IntoEternity (4 page)

The focus of his gaze had her flushing hot, bringing her out
of her preoccupation with the force of a slap.

“It’s an Isles name, Cousin.” The boy offered.

Ah, so the two were related. Gusty shook her head over the
child’s insistence that she came from the Isles. She had never confirmed his
belief as to her origins but she had not denied his assertion either. At the
moment it seemed like a silly thing to argue over. After all, what did it
really matter what these two thought?

“It is none of your concern how I discipline the lad. My
cousin deserves more than just my harsh words for what he has done. In his
little escapade, he not only left the safety of my holdings two days ago, he also
wandered onto Ross land. Our presence here is enough to start a war. In
addition, he stole my horse, drawing me and my men out of our warm beds in the
middle of a miserably rainy night to go chasing after him, endangering our
lives for no good reason. And lastly, he has the misfortune of traveling with a
beautiful woman from the Isles.”

Most of what he said seemed to justify his anger—the boy
deserved to be the target of his cousin’s wrath—but the barbarian’s last
statement made very little sense to her. What would her being from the Isles
have to do with anything?

“Why does it matter?” she asked and then clarified. “If I’m
from the Isles, I mean.”

“It matters because you are from the lowlands. Only a mad
person would make their way to a place where outlanders are unwelcomed,
unwanted.”

His answer made her laugh outright, something she hadn’t
done in a very long time, and it felt damn good to find she still had a sense
of humor.

“You think that amusing, Gusty of the Isles?”

“I think I’ll just be going back to the Isles, back to my
crazy people.”

She turned and walked swiftly into the trees, determined to
put some distance between herself and the arrogant barbarian. Just when she
thought she had made her escape she heard the snapping of twigs in the
underbrush behind her.

Damn!
She should have realized she could not get away
that easily. She stopped and waited, not bothering to turn around, knew what
she would find if she did so. If the way the big guy had been salivating over
her was anything to go by, he had no intention of letting her get away.

“You are going nowhere, lass.”

The heat from his large body warmed her back. He touched her
arm, turned her around to face him. Before she could say a word, his head
dipped and his lips claimed hers in a kiss that left her entire body tingling
with pleasure. Filled with tenderness, passion, anger and longing, the kiss was
like none she had ever experienced. With one passionate act, he offered her the
world. She gave herself up to the feelings washing over her and when he lifted
his head, her knees would have buckled beneath her if his strong arms had not
been there to hold her up.

“I have claimed you, my beautiful selkie.” He whispered
against her lips. “You are mine…now, tomorrow and forever into eternity.”

* * * * *

Gusty rode in the fast-fading light of the evening through
Scottish Highlands, held firmly in the strong arms of perfect stranger. A
Highland laird, no less, or so the boy had called his older cousin.

Her detainment by the giant barbarian had happened so fast
she had little time to protest. One minute he was kissing her senseless and the
next thing she knew he’d picked her up and carried her through the woods in his
mighty arms. Without a by-your-leave he placed her on an incredibly tall horse
and climbed up behind her. The big Scots had signaled his men and they’d taken
off, galloping down an unmarked trail with her hanging on for dear life.

They finally stopped when it was too dark to go farther.
Gusty breathed a relieved sigh, barely able to hold her eyes open and hurting
from her forehead to the soles of her blistered feet. The lump she’d sustained
gave her a splitting headache and a slight buzzing filled her ears. The
Highlander increased his grip on her waist and Gusty realized she was swaying
with fatigue and dizziness. Instinctively her grip tightened on the warm arm
wrapped about her waist.

“Steady, Gusty. Can you sit for a moment while my men make a
fire?”

He dismounted and lifted her from the saddle. He set her on
her feet and her knees buckled.

“Whoa there.” He caught her. “Come. There is a log near the
fire circle. You can rest there.”

Gusty pulled away from his helping hands and with grim
determination she took two steps toward the log he pointed out. Suddenly her
eyesight faded. She stumbled. A gasp escaped her lips as she felt herself
falling. She hit the ground hard.

“Ouch! Dammit!” When her vision cleared she found herself
laid out flat on the damp grass beside the log with the Highlander leaning over
her.

“Och, lass! What are you doing?”

His ludicrous question brought a snort of laughter from her
lips, which quickly turned to a low groan of pain. “What do you think I’m
doing, you big lug? I am tired and I decided this was the best bet for a bed
tonight. What do you mean, what am I doing?” Her try for sarcasm failed as her
voice quivered with emotion and her throat closed on a sob. Hurting and
altogether miserable, Gusty curled into herself and cried.

She felt him beside her and strong hands took hold of her,
lifted her onto his lap. Warm arms held her fast to a broad chest. A clumsy pat
to her head and back let her know her actions had disconcerted her Highland
barbarian.

