Dark Rival

Instantly Allie saw their eyes glaze. She looked at Aidan and saw the glittering light coming from his gaze and realized he had great powers of enchantment.

Both men released their swords, but they glanced at Allie now.

Aidan moved so quickly Allie didn’t know what was happening until it was done. He suddenly had one of the men’s swords laid against that man’s throat. “Ye show the lady respect,” he said softly. “She’s Royce’s guest.”

Allie wet her lips. What had she been thinking? He could flirt and charm, he liked trendy clothes and was a bit arrogant for her taste, but he was as fierce and powerful as Royce, maybe even more so, for the red in his aura was almost blinding. There was something else present in his aura that she could not understand, either—a black streak, like black rain. But she had forgotten all that. She had dared to curse him and strike at him.

A horn blew.

Allie jumped in surprise and almost twisted her ankle. She whirled to look up at the tower above her. She didn’t have to ask, she knew.

Royce was returning. She could feel him, his energy huge and hard and powerful, impossibly male, impossibly indomitable. He was somewhere beyond the castle walls.

Excitement seized her and made her breathless, caused her body to ache and swell. This was not the time—but maybe it was. Because after she leapt into his arms, she could think of nothing she’d rather do than be in his bed, making love, celebrating his life, and afterward, cuddling and talking, kissing.

Joy and relief warred.

Ahead was the gatehouse with its four towers, the one that he’d driven through in his Ferrari the other day. She rushed forward.

“Ye wait for him here,” Aidan called. “Ye let him accept what we have done.”

Allie ignored him, stumbling in her tall shoes, wishing she’d had the foresight to wear her Nikes. She stepped into the dark stone corridor that formed the passageway through the gatehouse—and came face-to-face with iron bars.

Her heart slammed. She was barred by a closed portcullis, because this was the fifteenth century, not modern times. Another portcullis was closed at the other end of the passage, and beyond that, she saw an outer ward, a smaller gatehouse and a drawbridge that was slowly lowering. Instantly she realized a large group of horsemen was approaching the drawbridge, the sun glittering wildly on their armor.

She seized the cold iron bars, her heart leaping.

His aura burned hotly red, dominating the orange and gold, making any blue and green invisible. He was at the band’s forefront, and he’d come from battle. The energy given by the planet Mars and the war gods was bursting in him still.

She swallowed, uncontrollably excited now and very aroused.

She hadn’t thought about what it would be like to see him again, in this century. Although they had first met when he was from this time, they’d exchanged no more than a dozen words, fought a single battle before they’d leapt time. The memories she had of him now had nothing to do with a Highland warrior standing in mail and a plaid, his legs boot-clad but bare. She would never forget the sight of Royce getting out of his Ferrari in his black T-shirt and trousers; Royce in bed, surrounded by Ralph Lauren pillows and sheets; Royce offering her wine, his 18 karat gold Bulgari watch glinting on his wrist; Royce smiling at her from across a table covered with linen and crystal.

The man riding across the drawbridge was on a huge, wild charger and wore mail over his tunic. Both horse and man were spotted with blood.

And then the bars started lifting.

She swallowed hard, telling herself it was silly to be uneasy. She shouldn’t be surprised to see him dressed like a medieval knight, because she’d seen him dressed as strangely at the fund-raiser, yet this was different—in his time, it was strange and somehow disturbing. It was hard for her mind to reconcile this Royce and the one she’d spent twenty-four hours with. The man approaching looked almost like a stranger. But he was the same man, when push came to shove, and she needed to remember that. He was her golden warrior, her lover, the man who fought demons no matter the time, the golden Master her mother had told her to trust.

The portcullis was waist high; Allie ducked through it and ran down the stone passageway. As she did, something made her look up and she saw gaps in the ceiling above. A face appeared, shocking her.

Allie ran faster, sensing hostile intent. Just before she made it to the second portcullis, this one almost the height of her head, an arrow whizzed past her. And then a dozen arrows scorched her path.

They were shooting at her.

Frantic, she ducked beneath the last portcullis, and she heard Royce shout, “Cease yer fire!”

She burst into the gray Highland daylight.

