The Dark Highlander

  There was no mercy in his gaze. She knew he meant it. She could either be bound, or bound and gagged.

  She shook her head, then nodded, befuddled by whether she was supposed to say yes or no. “Won’t scream,” she promised stiffly. No one can hear you up here anyway. God, that was probably true. On the penthouse level walls were thick, there was no one above, and the elite were given wide berth unless they requested something. She could probably scream her head off, and no one would come.

  “There’s a bonny lass,” he said, lifting her head with a palm and slipping a plump pillow beneath it.

  Then, in one swift, graceful move, he pushed away from the bed and stalked from the bedroom, closing the door behind him, leaving her alone, tied by silken scarves to the sinful bed of the Gaulish Ghost.

  She was the kind a man kept.

  Dageus cursed softly in five languages, recalling his earlier thought, palming himself roughly through his trews. It didn’t help. Indeed, made it worse. Happy for any attention.

  Scowling, he went to stand before the wall of windows, gazing sightlessly out over the city.

  He’d handled that badly. He’d frightened her. But he’d not been able to offer her soothing words, for he’d had to get away from her, quickly, lest he give his blood what it had been howling for. Though he told himself he’d pressed his lips to hers only to distract her while he bound her, he’d kissed her because he’d needed to, because he’d quite simply not been able not to. It had been a brief, sweet taste without tongue, for had he crossed that barrier, he’d have been lost. Lying atop her had been sheer agony, feeling the darkness rustle and flex within him, knowing tooping her would drive it back. Feeling cold and hungry, trying desperately to be human and kind.

  He’d gone to The Cloisters, pleased with how firmly he’d put all thoughts of the Scots lass from his mind. There, he’d discovered the parcel was en route to him, while he was en route to it. The cocurator had, with much fawning and gushing, assured him Chloe Zanders would be waiting for him, as someone named Bill had already returned, having left her at his address.

  But the lass hadn’t been downstairs and Security had, with much winking and grinning, told him that his “delivery” awaited him upstairs.

  Not finding the woman from the museum in the anteroom, he’d glanced about the living room, then heard noises upstairs.

  He’d loped swiftly up the stairs and walked into his bedroom, only to discover the loveliest pair of legs he’d ever seen, poking out from beneath his bed. Succulent thighs he wanted to nip with his teeth, slender ankles, pretty little feet clad in delicate high heels.

  Beautiful feminine legs. Bed.

  Those two things in close proximity had a tendency to divert all the blood from his brain.

  The legs had looked alarmingly familiar and he’d assured himself he was imagining things.

  Then he’d plucked her out by an ankle and confirmed the identity of the lass attached to those heavenly legs, and his blood had simmered to a boil.

  Staring down at her shapely backside as she’d lain unmoving on her tummy, a legion of fantasies riding him hard, it had taken him several moments to realize what she was lying amid.

  The “borrowed” books.

  The last thing he needed was the twenty-first century’s law enforcers hunting him down. He had much to do, and too little time in which to do it. He couldn’t afford complications.

  He wasn’t ready to leave Manhattan just yet. There were two final texts he needed to check.

  By Amergin—he’d nearly been done! A few days at most. He didn’t need this! Why now?

  He inhaled deeply, exhaled slowly. Repeated it several times.

  He’d had no choice, he assured himself. He had been wise to immediately restrain her. For the next few days, until he finished, he was simply going to have to hold her captive.

  Though he could use magic, a memory spell to make her forget what she’d seen, he wasn’t willing to risk it. Not only were memory spells tricky and oft damaging things, taking more memory than intended, he used magic only if there was no human way to handle the situation. He knew what it cost him each time. Tiny spells to obtain the texts he needed were one thing.

  Nay. No magic. The lass would have to endure a short time of comfortable captivity while he finished translating the final tomes, then he would leave, and release her somewhere along the way.

  Along the way to where? his conscience demanded. Do you finally accept that you’re going to have to return?