“Here, lassie. Don’t weep so. I would never cause you any
harm nor will I let another do so.”

The feel of his lips pressing a soft kiss to her temple
coupled with his kind words had Gusty wondering if she had perhaps made an
error in judging the man so harshly.

She fought back a groan of frustration. As if she were a
modern-day Alice and had chased the rabbit and fallen down the rabbit hole,
she’d apparently disappeared off the face of the earth she knew as home.
Somehow she must find her way back.

“My head hurts,” she whispered.

“Why didn’t you say so, lass? Davin!” he barked.

She flinched in pain. Her movement must have registered with
him because his next command came out in a loud whisper.

“Davin, fetch the willow bark from my saddlebag and a skin
of water.”

Gusty let the two men doctor her with an ancient remedy and
after they had forced a vile concoction down her throat with a good amount of
water she lay back on a pallet of thick blankets spread out on the ground for
her use. She did not fall asleep immediately but listened to the men sitting
around the fire, watched them eat a sparse meal of some sort of flat cakes and
dried meat, which they’d dug out of their saddlebags. The sounds of their low
laughter and quiet voices soon faded as she dropped off.

Her great thirst drew her up through layers of sleep. She
came awake, shifted on the hard ground and hissed in pain. Her whole body
ached. Bruises in places she hadn’t realized she’d injured made themselves
known to her. Bruises she had acquired as the result of her run-in with a
moving automobile throbbed incessantly. The only relief she felt was the warmth
at her back and the thick blanket covering her body.

She glanced around to find she was surrounded by sleeping
men. The movement at her back and the loss of heat had her turning over and
sitting up. She pulled the blanket tight about her shoulders. A large, dark
shadow dropped beside her.

“Here. Drink this. Your head still hurts? Drink so you can
rest.”

She hesitated and he pushed the cup into her hands. His
large, calloused hands held hers as he tipped up the mug, forcing her to drink
the mixture before she could refuse. The concoction tasted just as foul as she
remembered and she shuddered and pushed the cup away. She coughed, clearing her
throat, and wiped her mouth with her sleeve as she looked around the campsite
to see if anyone else was awake. No one moved.

“Lie down now, Gusty. There are still a couple of hours
until the sun rises. Try to sleep.”

Before she could protest he lay down beside her and drew her
back against his hard body. Only then did she realize he had been sleeping on
her pallet with her. Thinking to put some distance between them, she eased away
but an arm snaked around her waist pulled her firmly back into his warm
embrace.

“Stay still. Do not think to leave me.”

The low, whispered command stilled her movements. Firm, soft
lips grazed the side of her neck. He sighed, and after a few moments his deep,
steady breathing told her he’d fallen asleep with her anchored securely in his
arms. Gusty had never before slept with a man. Not for sex or just to sleep.
She found the arrangement strangely pleasant.

She lay awake for a long while, not moving and barely
breathing as she went over the events of this strange day. At the thought of
her brother, knowing he must be frantic wondering what had happened to her, she
blinked back stinging tears.

Oh, Michael, how did this happen? Why did this happen to
me?

* * * * *

Only a few more hours and they would be at Sutherland Keep.
Alexander was looking forward to the end of this journey. The lass on his lap
became more of a temptation with every passing hour. Her body pressed against
his left him in a needy condition. He tried not to think about how badly he
wanted her, but her luscious arse pushed so firmly against his arousal made him
bite back a groan. His hand rested at her slender waist and more than once he
had felt her stiffen when he moved his fingers and accidently brushed the
underside of her full, round breast. He considered slipping his hand beneath
her coat and cupping one of her breasts. At the thought he growled, pulled up
his mount and leaped to the ground.

“Why do we stop here, Alexander? It is but a short ride to
the keep.”

At his second’s query Alexander waved his men on. “I have
the need for a little privacy. Ride on ahead to the next creek and rest the
horses. I will catch up.” He ignored the pointed look Davin threw toward the
slender woman in Alexander’s arms.

Without a word, Davin wheeled his mount and rode off with
Duncan and the rest of Alexander’s warriors.

Alexander helped Gusty to the ground and watched her walk
away. While he waited for her to return he checked the cinch on his saddle,
patting his horse as he walked around to look at the halter and bit.

“Why did we stop? I could have made it a while longer before
needing some privacy.”

He glanced up. She stood at a distance, watching him. Gusty
walked slowly forward until she stood before him. Her movements seemed a little
easier since she’d had some rest and he had forced several doses of his healing
brew on her. Still she looked so small and lost, her face pale against the
black of her garments.

“I wanted a few moments alone with you.”

