Chapter 15

Elaine woke slowly in Cearnach’s protective and warm embrace, and realized several things at once. She’d actually slept the rest of the night undisturbed. She was relieved that she’d had no more issues with the ghost. But now she was in an untenable position, her gown gathered around her navel, Cearnach’s hand resting on her buttock, and her naked leg locking him in place as if she was a pirate and had captured him, and he was her prisoner. More-than-willing prisoner.

She wanted to keep the fantasy alive. Except she’d exchange the pirate’s cabin bed for this one in the castle, which was much more her style. Rocking on rough seas was not, considering how sick she got when traveling by ship.

He still wore the pair of black boxers, but that didn’t hide the fact he was fully aroused and that she was pressing against that rock-hard erection. She was imagining him entering her, making love to her, mating with her like two wolves would for life. Did he still want to do that with her?

She’d felt his hand slip from her ass, and she’d let out a slight moan in protest, not intending to, trying to pretend she was asleep. It hadn’t worked.

Maybe he was still asleep. She missed having his hand on her skin, feeling sexy and dangerous and ready for more.

She tried to move her leg off him without disturbing him, but as soon as she lifted her leg, he groaned in a half dissatisfied, half husky way. She glanced up at him. He was smiling down at her smugly, his face covered with a shadow of stubble.

“Ahh, lass,” he drawled with his sexy Scottish burr, “seems I chased Flynn away for you last night.”

He ran his hand over her arm, the silky fabric sliding up and down, his touch gentle and loving.

She quickly moved away from him, yanking down the gown so that the hem was around her ankles again. “You… weren’t in on this with your ghostly cousin, were you?”

Cearnach laughed, the sound rich and husky. He reached over, tugging playfully on a length of her hair. She breathed in deeply and smelled his delightful masculine scent. Now her own light scent mixed with his. She never imagined she’d spend the night in a male wolf’s bed when he wasn’t her mate.

She sighed. “Bathroom?”

“In there,” he said, motioning toward her side of the curtained bed.

She sat up and pulled aside the black velvet curtains and for the first time really saw his chamber. One wall was covered with swords and dirks and shields—some old and battle-scarred, some shiny and new. His chamber made her think of an Old World armory that would have been the prized possession of a museum on Scottish weaponry. She thought he should have a suit of mail to make the room complete.

Large, bulky dark oak dressers and armoires filled the room. On top of one, a brass framed picture of Cearnach caught her full attention. He was crouched among a dozen Irish wolfhounds—some lying at his feet, two looking up at him with adoration, some standing beside him, four sitting in a semicircle around him with eyes focused on the camera, and three pups climbing on his lap. He gave the impression that he was the alpha leader of a pack of wolfhounds, his elusive smile and the twinkle in his eyes as he looked into the camera making it appear as though he was observing her. Who wouldn’t love a man who loved animals?

Her gaze shifted to the remaining walls, which were covered with sketches of intricately carved Celtic knot designs for the wooden handles of daggers.

“My hobby,” he said, watching her as she turned to look at him. He motioned to the sketches. “I design them and sell them to shops looking for hand-carved individual creations.”

“They’re beautiful,” she said, marveling at the detail on the handles of the weapons. “You did all of these?”

“Aye. Our smithy makes the blades. I work the handles.”

“They’re truly artwork.”

“Thanks, Elaine.” He cast her a small smile. “Not all lasses would appreciate my collection.”

She gave his bared upper body an appreciative look. “I do.”

His smile widened and he leaned across the bed to grasp her arm in response to her comment. She quickly hopped down from the high bed and hurried into his bathroom.

“Coward,” he teased in a husky, sexy voice.

“I’m not a coward,” she said from the bathroom, finding it as luxurious as the other that she’d used when she shifted and dressed in the borrowed clothes. This one was all in black and white streaked marble, the counters and the floor in solid black stone, and the shower in white. She ran her hand over the cool, sleek marble.

She peered out of the bathroom at him as he now sat on her edge of the bed, smiling at her in the most wicked way, his chest and legs bared, his erection outlined as it stood at attention underneath the satiny fabric of the boxers.

She said, “I’m trying to protect your reputation.”

“My reputation,” he said, his voice taking on an even huskier tone.

“Oh, aye,” she said, attempting to copy his delightful brogue.

“It’s already in tatters.” He smiled at her.

She chuckled. “Which has nothing to do with me, and I want to keep it that way.”