  He sighed. The past few months had confirmed what he’d suspected; there were only two places he might find the information he needed: in Ireland’s and Scotland’s museums, or in the MacKeltar library.

  And the MacKeltar library was by far the best bet.

  He’d been avoiding it at all cost, for it was fraught with myriad and varied perils. Not only did the land of his ancestors make the darkness inside him stronger, he dreaded facing his twin brother. Admitting that he’d lied. Admitting what he was.

  Arguing bitterly with his da, Silvan, seeing the anger and disappointment in his eyes had been bad enough, Dageus wasn’t certain he’d ever be ready to face his twin brother—the brother who’d never broken a vow in his life.

  Since the eve he’d broken his oath and turned dark, Dageus had not once worn the colors of his clan, though a scrap of well-worn Keltar plaid was tucked beneath his pillow. Some evenings, after he’d seen whichever woman it was into a cab (though he tooped many, he shared his bed with none), he would close his hand around it, shut his eyes and pretend he was in the Highlands again. A simple man, naught more.

  All he wanted was to find a way to fix the problem, to get rid of the dark ones himself. Then he would regain his honor. Then he could proudly face his brother and reclaim his heritage.

  If you wait much longer, that nagging voice warned, you may no longer care to reclaim it. You may no longer even understand what it means.

  He forced his thoughts away from such an unpleasant bent, and they drifted with alarming intensity straight back to the lass tied to his bed. Tied vulnerably and helplessly to his bed.

  Dangerous thought, that. Seemed all he ever had anymore were dangerous thoughts.

  Raking a hand through his hair, he forced his attention to the text she’d left on the coffee table, refusing to dwell on the disconcerting fact that a part of him had taken one look at the lass in such proximity to his bed and said simply: Mine.

  As if from the moment he’d seen her, that he would claim her had been as certain as the morrow’s dawn.

  Several hours later, Chloe’s volatile emotions had run the gamut. She’d pretty much exhausted fear, plunged with effusive glee, for a time, into outrage at her captor, and was now thoroughly disgusted at herself for her impetuous curiosity.

  Curious as a wee kitten, you are, but a cat has nine lives, Chloe, Grandda used to say. You have but one. Beware where it leads you.

  You can say that again, she thought, listening intently to see if she could hear the thief moving around out there. His penthouse had one of those music systems that was piped into every room and, after an initial painfully loud blast of a bass-heavy song that sounded suspiciously like that Nine Inch Nail’s song that had been banned from airplay a few years ago, he’d put on classical music. She’d been treated to a medley of violin concertos for the past few hours. If it was intended to soothe her, it was failing.

  It didn’t help that her nose itched and the only way she could scratch it was to bury her face in his pillows and bob her head.

  She wondered how much time would have to pass before Bill and Tom would start to wonder where she’d gotten off to. Surely they would come looking for her, wouldn’t they?

  Not.

  Though both would say, “but Chloe never deviates from routine,” neither would question or accuse Dageus MacKeltar. After all, who in their right mind would believe the man anything but a wealthy art collector? If asked, her captor would simply say, “No, she dropped it off and
left, and I have no idea where she went.” And Tom would believe, and no one would push, because men like Dageus MacKeltar weren’t the kind one questioned or pushed. No one would ever imagine him a kidnapper and a thief. She was the only one who knew differently, and only because she’d gotten all foolishly infatuated with his artifacts and gone snooping through his bedroom.

  No, although Tom might send Bill around this afternoon, or more likely tomorrow, asking when Chloe had left, it would end there. In a day or two, she imagined Tom would really start to worry, call her at home, stop by, even report her missing to the police, but there were oodles of unexplained disappearances in New York all the time.

  Deep shit, indeed.

  With a sigh, she puffed a ticklish strand of hair out of her face and did the nose-in-pillow thing again. He smelled good, the dirty rotten scoundrel. Womanizing, bullying, amoral, larcenous, vilest-of-the-vile, debaucher of innocent texts.

  “Thief,” she muttered with a little scowl.