At her look of surprise he flushed warm. He dropped the
reins and reached for her, drawing her into his arms. Before she could react he
dipped his head and took her mouth in a long, deep kiss that told better than
words what he wanted. His arms tightened around her as his lips moved from her
mouth to trail light kisses across her cheek and down her slender neck. She
moaned, reached up and gripped two fists of his hair to hold him close. He
touched his mouth to hers, his lips moving across hers in a tender caress.

“I want you, sweet selkie,” he whispered against her lips.
“I mean to keep you.”

He stared down at the beauty’s upturned face, imagining what
delights the evening might hold for them both.

“Come we are almost home.”

But before he could scoop her up and seat her back on his
horse, the Fates intervened. In the blink of an eye his arms were empty.

“
What the h—?
”

Alexander drew his sword as he whirled looking around the
small glade. He was befuddled. Where in Hades’ fires had she gone?

“Gusty?”

His beautiful selkie could not just vanish. No. Not now. Not
when he had finally found her.

“
Gusty!
”

Gusty blinked several times, her mind racing.
What
the
hell…?

One moment she was in the arms of a large Scottish barbarian,
getting the breath kissed out of her, and the next moment she found herself
standing fully clothed and in her expensive Italian leather boots, no less, up
to her knees in a tub of hot water, which, to her horror, sat in the middle of
a blazing fire pit.

What happened to the very real, very warm lips and hard,
muscular arms that just a moment ago had her burning up with desire? Had the
handsome Highlander with the beautiful silver-colored eyes been part of some
strange dream? If so, she wanted to go back to sleep and not wake up for a good
long while. But as she glanced around, taking in the dark, dingy room, she
began to wonder if she had just traded one strange dream for an even stranger
one.
What in the world?

As she considered climbing out of the water and seeing if
she could salvage her leather footwear, hushed whispers sounded from the
shadows behind her. Slowly she turned her head and peered through the dimness,
trying to make out who else was in the room. The crackling fire provided the
only illumination and Gusty had difficulty making out anything beyond the
circle of light that surrounded her. She froze. Until she understood just what
sort of situation she’d stumbled into, she intended to keep her mouth shut and
her ears open. No time to panic now. She would do that later.

With her head cocked, she listened intently but heard only
the sound of her own breathing and the fire crackling under the pot as the
water she stood in grew steadily warmer. Cautiously she lifted her foot to step
out of the wet situation she’d found herself in when the whispering started
again, louder this time and distinctly familiar. She gasped as her eyes widened
in wonder.

“I told you. You made a mistake in that last incantation.
You should have said ‘spot’, not ‘pot’.”

“Well what do you want from me, old man? It was an
emergency. We didn’t have time to nitpick every little detail. The rogue was
about to make off with her.”

A torch flared, illuminating the rest of the room and the
two old people arguing behind her. Gusty stared over her shoulder, mouth
hanging open. Her heart raced. Her head swiveled from side to side in denial of
the sight before her. Her lips moved but no sounds came out.

How could this be? What were they doing here? They were
dead, weren’t they? There were really no words for the emotions that swamped
her as she stared into the beloved faces of the two people who had raised her,
who had loved her and then who, she’d thought, had been taken from her.

But there they stood, her beloved grandparents, apparently alive
and bickering with each other just as she remembered them doing throughout all
the years she had lived with them. The situation defied logic and a thought
occurred to her.

“I’m dead. There’s no other way of explaining it,” she said.

“Oh nay, my child. You are not.”

“Don’t lie to her, Hagen.” Maeve snarled as she swatted at
her husband with a large wooden spoon before turning back to Gusty with a
gentle smile.

“You are dead, dearling, but then again you are not.” She nodded
as if her cryptic words made complete sense and she had explained everything.

“I don’t understand. Am I dead or not?”

“Let me explain it to her, Maeve. You have made a complete
disaster out of it. Can’t you tell the girl’s head is spinning from your words?”
Emulating his wife, Hagen spoke harshly to his spouse then turned to Gusty and
spoke to her as if she were a fragile flower and the slightest breeze would
knock her flat.

“You see, my dear, you did die…in the present, which is this
time’s future, as Maeve and I did.” He smiled in a self-congratulatory way and
continued on as if what he had just said was as clear as the blue sky. “But you
are very much alive here in the past, which is now your present.”

She shook her head, struggling to comprehend his meaning. If
she were indeed dead, that would explain why she was visiting with her
grandparents. But what about the rest of what she had experienced? Gusty needed
more details.

“Where is here exactly?”

“Why it’s the beginning of the twelfth century, Augusta. And
you have finally returned home.”

“Home?”

“Yes, dear. You have finally come home to the Highlands of
Scotland.”

“Would you like something to eat? You must be starved. I
know after we made the journey we were as hungry as ravenous wolves.”

