Authors: Allie MacKay
She closed her eyes, almost there.
Then he suddenly slid his arms around her and pulled her close, slanting his mouth over hers in a hard, bruising kiss. He released her as quickly, stepping back as if she’d scalded him.
Margo frowned, not liking this turn of her dream.
“Now begone from here before I forget this isn’t real.” He dragged his sleeve over his lips, his gaze burning her. “If we meet again—where’er—I’ll no’ be responsible for what I might do.”
Before she could argue—or even blink—he turned and strode down the strand, slowing his pace only when the large scruffy dog she’d seen earlier bounded up to him. Without breaking stride, he reached down to pat the dog’s head. Together, they hastened along the water’s edge until they both disappeared into the mist, leaving her alone.
Except she still heard a Scottish male voice, soft and lilting, but nothing at all like Magnus MacBride’s deep, buttery-rich burr.
She was still cold.
Absolutely freezing ...
And—somehow—she was no longer in the shower.
She came awake slowly, not wanting to leave the cocooning darkness. She felt almost hungover, even though she’d had nothing stronger than Earl Grey Cream tea. Vaguely, she remembered coming into the living room, moving like a sleepwalker. Her grogginess told her she’d slept deeply. And that it was late. Rain still drummed on the roof, though the sound was only a light patter now. Somewhere, a Scottish voice did rise and fall, the musical tones filling her ears, pulling her from the hazy mists of her dream.
Crathes Castle’s ghost is a Green Lady.
The voice droned on, clearer now.
She’s most often seen in the
room given her name, the Green Lady’s Room,
where she paces back and forth, then pauses by the
fireplace. . . .
Margo started when she recognized the voice. “Oh, no!”
Her eyes popped open. fully alert now, she found herself curled naked in her plaid wing chair. Well, wrapped-in-a-big-bath-towel naked. And judging by the cramp in her legs, she’d been wedged into the chair for hours.
Her feet had even gone to sleep.
She stared across her living room at the soft glow of her television. A well-known Scottish medium peered back at her from the screen. She couldn’t recall his name, but he appeared weekly on a popular British ghost-hunting show.
Her heart plummeted as she stared back at him, watching him lead a small group of ghost enthusiasts through Crathes Castle in Scotland’s Royal Deeside.
She loved the show and had never missed an episode. Apparently she hadn’t skipped this night’s investigation, either.
But she
had
taken a shower.
And then, in the confused half-awake, half-asleep state that haunts the weary, she’d stumbled in here to watch
Ghosting Britain
.
There could be no other explanation.
Her hair was still damp. She’d even tended her nightly ritual of slathering on moisturizer. Her skin felt sleek and silky smooth. She could smell the fragrant jasmine notes of Sea of Nectar body lotion. She’d just been so tired that she didn’t remember flipping on the television.
What she remembered was dreaming of Magnus MacBride.
How his voice had deepened when he’d talked about
dragging his tongue over her
or
sating himself
on her taste
. She could still feel his kisses, so hard, rough, and plundering. His mouth crushing down over hers, stealing her breath, surprising her as his tongue plunged between her lips to twirl and tangle with her own, making her burn ...
She was still on fire.
She was also hungry.
So she scrambled out of her chair, ignoring the jabs of a gazillion needles shooting up her legs when she put weight on her feet. Quickly, she knotted her big purple towel more securely around her breasts.
Then she headed for the kitchen.
She was halfway there when she realized she could devour everything in her fridge—and even her cupboards—and she’d still be ravenous. She craved something a mere midnight snack would never satisfy.
And it was a hunger that would only worsen as the night progressed and she soon found herself alone in her bed.
This time, she wouldn’t sleep.
She’d spend what remained of the night reliving her dream and what it had felt like to be held and kissed by the Viking Slayer.
Chapter 4
Early the next day, across time and in a far-distant place, Magnus strode from Badcall Castle, making for a certain thick-walled cottage. Nestled atop a pine-clad knoll, Windhill Cottage required visitors to climb a rough track through dense bracken and to be wary of hidden bog slicks. But there were rewards for the effort. One of the finest was the welcoming curl of peat smoke that always rose from Windhill’s thatched roof.
A great, huge-bearded seer dwelt at the cottage, preferring seclusion to cast his runes, watch the roll of the sea, listen to the wind, or whatever else he did in his endeavors to unravel the mysteries of fate.