His gray eyes wide, he galloped his horse across the dirt ward, thrusting himself between her and the gatehouse. Allie halted, shaken by the attack, but so overjoyed to see him. The horse reared and Royce jerked mercilessly on its reins, making it submit to his halt. His gaze slammed to hers.

It was hard and incredulous.

Allie smiled, trembling. The moment he took her into his arms, all of her anxiety would vanish. Wouldn’t it?

But his hard eyes slammed down her rather exposed bosom to her skirt and bare legs. The sexual appraisal was raw, ruthless. Then he leapt from the horse, which reared again. Royce turned and kicked it in the ribs, hard.

The animal stood docilely, head down.

Allie tried to breathe. He didn’t look at her now, his expression strained, and she wasn’t sure she’d liked how he’d looked at her before dismounting. He was handing his helmet to a boy, then his gauntlets, his gestures forceful, almost angry.

They needed to speak. She tried to assimilate what was happening. He was the same man—she would swear it—but he was so different, too. He was so medieval. “Royce?” she asked uncertainly.

He whirled to face her, eyes blazing.

He was angry, she realized, shocked. But he couldn’t be angry with her. He might not know they were lovers, but he was in love with her. She had no doubt he’d told her he’d waited so many centuries for her.

And then he closed the short distance between them, towering over her. “I left ye in yer time,” he ground out.

What was this? As Allie stared blankly at him, her joy really faded. “Royce.” She wet her lips, terribly uncertain. Where was her warm welcome? She laid her hand on his chest. His strong heart thundered there. “I am so happy to see you. I have so much to tell you.”

His eyes widened with surprise. For one moment, he stared at her and she stared back, waiting for him to smile and erase all her doubt and confusion. Instead, slowly, he said, “Ye touch me as if we’re familiar.” His gaze had narrowed with cool speculation.

A sick feeling began. This was Royce five hundred and seventy-seven years before they’d made love. He didn’t know they were lovers, but he did love her, right? “We are very familiar,” she whispered. “In my time.”

His expression changed. A satisfied, smug and hard look settled on his gorgeous face. But then he said, “Ye need to go back to yer time.”

Allie dropped her hand. “You’re not…happy to see me?” She was shocked. It was hard to wrap her mind around the fact that she knew him intimately, but he did not know her.

Then she added silently, yet.

“Do I look pleased?” he demanded.

He did not look pleased at all. What was happening? Where was her lover—the man she had traveled through time to be with?

“Yer lover,” he said, his eyes glittering, “awaits ye in yer time, not this one.”

Allie could not react. Royce was cold and rude, terribly so. He was not welcoming, and he had put her in an uncomfortable and defensive position. She was far more than off balance, she was starting to feel rejected. But men did not reject her. They courted her, chased her, fell in love with her. Why was he being so harsh, so mean? Could he be so different from the man she’d slept with last night?

“Royce.” Aidan approached from the gatehouse.

Royce stiffened and turned. “Of course it was ye, Aidan. Ye brought her back. Are ye very amused?”

Aidan did not smile. He looked so incongruous, standing there in his jeans and leather jacket, confronting Royce in his mail and plaid. “There has been nothin’ amusin’ about this day. Ye need to be pleasant to the lady.”

Royce stared, his gaze narrowing. Allie saw the red in his aura explode. “So ye defend her?” he asked very softly.

Aidan shook his head, grimacing “Ye fool! Dinna start. I brought her to Carrick, not to Awe.”

Royce folded his arms, biceps bulging, a gold cuff glinting on one arm, a terribly dangerous expression on his face. His smile was ruthless. “Then ye be the fool. Take her with ye when ye leave.”

Allie bit her lip, aghast. He didn’t want her there.

Aidan flushed. “Ye dinna mean such cruel words.”

“If I’d wished to bring her back with me, I’d have done so,” he told Aidan. “I left her in her time for my reasons—I dinna like being crossed.” He glared at Allie.

Allie wanted to cry. He acted as if he hated her. He wasn’t even the same man as the Highlander who’d come to her aid at the fund-raiser.

“I dinna cross ye!” Aidan erupted, seeming as angry as Royce now. “Ye left her behind because yer afraid.”