Gusty stared at her grandmother. Was Maeve really rambling
on about eating a meal as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened?
Unbelievable…

“Are you saying I have traveled back in time nine hundred
years to somewhere in Scotland and this is my home?” Her voice rose, alarmingly
high pitched, and she gasped for much-needed air. Their explanation had
literally knocked the breath right out of her. “Don’t say another word please!
I need a moment to think about all this.”

Her grandparents looked at each other, a silent
communication exchanged between them. How many times over the years had she seen
them do the exact same thing? She had always thought the deep love they shared allowed
them to understand each other without saying a word but now she thought there
might be more going on there. Was it possible they could read each other’s
minds? With everything else that had happened, the idea was not so far-fetched.

“It is all right, dear, this”—Maeve waved her arm to include
the hut—”is not your home. You have yet to travel there.”

Obviously her grandmother was not going to give Gusty the
chance to think about anything at the moment.

“Come, you must be hungry. How about I fix you something
tasty to eat? Oh no! Hagen, just look where she has landed.” Maeve used her
spoon to point toward Gusty, who still stood in the large, tub-like pot over
the fire.

Gusty was beginning to become a little uncomfortably warm.
If she stayed in the water much longer, her boots would soon be tender enough
to eat. What she originally thought was a bathtub was actually a large black
caldron used for cooking.

“Well I guess she will just have to extract herself so we
can start supper. Help the poor girl out of the water while I see to making the
soup,” Maeve commanded before she shuffled off to the cupboard.

Hagen nodded and moved to give Gusty a hand out of the
caldron. Once her feet were on solid ground, Gusty allowed Hagen to help her remove
her coat, which now had a soggy hem, and while he hung the garment on a peg by
the door, she sat down to remove her sodden footwear. He handed her a small
piece of cloth to use as a towel and she dried her feet and then tried to
squeeze as much water as she could from the hem of her skirt.

“Here, take off your skirt and wrap yourself in this.”

Hagan thrust a wool blanket into her hands and then turned
his back while she complied with his suggestion.

As she shed her skirt and covered herself in the soft wool hundreds
of questions whirled around in her brain. Where to start? She’d need a week
just to prioritize them all, but for now she would ask for a few basic pieces
of information and then bide her time and enjoy having her grandparents back in
her life.

“Are we or are we not in Scotland?” She voiced the first
question that came to mind. Had she spent three days in the company of a large
Scottish laird and his band of warriors or had her overactive imagination
conjured them up?

“Oh aye, we are in the Highlands.”

Gusty stared at the bald spot on the top of her grandfather’s
head as he stooped to pick up her boots and place them on a low stool next to
the fire.

“But how can all this be? You died. You were killed in that
car wreck. I know this for a fact. I was there, remember?”

“Nay, honey, it only seemed that we died in the future. It
was time for us to come home.”

“But how? How can that be?” She remembered the memorial
service she and Michael had attended in honor of her grandparents. They had the
remains cremated and put in urns. Michael had taken care of the whole thing.
Hadn’t
he?

“Oh, dearling. It is so hard to explain to an ephemeral just
how these puzzling things happen. Sometimes we oracles don’t even understand
exactly what we are doing. Only an exceptionally receptive seer understands the
eccentricities of the Portal of Time and in our case it took two of us to
manipulate the gates so we could get you and Michael to the future and to
safety.”

“Michael knew?”

Maeve nodded and Hagen looked away, his face flushed.

“When? How?” Her brother had never said a word. He knew
about Maeve and Hagen and all this time-travel business and he didn’t tell
her?” She shook her head, trying to clear the buzzing as her vision grayed and
then cleared again.

“You made this happen before, didn’t you?” Gusty drew a deep
breath. Unbelievable. But… Something
had
brought her to this time and
place. “I want to know,” she demanded and watched the look that passed between
the couple before Hagen answered her.

“Aye we did, with great success. But when we decided it was
time to return to this century, things got a bit bungled in the doing.”

“How so?”

“Well you see, dear, you were supposed to come back with us
but something went awry with the Portal and you were left behind. We are
fortunate you were not caught in the fissure between times.”

“We are so sorry, child. We didn’t mean to hurt you. We did
not intend for matters to get so far out of hand. It was as if some other force
was at work, challenging our powers. But now you are here and that is all that
matters.”

Again a look passed between them. They were still hiding
something…but what?

“So why did you bring me back now? How did I end up in the
middle of the forest with that young boy? Why not bring me directly here in the
first place? What about Michael? He was there in the future with me. Why didn’t
you bring him back as well?”

“We didn’t actually bring you back, dear.” Maeve placed a
basket of hard bread and a crock of fresh butter on the table.

“What do you mean?”

“We were going to bring you back with your brother. But not
for a while yet.”

“What happened?”

“Someone else brought you back.” Maeve gave Hagen a worried
look, a look that also held a great deal of fear.

“Someone else? Who?”

“We don’t know, Augusta. We just don’t know.”