This man was Magnus’s reason for leaving his hall on such a chill and drizzly morn. And why he carried a basket of smoked herring on his arm.
Orosius was an unlikely prophet, but skilled at reading signs in elemental forces. Or through other means he didn’t care to divulge.
Most times, Magnus appreciated the seer’s wisdom.
Just now he only wanted to put an end to Calum’s blether about the realm of the dead and a naked, golden-haired siren he knew wasn’t Liana.
He hoped she wasn’t the temptress conjured by
Donata.
The lushly curved vixen who’d appeared to him twice now. Once when he’d cut down Godred, and—he frowned—in the heated dream that robbed his sleep and left him so angry this morn. More than that, for ever since she’d visited him in the night, his tongue ached to tease and taste her. He’d wakened to find his entire body so tight that even breathing was an agony.
His loins ...
Magnus’s scowl deepened. He quickened his pace, glad for the damp air, the cold wind fretting his plaid.
And for Frodi’s loyal presence as the old dog trailed him up the steep rise. A journey that, thanks to the spume-flecked maid from the sea, had never struck him as so torturous.
Such intense, bone-aching lust hadn’t seized him since the first time he’d thrust his head beneath a woman’s skirts and breathed in the tangy musk of female desire. It galled him that he now felt an overwhelming urge to fill his lungs with the naked beauty’s feminine dew. Shoving the desire from his mind, he avoided a jumble of loose, moss-covered rocks and then leapt over a narrow, rushing burn.
Without doubt, the sea siren had cast magic over him.
He’d have been fine if she hadn’t taunted him by placing her hands on her hips, offering him such a grand view of her full, round breasts and her shapely, succulent thighs. The lush triangle of dark gold curls that set his blood to simmering.
Even then, he might have remained unaffected.
But his dream self had kissed her.
And she’d sighed her pleasure, parting her soft, ripe lips. Somehow, before he realized what was happening, his tongue was tangling with hers and they were sharing breath, the intimacy scalding him.
If the vixen hadn’t wished to seduce him, why had she kissed him back? Why deepen the kiss and let her tongue twirl so hotly with his, if not to drive him to madness?
Why burst into his life wearing naught but pearls of water and sea foam?
She’d even leaned into him when he’d seized her, melting against him so that he felt the delicious burn of her tightened nipples. The soft, beckoning heat of her woman’s place and the silky-wet delights waiting beneath her tangle of golden female curls.
He might have been dreaming, trapped in the thrall of Donata’s curse, but he could almost taste the naked beauty now. He knew she’d be honeyed nectar on his tongue. Sakes, he’d kill a man just to run a finger down the slick, molten center of her.
And that need fashed him greatly.
Especially as he was certain Sigurd Sword Breaker or Donata Greer had worked some kind of dark, carnal magic to send the seductress to plague him.
Donata would laugh when he succumbed to the vixen’s charms. Sigurd would wait until he mounted her and then plunge a blade through his back, piercing his heart.
Only his foes could hatch such a plan.
His own mind was too filled with his need to sharpen his sword on his enemies’ bones for him to bother conjuring bare-bottomed, pert-nippled females to addle his wits and rob him of his nights’ rest.
“Come, Frodi.” Magnus frowned when his dog stopped to sniff heather. “The female is a proper pest.
I want Orosius to banish her.”
Frodi swiveled his furry head, seeming to grin at Magnus before trotting back to his side. The dog’s swishing tail gave the impression he agreed that the seer could spin such magic.
If anyone could vanquish the sea witch, it was Orosius.
Magnus trusted in the seer’s power.
But his hopes dimmed when Orosius opened the door as he neared the cottage. The seer was known for his moods, and the way he scratched his tattered ear at Magnus’s approach didn’t bode well.
Orosius had lost much of his ear to an enemy’s sword years ago and believed the injury was the gods’ retribution for using his gift unwisely. He tugged the damaged ear only when he wasn’t of a mood to scry.
The fierce look he pinned on Magnus was equally telling. His wildly mussed hair signaled that he’d only just risen.
It was clearly one of those mornings when Orosius desired his peace.
Magnus didn’t care.
Letting his own brows snap together, he strode on toward the low, whitewashed cottage. “Orosius! I’ll be having a word with you.”