  She inhaled, then caught herself. She was not going to appreciate his scent. She was not going to appreciate a darned thing about him.

  Sighing, she wriggled her way up the bed until she was leaning, in a mostly upright position, against the headboard.

  She was tied to a strange man’s bed. A criminal to boot.

  “Chloe Zanders, you’ve got all kinds of problems,” she murmured, testing the silken bonds for the hundredth time. A little play, no give. The man knew how to tie knots.

  Why hadn’t he hurt her? she wondered. And since he hadn’t, just what did he plan to do with her? The facts were pretty simple and quite horrifying; she’d managed to stumble into the lair of an expert, slick, thoroughly top-notch thief. Not a petty thief or a bank robber, but a master thief who broke into impossible places and stole fabulous treasures.

  This was not small-time stuff.

  There weren’t thousands riding on her silence, but millions.

  She shivered. That dismal thought could send her straight into hysterics, or at the least, a potentially terminal bout of hiccups.

  Desperate for a distraction, she wriggled as far to the edge of the bed as the bonds permitted, and peered down at the stolen texts.

  She sighed longingly, aching to touch. Though not originals—any originals worth having were securely tucked away in the Royal Irish Academy or Trinity College Library—they were superb late-medieval copies. One of them had fallen open, revealing a lovely page of Irish majuscule script, the capital letters gloriously embellished with the intricate interlacing knotwork for which the Celts were renowned.

  There was a copy of Lebor Laignech (the Book of Leinster), Leborna hUidre (the Book of the Dun Cow), Lebor Gabála Érenn (the Book of Invasions), and several lesser texts from the Mythological Cycle.

  Fascinating. All of them about the earliest days of Éire, or Ireland. Full of tales of the Partholonians, the Nemedians, the Fir Bolg, the Tuatha Dé Danaan, and the Milesians. Rich in legend and magic, and endlessly disputed by scholars.

  Why did he want them? Was he selling them to fund his fabulous lifestyle? Chloe knew there were private collectors who didn’t give a damn where the item came from, so long as they could own it. There was always a market for stolen artifacts.

  But, she puzzled, he had only Celtic artifacts. And she knew for a fact that most of the collections he’d raided for those texts boasted far more valuable items from many different cultures. Items he’d not taken.

  Which meant, for whatever reason, that he was highly selective and not motivated solely by the value of the artifact.

  She shook her head, befuddled. It didn’t make any sense. What thief wasn’t motivated by the value of the artifact? What thief stole a lesser-valued text and left dozens of more valuable items untouched once he’d gone to the trouble of breaching security? And how was he managing to breach security? The collections he’d robbed had some of the most sophisticated anti-theft systems in the world, requiring sheer genius to penetrate.

  The door suddenly opened, and she scrunched hastily away from the edge of the bed, donning her most innocent expression.

  “Are you hungry, lass?” he said in his deep burr, glancing around the partially opened door at her.

  “Wh-what?” Chloe blinked. Not only was the dastardly man not killing her, he was going to feed her?

  “Are you hungry? I was preparing food for myself and it occurred to me that mayhap you were hungry.”

  Chloe puzzled over that for a moment. Was she hungry? She was completely freaked out. She was going to have to use the bathroom soon. Her nose itched furiously and her skirt was getting all bunched up again.

  And in the midst of it all, yes, she was hungry.

  “Uh-huh,” she said warily.

  Only after he left did it occur to her that maybe that was how he was going to get rid of her—by poisoning her!

  4

  Poached salmon, stovies and cullen skink. A salad tossed with nuts and cranberries. A plate of Scottish cheeses, shortbread and marmalade. Sparkling wine in Baccarat goblets.

  Death by scrumptious Scots cuisine and fine crystal? “I thought I’d get a peanut butter sandwich or something,” Chloe said warily.