“I left her behind at Carrick to protect her,” Royce said as furiously.

“Stop,” Allie cried. “Stop fighting like small boys.”

They ignored her. Aidan said, “There’s no one at Carrick in her time to protect her.”

Royce stiffened.

Allie looked back and forth between the two men, certain Royce had instantly understood Aidan’s inference. And he slowly faced her.

Uneasy, she tried to decipher his feelings. Most men would be shocked to learn of their death. Most men would be distressed to learn of the event, and the date. Royce’s gray gaze met hers.

And she saw the stark comprehension in his eyes. She wanted to ease any distress he might feel, to soothe any anxiety, any fear. She wanted to tell him that it was not the end, that they would fix it, change it somehow.

But a mask settled over his face. “I die in her time.” He was still looking at Allie as he spoke to Aidan. And he did not seem to care.

“Aye,” Aidan said. “Ye died in bravery for her, as any Master would.”

He nodded at that.

Allie still wanted to comfort him, not that he looked as if he needed comfort from her or anyone. He didn’t even seem upset. She laid her hand on his hard chest again, hating the feel of the sharp mail. And in spite of the vest, she felt him tense. “It was a mistake. An awful mistake. It doesn’t have to happen that way.” She tried to smile. Instead, horrified, she felt tears well. It was going to be a long time before she got over his death.

His thick, dark lashes lowered. “Yer fond of me. Ye grieved.”

Allie nodded slowly. “You’re fond of me, too, Royce.”

He made a harsh sound, and it was dismissive. Only then did he look up. Allie forgot to breathe. Everything was the same—she felt his lust, huge and bold, a presence throbbing between them, and she was overcome by it. It was as if a bond was there between them, connecting their desires, their bodies. She moved her hand lower, across the sharp mail, toward his waist. A terrific fold had appeared near the hem of the mail shirt.

“I need wine,” Aidan said. He wheeled and strode back through the gatehouse.

Allie was alone with Royce, although several knights remained at a distance. She trembled and waited for him to take her into his arms, hold her and tell her everything would be all right. Then they could go inside, upstairs. And by the dawn, everything would be back to the way it should be. She knew it. It wasn’t too late. They could get past these first few awful moments.

He took her hand and removed it. “Dinna tease me.”

Her eyes widened. “Royce, I am not teasing you.”

His smile twisted. “Yer lover is dead.”

She inhaled. “No, you are very much alive,” she cried. “And I thank the gods for it!”

“Ye mistake,” he said grimly, “two very different men.”

Allie backed up, shaking her head. “Why are you doing this?”

“Why did ye follow me to my time?” he shot back.

Allie tried to control the hurt roiling through her now. “You don’t want me here?”

“Nay, I dinna.”

His words were a blow. She could not begin to fathom what he meant, or why, and what this meant for her, for them. She had never suffered such cruelty before. “You’re not making sense,” she said thickly. “You told me you waited six hundred years for me! You are not acting like a man in love.”

His eyes widened. “I am a soldier of God,” he said sharply. He nodded at the gatehouse, a gesture that was clearly a command for her to follow, and he whirled and strode that way.

Allie didn’t move. The man striding away from her was not the man she was in love with. It had become painfully clear. What had she done, coming back to his time? And what should she do now?

Allie wiped at some moisture on her face. Her world was spinning now. And the grief came back, hot, hurtful, fresh. With it, there was so much confusion.

“I can please ye, lassie.”

Allie tensed. She hadn’t paid any attention to his men. Several stood in a half circle around her now.

The giant who had just spoken to her smiled, revealing mostly missing teeth. He was huge and unshaven, and blood stained his tunic. He had no mail and he wore a longsword, a dagger and carried a spiked club. He was dirty and reeked of body odor.

Five other men stood with him, each as gross and primitive and dirty, and they were all leering.

Alarm began.

She was used to being admired. Men looked at her lush boobs all the time. Suddenly Allie wished she was not wearing a supersexy corset top a size too small, much less such a feminine skirt and high heels. For the first time in her life, she was not the center of admiration; she was the center of savage, primitive lust. She felt as if the men were rabid wolves about to fight over her carcass before ripping it apart while devouring it. And she felt a flicker of fear, when she was never afraid.

