?” Maria asked loudly, as if she was afraid Julia had already pulled the phone away from her ear and was going to hang up before her friend knew the answer. Because of that, Ian heard her words.

“Of course. See you later.” Julia signed off and rose from the chair. “The gardens, right?” She came around the desk and began petting Dillon, then Anlan. “Irish wolfhounds. What an odd choice of dog for
lupus garous
to have.”

He hadn't even considered she might be afraid of the dogs. Not everyone loved them like his family did. So he was glad to see her approach them with confidence like an alpha would, and with obvious interest in them, the way she smiled at them and continued to stroke their heads as they vied for more of her attention. Hell, not only were his men and he besotted with the lass, but his dogs now, too.

“The one with the darker face is Dillon. The other is Anlan. They love us whether we're in our wolf forms or as humans. They wouldn't bite the hand that feeds them.” He watched the way she smiled at the dogs, a genuinely affectionate smile.

With the way they seemed to hit it off, he had another idea. “They need to run. Would you mind if I took you to the falls? Instead of the gardens?” He felt devious for asking the question. Sure, the dogs needed to run, and the gardens wouldn't do. But anyone could have taken the dogs out while he walked with Julia in the gardens. He wanted to get her alone, away from his people, just the two of them. He needed some answers. Sometimes the castle seemed too large to locate anyone, but at other times, like now, it seemed too small for real privacy.

Her expression brightened. “Falls? Oh, I'd love to see them.”

But then recalling the way she'd been limping earlier, he reconsidered. “Your ankle is no longer hurting? The falls are quite a distance from here.”

“No, my boots are giving me enough support. I'll be fine. The car accident and tromping over the rocky ground in heels caused all the trouble.”

He wanted to take hold of her arm, wanted to walk with her through the castle to see if she leaned against him at all. Her enthusiasm made him have no doubt as to her sincerity about desiring to see the falls. Whether her ankle was up to the hike was what concerned him now.

“We could wait until tomorrow.” Although he didn't want to.

She smiled dazzlingly up at him. “No, no, I'm just fine. A walk to the falls with someone who knows the lay of the land will be fun.”

The implication that anyone who could act as guide would do deflated his ego a bit.

In silence, they walked down the two flights of stairs and then through the great room where Cearnach, Duncan, and
now
Guthrie lounged. Each gave him a furtive smile. He wondered what was going on with dinner. And he wondered why Duncan wasn't researching anything he could about the Iberian wolf. And more than anything, what Guthrie might have learned about Julia Wildthorn.

Smiling, Guthrie said, “I have some news for you, Ian.” He glanced at Julia.

Ian bet the news was about the little red wolf. “You can tell me the news later.” Although he was dying to know what his brother had learned since he seemed in such good spirits. “We're going to the falls. Be back before dinner.”

“The falls,” Cearnach said, raising his brows, as if he knew just where this was leading. “About dinner, now that Guthrie is finished with his assigned task… and since you gave him the order initially about fixing—”

“Aye, well, seeing as the three of you have nothing better to do, make it a family affair.” Ian smiled a wee bit and then he guided Julia toward the entryway, dogs in tow.

His brothers spoke in Gaelic to one another. “They'll never make it back here in time for dinner,” Duncan said lightly. “It won't matter how badly we cook.”

“She'll be staying the night and be here for breakfast,” Cearnach warned. “If Cook isn't here before then, and I doubt she will be, we'll have the daunting task before us once again.”

Guthrie had the last word before Ian and Julia were outside. “He doesn't know what he's getting himself into.”

Guthrie's comment about Julia warned Ian that something about her would surprise him. He was already thinking along those lines anyway, but now his curiosity was elevated another notch. Usually, he was cautious, but Julia made him want to take risks he normally wouldn't take. Maybe that was because she had been running through his woods as a wolf, very risky business, and he wanted to prove to her he was just as daring.

Life had grown dull of late. The same sword-fighting routines with his people. The same visits to the local tavern, to the Highland games, to his usual fishing haunts. No more wars or clan fights or political intrigue that involved his people. Aye, life had become dull. Until Silverman stole their investments and a red female walked into his life.

As soon as they were beyond the castle walls and walking through the woods in the dark, although with their wolves' vision they could still see well enough, Ian slipped his arm around Julia's to offer support and to judge if she faltered because of her ankle. He surmised she was not the kind of woman who would give up on an adventure, even if it killed her. Maybe because she'd been running around his lands after being injured earlier and, before that, had been fleeing from what she thought had been a pursuer.

The dogs stayed nearby, exploring, sniffing the ground, and looking for rabbits, but they didn't stray far.

“Why did you and Maria rush off after the accident? I called out to you to see if you were all right,” he said, wanting to know if she had really been scared of them and intending to make amends.

“We thought whoever hit our car might have done so on purpose.”

Ian pulled Julia to a stop. “Say again?” He'd assumed they had just thought he and Duncan were bad news, maybe drunken, but he'd never considered that the other vehicle might have hit them on purpose.