  Dageus placed the final dish on the bed and looked at her. His entire body tightened. Christ, she was fantasy come to life on his bed, sitting back against the headboard, her wrists tied to the posts. She was all soft curves, her skirt riding up her sweet thighs, teasing him with forbidden glimpses, a snug sweater hugging full, round breasts, hair tousled about her face, her eyes wide and stormy. He had no doubt that she was a maiden. Her response to his brief kiss had told him that much. He’d never had a lass like her in his bed. Not even in his own century, where proper lasses had given the Keltar brothers wide berth. Rumors about “those pagan sorcerers” had been abundant in the Highlands. Though experienced women, married women, and maids had eagerly sought their beds, even they’d eschewed more permanent ties.

  They’re drawn to danger, but of no mind to live with it, Drustan had once said with a bitter smile. They like to stroke the beast’s silky pelt, feel his power and wildness, but make no mistake, brother—they’ll never, never trust the beast around children.

  Well, ’twas too late. She was with the beast whether she liked it or not.

  If only she’d stayed on the street, she’d have been safe from him. He’d have left her alone.

  He’d have done the honorable thing and erased her from his mind. And if by chance he’d encountered her again, he’d have turned coldly about and walked the other way.

  But ’twas too late for honor. She hadn’t stayed on the street like a good lass. She was here in his bed. And he was a man, and not an honorable one at that.

  And when you leave her? the tatters of his honor hissed.

  I’ll leave her so weel pleasured she’ll no’ rue it. Some other bumbling fool would hurt her. I’ll awaken her in ways she’ll never forget. I’ll give her fantasies that will heat her dreams for the rest of her life.

  And that was the end of that argument, so far as he was concerned. He needed. The darkness in him grew wild without a woman. He no longer had the option of entertaining Katie, or any other women, in his home. But seduction, not conquest, was the main course on the table this eve. He would give her this night, mayhap the morrow, but anon, ’twould be conquest.

  “So, um, are you going to untie me?”

  With effort, he pried his gaze from her twisted skirt. She’d clamped her knees together anyway. Wise lass, he thought darkly, but ’twill do you no good in the end.

  “You can’t just keep me,” she said frostily.

  “But I can.”

  “People will be looking for me.”

  “But no’ here. None will press me, you know that.”

  When he eased himself down on the bed facing her, she plastered herself back against the headboard.

  “You’ll come to no harm at my hands, lass. I give you my word.”

  She opened her mouth, then cl
osed it, as if she’d thought better of it. Then she seemed to change her mind, shrugged, and said, “How can I believe that? I’m sitting in the middle of all this stolen stuff and you’ve tied me up. I can’t help but worry about how you plan to deal with me. So, how do you?” When he didn’t respond immediately, she added heatedly. “If you’re going to kill me, I’m warning you right now—I’ll haunt you till the end of your thieving days. I’ll make your life a living hell. I’ll make your legendary banshee seem demure and soft-spoken by comparison. You . . . you . . . you barbarian Visigoth,” she spat.

  “Och, and there’s your Scots blood, lass,” he said with a faint smile. “A fine bit o’ temper too. Though Visigoth is a bit far-fetched, I’m hardly doing anything so epic as the sacking of Rome.”

  She scowled. “Lots of books were lost then too.”

  “I treat them with care. And you needn’t fash yourself, lass. I will no’ harm you. Naught will be done to you that you doona wish done. I may borrow a few tomes, but that’s the extent of my crimes. I’ll be leaving soon. When I do, I’ll release you.”

  Chloe searched his face intently, thinking she didn’t quite like that part about “naught will be done to you that you doona wish done.” Just what did he mean by that? Still, his gaze was level. She couldn’t imagine why he would bother lying. “I could almost believe you mean that,” she finally said.

  “I do, lass.”

  “Hmph,” she said noncommittally. A pause, then, “So, why do you do it?” she asked, nodding her head in the direction of the stolen texts.

  “Does it matter?”

  “Well, it shouldn’t, but it sort of does. You see, I know those collections you stole from. There were far more valuable relics in them.”

  “I seek certain information. I merely borrowed them. They will be returned when I leave.”

  “And the moon is made of cheese,” she said dryly.

  “They will, though you doona believe me.”