All The Time You Need (25 page)

She was warm and soft to his touch. Salty to his tongue that traced the perfect outline of her mouth.

He’d meant only to comfort her. But the touch that had been intended to comfort had set his body on fire. His blood boiled with desire and tightened his embrace, deepening the kiss. He might have had some chance of stopping himself there, but her lips had parted as if to invite him to dip inside for a new taste. Her fingers tangled beneath his hair at the nape of his neck, gently pressing as if to invite him deeper. Thus encouraged, he was lost.

Her soft moan beneath him brought him back to himself, allowing him the strength to break the kiss and lift his head. Somehow he’d bent her over backward on the bench, and he lay on top of her. Her hair had come loose, and fanned around her like a pillow of silk. And her eyes! When they opened to meet his, they shone with a faraway, dreamy expression that very nearly had him kissing her again.

But no. He couldn’t take advantage of her. Not like this.

“Why do I feel like this every time you touch me?” she whispered, her expression reflecting the same desperation he felt.

Why? He couldn’t begin to answer. No more than he could say why he felt the way he did every time they touched. He only knew that he did and that this feeling that enshrouded him had to mean something.

He wanted to hold her. To comfort her. To be held and comforted by her. This woman in his arms was a woman he could imagine himself taking as his wife.

A woman pledged to be another man’s wife.

Two men, if he were to allow himself to believe her outrageous story. And, strangely enough, with her in his arms like this, he found himself believing. And with that belief, a new fear clawed at his chest. If the Fae had sent her here, they could just as easily take her away. Just as they had done to his Grandda Aiden.

The moments that passed as they stared at one another must have been enough for her to remember where she was. And why she had come here.

Tears began to trickle from the corners of her eyes, slowly this time, as if the hot, white heat of her sorrow had passed her by and she was left with only the dregs of heart-twisting desperation.

“This place, this arbor, and the stone heart that should be here, they are the key to my finding my way back home. Please don’t let them take me away from Dunellen. If that happens, I’ll be lost in this time forever.”

“Would that really be so horrible?”

He had to ask. After the moments that had just passed, to his way of thinking, nothing could be worse than having her leave his world.

“Staying here and marrying that lying impostor who showed up here today?” Annie nodded and sighed deeply, wiping her hands over her eyes and down her cheeks. “Yeah, I think that would really be about as horrible as it could get.”

There was one other question, one other thing, nagging at the back of his mind that he had to know.

“Do you love the Peter you left behind in your time?”

Asking it was tantamount to admitting he accepted her story. He didn’t care. He needed her answer.

Another sigh was her first response as she closed her eyes, seeming to search for the words she wanted to use.

“No. He’s a nice guy, but no, I don’t love him. I had to come all the way to Scotland to admit that, even to myself. I agreed to marry him, but I don’t love him. I came on this trip to find a way to escape marrying him.” She blew out a puff of air, shaking her head. “I escaped, all right. Classic case of out of the frying pan and into the fire.”

Alex forced himself off her, sitting up straight and assisting her up as well. “What do you mean?”

Annie withdrew the hand that had remained on his shoulder and laced her fingers tightly together, her hands in her lap. “After all that’s happened, I realized that there is something worse than agreeing to marry someone you don’t really love. It’s being forced into a marriage to someone you not only don’t love, but who you don’t even know.”

“Like the Peter Gordon waiting back at Dunellen?”

“Exactly.” She took another slow, deep breath, and her shoulders straightened as if she’d made some important decision. “I won’t marry him, Alex. Even if I can’t find my way home. I don’t know what I will do, but I do know I won’t marry him. I agreed to a marriage back home to a man I didn’t love. I won’t do that here. Never again.”

The shaky intake of breath after her statement belied her attempt at bravery.

“Doona fash yerself over the matter, Annie.” Alex tightened the arm around her shoulders, winding a strand of her hair around one finger. “I’ll no’ allow it to come to pass. I willna give him leave to take you away from Dunellen. You have my word upon this.”

She nodded slowly, holding her silence for a long moment before looking up at him again. “I guess my reaction to all this must be hard for someone like you to understand.”

He studied her face, not understanding her comment. “Why would you think that?”

“Because you’re always so sure of yourself. So sure of everything you do.”

Him? Sure of himself? More than anything, those words demonstrated her
naiveté
.

“As much as I hate to disillusion you, yer wrong in that assessment. I spend my fair share of time questioning everything I do.”

He could hardly believe he was confessing his weaknesses to her. And yet it felt natural to do so. Easy.

“I find that hard to believe, Alex. I’ve watched you in the great hall, meeting with your people. You were born to be the laird of your clan. Your father certainly has confidence in you.”

“My father?” He struggled to quell the laughter bubbling up in his throat. “My father was the one born to be laird. I’m no’ even half the man my father is. I always claimed I dinna want the responsibility, but the truth is I always doubted my ability to do the job. I told myself that I shunned the responsibilities of becoming laird because they were too small for me, too confining. Now that I’m here, faced with the tasks my father shouldered for so many years, I realize that it’s me what’s too small.”

There. He’d said it aloud, and it felt as if he’d removed the weight of a hundred men from his chest, even though the confession meant that Annie would know he wasn’t what she’d thought him to be.

She shook her head and lifted a hand to his cheek. “You just can’t see yourself the way others do, can you? You were born to be laird every bit as much as your father. I have confidence in your abilities to lead your people. So do they. They trust you as I trust you.”

He may not be the laird his father was, but after hearing her say that, he would move heaven and earth to ensure that he didn’t let her down.