“Maria told me that because of choosing your castle over any others, a man with a Scottish brogue called her and said she'd live to regret it as soon as she arrived here. I assumed it was an idle threat. But she thought the tires were shot out. I believed they just blew when the tires hit the rocks. It makes the same noise. I know, because it happened to me once.”

Ian began walking again, more slowly this time. “I thought I smelled the faint odor of gun smoke.”

“Oh.” She looked a little pale.

“Did you?”

“Not where we were when the car hit the stone wall. We didn't go back up to the road.”

Ian nodded, figuring that if they had come up to the road, he and Duncan would have run into the lasses. “So you thought Duncan and I were after you in a bad way?”

“Yes. At least Maria did.”

Pondering the way she said the words, Ian didn't respond for several minutes. Was she a better judge of character? Or something else? “But
you
didn't worry about us?”

“I… well, you had called out to us, and I thought you truly wanted to help. I mean, your…” She looked up at him. First, her gaze latched onto his, and then she looked at his mouth. “Your voice sounded so…” She cleared her throat.

“So?”

She gave a wee shrug, looking away, her face blushing with color.

“So?” he asked again, wanting to know what she'd thought of his voice that made the color blossom on her cheeks and extend down her throat. Were her breasts blushing as well?

“Nice,” she said.

Nice.
But he didn't think that's the word she would have described his voice. Not the way she'd acted so embarrassed.

“Then again, I didn't really think anyone had hit us on purpose, either. A gray wolf ran in front of the car, and Maria slammed on her brakes. Right after that, the vehicle hit us. It was foggy and the guy was traveling faster than we were. I figured he knew the lay of the land so he was familiar with the roads, much more so than we were.”

What she said all sounded reasonable, except for the one thing she'd mentioned. The wolf. “A wolf?” he asked testily.

“I thought it might have been a…” She hesitated to say and then rubbed her arms. “I thought I saw him earlier, running parallel to the road.” She took a deep breath. “Maria tends to watch movies where everyone's in on some kind of a conspiracy, so she thought the wolf was in league with the other driver.”

Ian wrapped his arm around Julia's shoulders and pulled her close. “You're shivering, lass.” He worried she was scared that someone might come after her again. But he didn't like the notion someone had threatened Maria and then the car accident had occurred. That he'd smelled gunfire. And then there was the wolf. A gray wolf. Not one of his own. A trespasser. What if Maria's assumption had been right? What if the wolf had been in league with the driver of the vehicle? What if they had been part of Basil Sutherland's clan?

“It's a little chilly out tonight,” Julia said.

“Do you want to go back?” He hoped not. In fact, he realized how much he was enjoying a walk in the woods with her—away from his brothers, his cousins, and the rest of the pack, away from her girlfriend Maria, even. And not just that they were alone. He enjoyed being with her when he hadn't been with a woman on a quiet hike on his beloved land ever.

“No. If I keep walking, I'll warm up,” she assured him, and snuggled a little closer.

He smiled, tightened his hand around her shoulder, and gave a light squeeze. Warming her up was just the notion he had in mind. But still, the idea that someone wished the women harm preyed on his thoughts. “Has Maria had any other calls?”

“No. Although her phone was lost in the car fire.”

“I'll have my brothers check into it when we return. Were you included in the threat?”

Ian's hand rubbed Julia's shoulder, the heat of his body pressing closer to her side. She knew he was just trying to keep her warm, but he felt good, protective, perfect for the hero in her story, but more than that. He was causing her hormones to tumble wildly into uncharted dimensions. She didn't want to think about the man who had called Maria or his threats. Just about what Ian was doing to her, triggering her sexual drive. “Yes, after a fact.”

His dark brows knit together. “After a fact?”

She shrugged, trying to concentrate on his fingers tightening on her shoulder in a shielding way, not wanting to discuss this since she didn't have firsthand knowledge. “He mentioned me as an afterthought.” She wasn't about to tell Ian the guy had warned her away from the laird, that he acted as though they had known each other personally, or anything about the ex-boyfriend. Although
lupus garous
could have human sexual partners, that didn't mean another wolf wanted to hear about it.

Ian pondered her response for a while, his hand gliding over her shoulder and down her arm in such an affectionate manner that she felt she could melt into the pine needles blanketing the ground, pulling him with her and stripping him of his clothes so she could see the muscles she'd had a glimpse of earlier in the pub when he was soaked to the skin. And run her hand over them, memorizing the hot feel of his skin, the—

“Does Maria have any idea who the disgruntled Scot might have been?”

Here Julia was thinking about sex, and Ian was just concerned about the call Maria had gotten. Julia sighed and snuggled deeper against Ian's hard body. “No.”

His arm tightened around her shoulder, and her heartbeat sped up. She hated that she could see anything romantic coming from him touching her. He was a Scottish laird, and she was an American nobody. He was a gray, and she was a red. He probably knew Gaelic, Scottish, and English, maybe other languages, and she knew American English and that was it.

And why she was even thinking about anything like that, she hadn't a clue. He was
not
interested in her! Except to keep her warm because she was shivering. For heaven sakes! As for the threats to Maria and her, he was laird here and probably didn't like anyone with the production being threatened because he was making money off it.