Suddenly Royce was striding past her, his face livid.

Allie was so relieved, although instinct made her jump out of his way. He didn’t stop to ask her if she was fine or look at her. Enraged, determined, he went to the first giant, who backed up quickly.

Royce suddenly had a dagger in his hand—and he pressed it between the giant’s thighs, beneath his tunic.

Allie clapped her hand over her mouth, not daring to cry out.

“Take another look,” Royce taunted softly. “Dare.”

The giant was white. “I be sorry, my lord. I’ll nay look again.”

“Ye look at her one more time, ye ever speak to her again, ye’ll be looking at yer balls, hanging from my walls, drying in the sun.” He straightened, sheathing the dagger.

The giant got on his knees. He bowed his head. “Aye, my lord.”

“Lady Ailios is my guest, under my protection,” Royce said harshly. “Ye tell every man in the keep.” He turned and his heated gaze locked with Allie’s.

Allie was frozen. He meant it. She was no stranger to evil, but she was a stranger to this kind of violence. Royce was a holy warrior, but she had not a doubt he would emasculate the man who had dared to look at her with lustful intent without thinking twice. And as gross as that man was, he wasn’t evil, he was just a savage.

This was a primitive, savage world.

And this man was not her twenty-first-century lover.

There was nothing civilized about him. He was utterly ruthless, terribly chauvinistic, a barbarian. A product of his primitive, savage time.

What had she done?

His jaw flexed. An odd light came to his eyes. “T’is late for regrets.”

She swallowed hard. “I have made a mistake.”

His face hardened. He gestured for her to precede him through the gatehouse, even more displeased than before.

Allie did.

THERE HAD BEEN a huge battle with a rival clan, and his body was still hot and hard from the fight. Like most men, he always enjoyed fucking after fighting, and he had returned to Carrick intending to do just that. Instead he had discovered Ailios in his home, waiting for him, her eyes filled with love.

He was furious! He had left her in the future for a clear purpose! He did not need such temptation now—or ever.

There would be such a respite when buried in her warm, quivering flesh, from this life….

She shined with that pure, holy, healing white light. He could bathe in it….

He was so tired of the fight….

He steeled himself against such weakness, against her. He stole a glance at her now. The light around her was stunning and bright, as if the air surrounding her was infused with moisture after a Highland rain. His pulse drummed harder and he looked away. Even with the entire hall separating them, he could almost taste her purity and power; he could almost feel its warmth seeping into his sore, aching flesh.

Except he was hardly sore, anywhere, and he did not need healing. He had never beheld such power, and that must be the reason for his fascination. For he had never spent even an entire day, much less two weeks, thinking about a woman—not even Brigdhe in the days when he had just taken her as a bride and they were still exploring their passion. He was a Master. He dwelled on great matters of good and evil, life and death. Lust belonged in the bedchamber, the stables, or the wood on a quiet afternoon.

But ever since he’d left her in modern times at Carrick, he had been restless, annoyed, short of temper and irascible. In general, everyone and everything had displeased him. He had thought about her frequently, in spite of his better intentions. His interest hadn’t waned—it had increased. He had thought about her even while in bed with other women. But this was worse, oh, yes, to find her here, in his home, in his time, a temptation that would lead him astray from the life he had so carefully forged.

But Aidan had made the decision to bring her there because he had died in the future last night.

His heart drummed hard. He would live for almost six more centuries, and he did not know whether to rejoice or despair. He strode across the hall to the long trestle table, his mind grappling with the fact of his future death. He did not know the details, although he soon would. All men had to die eventually, even Masters. But that left the gaping question of how to best protect Ailios now.

Filled with tension and heat, he ignored his friend Black-wood at the hearth, talking in a low voice with Aidan. He poured claret into a mug, his hand trembling. His mind could spin and race, but he felt the woman at the far end of the hall as if the air was a bridge of desire and emotion between them.

She was so small and so beautiful. He felt the waves of hurt emanating from her, washing over him.