“Yer safe to place yer trust in me,” he said, folding her once again in his arms, holding her close.

He hadn’t intended more than to reassure her, but the moment escaped him and their lips met once again. As the kiss deepened, his body burned for her like a fire in an August field. He wanted her. Not just physically, though he’d be as great a liar as Peter Gordon if he dared deny that desire.

What he felt for her in this moment was more than that. He wanted her by his side—in the great hall as well as in his bedchamber. Body and soul. He’d never truly understood those words before now.

Once more he forced his lips from hers and stood to extend a hand to help her to her feet. “The hour is late and we should return to the safety of Dunellen’s walls.”

Their trip back passed in silence, her hand tightly clasped inside his.

For his part, he was grateful for the silence. He couldn’t have carried on a conversation for all the noise inside his head.

He could bare his darkest secrets to this woman, save one. His feelings for her were still too tender, too new, too foreign for even him to understand. Those he could not yet share with anyone.

In spite of the shortcomings he’d confessed, Annie still trusted him. Trusted him to keep her safe. Trusted him to protect her from the man she’d called a lying impostor. Trusted him to keep her here at Dunellen.

He’d meant everything he said to her. He’d given his word and he’d never gone back on his word. He would do as he’d promised. He would stop her from marrying Peter Gordon. Somehow.

Though how he would prevent such a thing without starting an all-out war between the clans, he had no idea.

Chapter 17

A knock on the heavy wooden door to the chamber he’d been assigned had Peter on his feet. Perhaps this was the news he’d been waiting for over the past two days.

He flung open the door to find the one called Finn standing there.

“Our laird sent me to fetch you to the bailey. A mounted party approaches the gates. We assume it is your father. Alexander thought you would want to be there to greet him upon his arrival.”

At last!

Peter pushed past the warrior sent to escort him. Him and the filthy beast that was always at his side. A creature such as that would never be allowed inside the halls of the Gordon keep. Another clue as to the low character of the MacKillican louts. No wonder they were so easy to fool.

All such thought fled his mind as he hurried out of the keep and toward the gates. This was the moment he’d waited for, his moment of triumph. The moment he’d be able to finally show his father that he was the son with the intellect and bravery to lead their clan in the old man’s stead. He was the son who should be chosen to succeed his father as leader of their clan.

He held his ground, forcing himself not to twitch with excitement as the grinding of metal on stone signaled the portcullis slowly sliding open. A moment later, when the horsemen came into view, the excitement he’d felt died a quiet death.

Instead of his father, his older brother John rode at the head of the Gordon contingent.

The young laird of the MacKillicans, Alexander, greeted John and the others as they dismounted, giving Peter a much-needed moment to collect his wits. He wasn’t sure what fresh torment his father had decided upon for him, but whatever it was, he was ready for it. He strode forward and took his brother’s arm, urging him away from the others.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, his voice sounding much more petulant than he’d intended.

“Interesting question, little brother,” John responded, his eyes hard and emotionless. “That’s exactly the same question Father sent me to ask of you after yer man arrived with that ridiculous story about a betrothal of some sort. What’s going on here?”

A moment of panic clutched at Peter’s throat, but only a moment. He had no need to fear his brother’s disapproval. The plan he followed was perhaps the best he’d ever hit upon in the whole of his life.

“Just you wait, John. You’ll see. You and Father both. I’ve come up with an idea that canna fail this time.”

Thanks to his having intercepted the rider the MacKillican had sent before he’d reached the Gordon laird.

“What’s all this about Father having arranged a betrothal to a Shaw? He knows of no such arrangement.”

“But that’s the beauty of all of this,” Peter said, unable to keep the sheer excitement out of his voice. “We know there’s no such arrangement. But the angels themselves dropped this situation into my lap. Before this is over, we’ll add half the MacKillican lands to our own. I’ll wed the Shaw woman and the MacKillican will be forced to provide her dowry or face the wrath of the Gordon might—”

“We’ve no desire for a war between the clans,” John interrupted. “Father has made that absolutely clear. We’ve neither the men nor the silver to spare, no’ with a larger battle looming large in our future.”

How could his father ever have chosen John over him? John, whose shortsightedness could well cost them all that he had worked so hard to achieve.

“But we’ll no’ actually have to go to war with the MacKillican, you fool. We need only to suggest the possibility. Their laird is young and untested. He’ll give us what we want without the need for a single battle. All you have to do is to keep yer teeth together and no’ go about unraveling the story I’ve worked to build here. Can you manage that one little thing for me, do you think?”

The next few moments passed in heavy silence as John simply stared at him, that all-too-familiar expression of doubt and disappointment clouding his brother’s eyes.

“Aye, I can manage that, little brother. I’ll no’ interfere with what yer doing here.” John turned from him to join his men who waited with the MacKillican laird, but stopped after only a few steps to face him again. “But be warned, Peter. I’ll no’ allow our clan to be dragged into any conflict. That’s word straight from our father. If you attempt to go there, I’ll cut you off at the knee as if we shared not a single drop of blood. You’ve no’ the authority to speak on behalf of the clan, and I willna hesitate to say as much if you go too far. Do you understand?”

Peter returned his brother’s glare, furious at such demeaning treatment.

“Answer me,” John demanded. “I’d hear the words from yer own lips. Do you understand?”

“I do,” Peter answered through clenched teeth, bile building in the back of his throat.

Always they treated him like some useless burden upon the family. Well, not after this they wouldn’t. He’d show them. He’d show them all. And after he returned to the Gordon stronghold with ownership of half the MacKillican lands to present to his father, he’d see to it that John was the one on the cowering end of the stick.