Highlander in Her Bed (20 page)

His nightmare. A ringing slap in his face.

Just riding across the ground set his hair on end.

"I asked you a question, tin man," she badgered, the quiver in her voice belying her strong words. "What will you do when we get back?"

"Sons of Lucifer," Alex swore, urging the mare to greater speed as they sailed past the pile of stones for her memorial cairn. "I shall do what I have always done."

"And what's that?" she had the gall to ask.

"Guard my bloody bed."

"You mean my bed."

"Nay, it is mine," he snarled, doing his best to ignore the way her bottom pressed against his still-roused manhood.

He grimaced. Her bed, she'd said.

His bed, he'd insisted, and his heart had split on the lie.

The bed was neither his or hers.

It was theirs.

And he was the world's greatest fool for admitting it.

Chapter 9

Several evenings later, Mara stood in her bedchamber admiring the changes she'd made. Not alterations so much as additions. Carefully selected items, strategically placed to ensure she need never again enter the room only to be seized by a strong awareness of unwanted company.

In particular, the six foot four, annoyingly seductive kind.

But also the room's uncanny chill and the assorted creaks, groans, and thuds in the night she was certain Hottie Scottie conjured just to unsettle her. For three nights he'd plagued her with such trickery, at times causing bangs loud enough to shatter the window-panes, then letting the lights flicker on and off.

Waking her in the small hours by the sound of the door opening and closing—although it had been securely bolted!

"Such pranks are history, tin man," she breathed, pacing the room, feeling more confident with each stride. "You've been outfoxed."

She glanced at Ben, sleeping snug and content in the glow of the hearth fire. Oddly, the old dog hadn't seemed to mind the knightly shenanigans.

But she'd had enough.

Especially since The Kiss that never should have happened. She shivered and rubbed her arms. At least she hadn't actually
seen
him again.

Good riddance.

For all she cared, he could spend his time in the sea cave, bodysurfing incoming waves. Or better yet, howling away the hours in the gloomy unlit dungeon of some other gullible's Highland castle.

Hers had just become out-of-bounds.

If Ben missed him, she'd play him some old videos of
Casper the Friendly Ghost
.

There were only so many insults a girl should tolerate, and she'd reached the end of her patience. Hottie Scottie, tin man, or whatever guise he chose would be in for a rude surprise if he dared to make a repeat appearance.

"No more trotting beside someone who isn't there," she huffed to Ben's sleeping form. "No more sniffing ripples in the air or wagging your tail at nothing."

And no more shivery sighs or heated glances for her.

Not that she cared, phony as every one of his smoldering, make-her-burn looks had been.

Hottie Scottie, indeed.

She frowned, nudged a piece of lint on the carpet.

The ogly eyed bastard had burned her all right. Even swept her to the edge of a tremendous, earthshaking climax only to plunge her into a shocking, icy void just when she'd started to shatter. And that without even undressing her.

But it wouldn't happen again. Now she was prepared, had taken measures.

And from what she'd been told, they were good. Highly effective and able to repel even the hardiest specter.

Hoping that was so, she went to the heavy oak dressing table and picked up a finely tapered candle. She sniffed it appreciatively. Handmade by Innes and delicately scented with lavender, it was a charmed candle.

An antighost candle.

Or so the dotty old woman claimed, proudly informing her that Ravenscraig's resident spook expert, Prudentia, had said spirit-cleansing blessings over Innes's latest batch of special lavender candles. Her heather soaps, too, not that Mara wished to go to such extremes. She didn't need Hottie Scottie appearing in the shower with her, should Prudentia have erred with her spell castings.

Nor did she really trust in the cook's self-proclaimed powers. No mumbled mumbo jumbo could turn ordinary housewares into apparition deterrents.

But she was willing to try anything.

Even if employing such dubious methods incited Murdoch's considerable wrath.

Although, much to his credit, with the exception of a few
harrumphs
and narrow-eyed glares at the cook and Innes, the bandy-legged steward had grudgingly allowed that Mara could do as she pleased in the Thistle Room.

And she did please.

So long as the mere thought of Hottie Scottie still set her heart to pounding, she had little choice.

Furious or not, she was suffused with tingling excitement at just the memory of his fingers toying with her nipples. Remembering his tongue swirling against hers, an agony beyond bearing. So she set down Innes's purple-hued antighost candle, took a deep breath, and went straight to the tall windows across the room.

Great looping swaths of MacDougall tartan had hung there since yesterday, and the sight filled her with satisfaction.

Immense satisfaction.

As much as the ghostly Highlander loathed her clan, the new window dressings should annoy him enough to keep him from seeking her chamber.

If not, she had other antiapparition booby-traps in place.

Countermeasures she doubted even he could parry.

A nervous laugh rising in her throat, she pulled back a panel of the heavy plaiding and peeked outside. Blessedly, her special window treatments were still there: Braided clusters of large, pungent garlic bulbs lay in wait against the outer glass, as did fine bunches of freshly cut red-berried rowan branches.