“Humph. I knew you’d be coming.” Orosius continued to scratch his ear. “Felt it in my bones, I did.” A huge man with piercing, silvery eyes, a bulbous red nose that had surely been broken more than once, and a great, bushy black beard, he filled the doorway.
He was also blocking it, deliberately.
His odd eyes narrowed. “Calum couldn’t keep his tongue from flapping, eh?”
Magnus forgot his intention to treat the seer with respect. “I’d rather you put such tidings in my own ears before filling Calum’s head with nonsense.” Orosius gave him a chiding look. “As it happens, I meant to tell you. That long-nosed Calum darkened my door before I had a chance.”
“You could’ve come straight to Badcall.”
“Harrumph.” Orosius rocked back on his heels and glared at Magnus. “I need to sleep after seeing the like. And with everyone tromping a track to my door of late, I haven’t had my rest.”
“You can sleep after I’ve had my answers.” Magnus glowered back at him. “What’s this about seeing me dead?”
“Only what I saw, no more.”
“You erred.”
“Be the first time, if I did.” Orosius bristled. “I’m not a storyteller, spinning tales to fill a long, cold evening.” He swelled his chest, looking proud. “I speak true, whether or not my words are pleasing.”
“Then I’ll tell you what pleases me.” Magnus drew himself up likewise. “Standing in Godred’s blood was more than satisfying. And I’ll no’ be dying until I’ve danced in Sword Breaker’s guts.”
“Could be that’s so.” Orosius shifted and a waft of peat smoke drifted from the cottage’s dim interior. “I didnae see your end happening. I only saw—”
“I know what you saw.” Magnus’s gaze met the seer’s. “And it wasn’t me with Liana.” Orosius’s heavy black brows drew together. Instead of answering, he peered at the basket of smoked herring in Magnus’s hand.
“Be that your tribute for me?” Orosius’s sharp eyes narrowed on the fish. “I still have two strings o’ herring hanging o’er my fire from your last visit. What I need is more peat to burn.”
“You’ll have your peat.” Magnus turned a sour glance on a fresh curl of smoke whirling out into the cold morning. He knew if he peered around the corner of the cottage, he’d see a peat stack nearly as high as the one that supplied Badcall. “Truth is, you’re better supplied than most.”
Looking belligerent, Orosius folded his arms over his barrel-sized chest. “If my kettle isn’t kept simmering, there’s no steam to scry—”
“Is that where you saw me in the realm of the dead?” Magnus gave him an equally hard look.
“Peering in the steam off your cauldron?”
“I could’ve seen what I did in the bottom o’ my ale cup.” Orosius didn’t budge from the door. “Where and what I saw changes naught.”
“It does if the woman you saw wasn’t Liana.” Magnus half turned to glance at the dark clouds racing in from the sea. Thunder sounded in the distance and cold wind thrashed the red-berried rowan tree next to Orosius’s cottage. “I say”—he swung back around to fix the seer with a stare—“your scrying showed me in the thrall of a she-demon summoned by Donata Greer, the sorceress.”
Orosius thrust his chin. “I dinnae mistake what’s shown to me.”
“Let me see what you saw and we’ll know.”
“Begad!” Orosius looked horrified. “Suchlike would flatten me for days. You dinnae ken the power needed to share even a glimmer of what I see.”
“You showed me how Liana died.” Magnus’s voice hardened.
“That was long ago and she came to me in a dream, wanting to reach you.” Orosius’s eyes gleamed with defiance. “If she wished to be seen now, she would’ve shown me more than the back of her head.”
“You didn’t see Liana.” Magnus was sure of it.
“Humph.” Orosius snorted.
Magnus frowned. The seer was his last hope.
And the cantankerous lout’s foul mood grated on his nerves.
Orosius was an ogre.
And Magnus was weary of him. He also pushed past him into the low-ceilinged cottage. A small fire burned in the central hearth, where Orosius’s black kettle hung on a chain above the smoldering peats. It was there that Frodi chose to sprawl on the stone-flagged floor.
Orosius went to stand beside the dog. The red glow from the peat lit his hulking form, making him look even bigger, almost like an oversized troll with his large nose and wild hair. “Bad things happen when folk go poking into things they aren’t meant to be a-seeing.”