Yet she reminded herself that the way he was making her feel with his touching her was perfect for her story. The Scottish laird was now warming up to taking her as his bride, although he'd mentioned a handfasting, instead of an actual marriage, to get to know her for a year. Like an engagement period with sex. If she produced an heir, he'd marry her. If she didn't in a year and a day, they could call it quits.

She harrumphed.

“Hmm?” Ian said, quietly walking beside her, his hand caressing her shoulder and alternately squeezing her against him from time to time.

Her face heating, she glanced up at him, not having thought he would hear her. He was looking ahead, the dogs having disappeared for a few minutes, now returning again, making sure Ian was still with them, and then loping off.

She might as well get in a little research while she was at it. “So about the custom of handfasting, do you still do that?”

His face darkened a little, and for a few minutes he didn't say anything. She wondered what would cause him to be annoyed about the topic. Then he finally said, “Sort of a trial marriage. The Scottish Marriage Act did away with recognizing handfasting in 1939. But then in 1977, the Marriage Act allowed for handfasting again, but now it's legalized.”

“What about your parents?”

Again, he hesitated for too long—at least she felt as though it was for too long, as if he didn't wish to speak of it.

“We normally don't marry, not unless the one marrying has a title, like my parents did. Do your people?” He frowned a little, looking somewhat surprised.

Her mouth dropped slightly. She caught herself and snapped her mouth shut, then shook her head. “No, you're right. We don't marry. Just…”

Mate. For life. But all of a sudden it seemed like too personal a discussion.

Thankfully, Ian took up the slack. “The mating was prearranged as many for those who have titles are. But my parents soon fell in love anyway after they were married in the kirk. The exception…” He stopped speaking as if he thought better of mentioning it.

“The exception?”

“If the werewolf was mated to a human. Then some acknowledgment would have to be made of the arrangement—either a handfasting or a church ceremony. Otherwise, humans who are just looking for a roll in the heather wouldn't need such a commitment. To carry on a title, a commitment would have to be made.”

She shouldn't have been so nosy, but she was a royal, which meant no human roots for eons, and she wondered if one of his closer ancestors had been human. It wasn't a bad thing; it just made it more difficult for the wolves to remain in their human form during the full moon, and they couldn't shape-shift at all during the new moon when they would remain as a human the whole time.

“Are you a blue blood?” he asked.

“A royal?”

“Not a titled lass, if you are from America.”

“No, that's what we call
lupus garous
who have very few human genes in their recent history.”

“Aye. Blue blood.”

“I'm a royal.” Blue blood sounded too much like a titled person to her. The term “royal” just seemed more suitable, maybe because that's how her family had always referred to themselves and because the States didn't recognize titled lairds and the like. But the funny thing was that she referred to royals as blue bloods in her stories, attempting to disguise the werewolf truths somewhat. Had she subconsciously picked up the term from her grandfather when she was a child?

“Royal sounds titled, to my way of thinking.” He smiled at her, and she got the impression he understood her reluctance to use his term for the same reason.

“So, are you? A blue blood?” she asked.

“Aye.”

“But you were thinking about a human in your line. A marriage commitment. Weren't you?”

He let out his breath in an exasperated way. “Aye.”

All of a sudden, she got the very distinct impression that
Ian
was the one who had married a human. She didn't know why that bothered her. Maybe a shortage of female werewolves also existed in the United Kingdom. She had no right to judge him, and it
really
wasn't any of her business. So why did the next words out of her mouth contradict that? “What happened?”

She could have bitten off her tongue after the words slipped out.

“You're very intuitive.”

A compliment, but no explanation.

They walked on and she felt her ankle beginning to bother her, which added to the annoyance of wanting to know more about the woman Ian had married. But it could have been very long ago, and the woman might even be dead by now. If he'd changed her, she'd have to be a werewolf, and he'd still be mated to her. For life. He wouldn't be holding Julia this close if he had a mate, though.

“We handfasted, but we didn't make it to the end of the year,” he finally admitted. His voice was gruff, annoyed.

The sinking feeling that the woman had died came to mind. Suddenly Julia wanted to change the topic if it made him so uncomfortable, yet she was also dying to know what had happened to the woman.

“She was titled and had lands and money,” he said, distractedly.

“You weren't marrying her for love?” she asked, surprised. When he looked down at her, his mouth twitching, barely hiding the faintest of smiles, she could have kicked herself.

“When it comes to power and money and titles, lass, sometimes they're all that matter. Besides, in the Highlands, my da couldn't locate another werewolf lassie for me to mate.” He shrugged, although his nonchalant attitude seemed contrived. “I needed an heir, and her da and mine came to an agreement, so she seemed the right choice.”

“You changed her?”

He shook his head. “It wouldn't have worked out. She didn't even like our Irish wolfhounds. Complained they slobbered, shed fur all over our tapestries, and took more of my attention than she did. Spoilt, she didn't even like the relationship I had with my kin. She wished to be the center of my attention. I had a pack to run, a clan.”