Mara smiled. Better doubly secure than unprepared.

Equally reassuring, the wall walk looked empty, the whole of the battlements quite still. No mailed knights or hot-eyed Highlanders patrolled the flagged stones. Or, an even more daunting image, no Hottie Scottie leaned arrogantly against a merlon, arms crossed and glaring at her.

Mara released the breath she'd been holding and turned back to the room. She hoped she hadn't forgotten anything.

But Innes's antighost candles were already lit for the night, and their golden flames reflected nicely in the row of little mirrors she'd placed along the marble mantelpiece. Even the freestanding mirror wore its own red-ribboned cluster of rowan. A wooden crucifix adorned each wall, one even winking at her from the back of the bedchamber door.

She'd also placed small silver bowls of sacred well water on every available surface. This, Prudentia had insisted, was an incredibly powerful impediment to nocturnal visitors of the supernatural variety.

Mara sniffed, unable to squelch her doubts. The improbability of the water's magic made a muscle beneath her eye twitch. Whether the water was sacred or not, she made a mental note to thank the twin housemaids, Agnes and Ailsa, for making the trek into the hills to the ancient Celtic well.

Then, before she had time to feel even more foolish, she picked up the nearest bowl and began flicking the icy droplets about the room, taking especial care to trickle a broad protective circle around her bed.

"Almost done," she promised Ben, dribbling a circle around him, too.

Just for good measure. Not that she thought Hottie Scottie would harm an innocent old dog.

Truth was, he seemed rather fond of Ben. Even of Scottie and Dottie, although those two only growled at him or nipped at his ankles—when they didn't avoid him altogether.

Mara sighed. Sir Alexander Douglas had clearly been a dog lover, a quality she usually credited highly. And one the kiss-her-senseless Highlander seemed to have retained into ghostdom.

But at the moment she didn't want to think anything nice about him.

Doing so left her feeling oddly bereft.

So she turned away from the sleeping dog and set down the empty silver bowl. She'd done all she could, and there wasn't any point in letting her heart fill with what-ifs and might-have-beens.

Especially when
he
was so insufferable.

She brushed off her hands, wished she could forget him as easily. Instead, her heart skittered and her mouth had gone way too dry.

But at least she was here and not cowering in some inn in Oban, afraid to enjoy her inheritance.

She was also enough of a MacDougall not to let a ghost ruin her pleasure in sleeping naked. Well,
almost
naked, she decided, beginning to strip. She'd keep on her sexy black teddy. Though Highland nights never really darkened in summer, with so much thick MacDougall plaiding at the windows, the room was cast in heavy shadow.

Dim except for the glow of the fire and Innes's candles.

But she wasn't of a mood to flip on any lights. If tin man
was
lurking somewhere, glaring invisible daggers at her, he could just strain his ghostly eyes.

In fact, maybe she'd encourage him by putting on a little show.

Feeling deliciously wicked, she flopped onto the bed. "My bed," she challenged the silence.

Then, rolling onto her side, she began a set of leg lifts, raising and lowering her leg with deliberate slowness. He'd already revealed that he couldn't resist peeking between them, so she'd just oblige him.

Hopefully he'd run so hard, he'd get blue balls.

Her naughty little black teddy should be worth that, at least.

An utterly decadent bit of sheer lace and froth, the thing had cost her a mint. But she'd been unable to resist it from the moment she'd seen it displayed in a Covent Garden lingerie boutique. She'd bought it on plastic, intending to save the teddy for a night of sizzling seduction and hot, heart-pounding sex.

Wild, pull-out-all-the-stoppers, really-let-herself-go sex.

The kind romance writers tried to make innocent readers believe really existed.

"Har, har, har," she scoffed, flipping onto her back and folding her arms behind her head. Who'd she been kidding? The only men she ever met were anything but seduction worthy.

So far they'd all been nerds or nutcases. Or carried so much baggage they'd give an airline worker a double hernia.

The only gallant ones to notice her sported four legs and wet noses.

And more recently, she attracted ghosts.

Or rather, a ghost.

So she set her face in a scowl she hoped was fierce enough to ward off a whole battalion of such buggers and lifted her leg again, this time poking at her bed's new dressings.

So soon as her naked toes touched the bright tartan curtaining, a jolt of icy tremors shot through her. MacDougall plaid on the windows was one thing, but outfitting her magnificent four-poster in clan colors was something else altogether.

No longer feeling quite so bold, she withdrew her foot and slipped beneath the covers. They, too, were of fine MacDougall tartan, but pulling them up to her chin felt good.

Half expecting to hear his deep, Scottish voice ranting at her, she ignored the prickles on her nape and tried not to look at any of the grand old portraits on the bedchamber walls. If she dared, she suspected it wouldn't be one of her bearded, plaid-draped ancestors frowning at her, but him.