Damn it all! He did not care if her feelings were hurt because he hadn’t welcomed her with warmth and smiles into his home—and into his bed. When would she understand that he was not her lover? Her lover was dead. And if she spoke the truth, if he had somehow come to love her, then there was the proof that he must avoid her seduction at all costs. His recollection of her these past two weeks was proof he must avoid her or find an entanglement that would endanger her—and him. He must never take a mistress, much less care for one. She must never be another Brigdhe. Although his wife’s features were faded beyond recognition now, he would never forget how she had suffered because of him; nor did he want to.

At least he’d had her before dying.

That knowledge gave him a savage exhilaration. But he didn’t know the details of their time of passion. He didn’t know what had happened, what it had been like. He didn’t know how she sounded when she was coming, or how she felt, climaxing around him. Could he really wait five hundred and seventy-seven years to find out?

He cursed and drained his wine. His frustration knew no bounds. He would have enjoyed ripping McKale apart and hanging his balls out to dry. He felt like doing so now. She was the reason he was as frustrated as a twenty-year-old. It was inexplicable.

He refilled the mug and turned, staring against his will. Instead of lusting for what he could not have, he must dwell on the hard facts. Moffat hunted her and she was out of her time. She did not know their Highland ways. She could not strut about Carrick in such clothes, with her chemise missing, inflaming all men. His men would have raped her had he not come out and made his law clear. She came from a soft time, an easy place. This time was hard and savage and she needed protection more now than ever, and not just from Moffat and the deamhanain.

He would never hand her over to another Master, because his brethren were ruthless when it came to seduction and she would wind up in another’s bed in the brief moment it took for her to become entranced. He had not meant it when he’d told Aidan to take her to Awe; he’d never let Aidan do so. MacNeil had chosen him to protect her, and he could not do so in her time, when his future self was dead. Iona would be a safe haven for her—but he’d have to convince MacNeil of that. Somehow he would do so. Until then, she would have to remain at Carrick, under his protection.

He returned to the bottle on the table. It was not his wish to hurt her. He was not a cruel man. But he was not going to feel guilt, either. He owed but one woman guilt—his wife. This was Aidan’s fault, and he would gladly blame Aidan for disobeying him and creating such a predicament. However, she was in his home now and he should treat her as he would any other valued guest.

Having a clear, determined course of action calmed him somewhat. Almost soothed, he decided to offer her wine. He poured a new mug, and walked over to her. Her eyes widened.

“Will ye have some wine?” he asked brusquely. He could not risk showing her any pleasant manner beyond politeness. Oddly, though, he wished she would smile. Her smile was like the Highland sun rising from behind Ben More. “Ye’ll feel better. A maid will show ye to a chamber.”

She took the mug and cradled it in both hands against her full, soft bosom. He stared, not bothering to hide his avid interest. Any man would look at what she displayed in such a garment and think of being pillowed there in various ways.

“Are you being nice to me now?” she asked thickly.

He dragged his gaze upward. “Ye need to rest.” Surely she knew his suggestion was a command? “Ye can eat first,” he added, realizing she might be hungry.

“I’m not hungry and I’m not tired,” she said, staring at him, her gaze terribly moist. “And I have no intention of staying here—with you, an ogre like no other.”

Her words stung. He reminded himself that he did not care—and no matter what she claimed, he never would. “Ye’ll stay here. Ye need protection. I’ll see if MacNeil will allow ye to stay at the Sanctuary. Then ye go to Iona.”

Her stare intensified. “The only place I’m going is home! Ask Aidan to take me. I don’t want—or need—your protection.”

She seemed ready to shed tears. It was time to end the conversation. “Ye have my protection, whether ye wish it or ye dinna wish it.” And he started to walk away.

“And to think I thought you were a tyrant in my time,” she whispered.

He did not pause, but he did not understand. Curious, he lurked in her mind. He inhaled, seeing her very graphic thoughts about his prowess in bed, seeing him slowly entering her, purposefully teasing her, as she wept and begged. He even heard her cries of pleasure. His pulse raged, almost blinding him. He tried to think of something else, but it was simply too late. He had given her so much pleasure. He was pleased—he was tortured. He whirled.