He cocked one brow. “It has all to do with you.”

“It has all to do with your cousin Flynn.” She glanced around at the bathroom and realized she didn’t have any clothes with her here. She would need to either get them out of the guest bedroom and return here, or shower over there.

Flynn wouldn’t bother her now that it was daylight, she assumed. If he had meant to get her and Cearnach together, he’d already done so.

She left the bathroom.

Cearnach stood in front of the bed, stretching his muscles, his brows raised as he watched her, probably wondering what she was up to. She tore her gaze away from his muscled chest and arms, perused the bulge in his boxers with interest, and curbed a smile. He was just too sexy for a morning wake-up vision in the flesh.

She waved to the guest room across the hall. “I’ll use the one in the guest chamber since my clothes are there.”

“Ah,” he said, giving her rumpled appearance a long, fascinated look. “I’ll escort you down to breakfast as soon as you’re ready to go.”

At least no one was about when she left his room and rushed across the hall to her chamber.

She closed the bedroom door, then hurried into the bathroom to take a shower. The guest room was well equipped with travel-sized soaps and shampoos, packaged guest toothbrushes, and mini tubes of toothpaste, perfect for a guest whose kin had stolen her suitcases. After brushing her teeth, she pulled off the gown and tucked it over the gold bath towels on the towel rack, then entered the glassed-in shower stall.

She was in the middle of soaping her hair with the sweetest-smelling lavender shampoo, the hot water sluicing down her body making her nearly moan with pleasure, when she felt a hand brush across a nipple.

She screamed, opening her eyes at the same time, and realized too late that the soap was running into them. She saw no one in the second of reprieve she had before her eyes filled with tears mixing with shampoo.

Rubbing frantically to get the burning shampoo out of her eyes, she heard the door to her chamber open.

“I’m all right,” she called out to whoever it was, suspecting it was Cearnach since his room was so close and he was so protective.

Footfalls moved across her chamber, headed for the bathroom anyway. She still couldn’t see, her eyes tearing up as she continued to try and wash the soap out of them.

“Elaine,” Cearnach said, standing outside the glass door of the shower stall.

She shook her head, barely able to see him through her stinging eyes. He was wearing a towel, soap in his hair and a scowl on his face. She shoved the door to the stall open. “Come in.”

“What happened this time?” Cearnach asked, sounding annoyed with what he suspected was his cousin’s unsettling her, but then he caught sight of her naked body covered only in a light coating of soapy water. He dropped his towel on the countertop, then stepped into the shower and closed the door.

“I don’t think he wants me here. Not the way he keeps hassling me.”

Cearnach moved in behind her and began to wash the shampoo out of her hair, gently, lovingly as if they were already mated. He didn’t say anything as she continued to try and wipe the soap out of her eyes. They felt better, but they still stung and tears reappeared as they tried to wash away the sting.

Yet something about his protectiveness, his wanting her—his pheromones were so hot she could smell them over the scent of the shampoo, the water, him—the way he was declaring his interest, yet not pushing until she agreed, and his tenderness touched a need so deep that she couldn’t deny she also wanted him in a desperate way.

“What did he do?” Cearnach sounded angry, although he was attempting to couch that anger.

His voice broke the magical spell he’d cast over her.

She hesitated to tell him, afraid he’d be so furious that he’d want to exorcise the ghost, and she didn’t want that. She supposed, as far as spirits went, Cearnach and his kin were family and Flynn deserved some happiness. Not that she wanted him touching her.

“Elaine?” Cearnach wasn’t saying her name as a question but more as a command. “Tell me. What did Flynn do to you?”

“He touched my breast.” She was thinking that Flynn had to be a breast man. Or… had been. Well, still was.

She heard Cearnach gnash his teeth. He didn’t touch her, beyond rinsing out her hair, and she finished washing, then cast a look over her shoulder to see him watching her, rinsing out his own hair, looking primal, but not with regard to her, she didn’t think. More that he was ready to kick a Highland ghost’s butt.

“Thanks, Cearnach. Sorry,” she said. Then she frowned. “No one heard me, did they? I mean, they were probably miles away in the kitchen.” She hoped.

“I met Ian in the hall and told him I had this under control.”

While Cearnach had been naked, wearing only a sheen of soapy water, shampoo in his hair, and a towel around his waist? Not that she’d want Ian to come to her rescue in the state she’d been in.