Hotter Than Hell

CHAPTER 1

HE WATCHED HER FROM THE SHADOWS, HIS BREATH speeding up, the blood pumping hard through his veins.

It had been years since anyone had set foot inside the walls of his refuge. Anyone other than juveniles up to no good, daring each other to cross the threshold of the eerie and reportedly haunted Castle MacKay.

But this one…this woman…was no adolescent bent on mischief. She was up to something.

He could tell by the way she glanced around, slowly and with great interest. And by the bags she was carrying, one thrown over her shoulder, the other clutched in her hand at knee level.

Long shafts of evening sunlight shone through the tall, thin windows, illuminating the specks of dust in the air and sending wavering slivers of blue and violet through the woman’s otherwise inky black hair.

She wore a loose pink top with some type of picture and writing on it, and a small golden cross that hung to just between her full, rounded breasts. Her legs were covered in denim, a thin black belt at her slim waist and sturdy brown hiking boots on her feet.

With a sigh, she let the duffle in her hand fall to the dirt floor, lowering the bag on her shoulder much more gently.

“This should be fun,” she muttered.

She twisted around, looking for a moment in his direction, and he jerked back, standing even tighter against the wall.

From the corner of his eye, he could still see her, but he didn’t think she’d seen him. If she had, she wouldn’t even now be walking back outside at a leisurely pace.

No, if she’d seen him, she would be running. And screaming in fear.

Only a few minutes after she’d disappeared through the castle’s main, if crumbling, entrance, she returned with a rolled-up sleeping bag, a worn leather satchel, and a large silver thermos.

His heart thrummed in his ears, pounding hard against his ribcage as she began spreading out the sleeping bag and he realized she meant to stay. Here. Overnight. In his secret lair.

Fists clenching at his sides, he watched her, torn between fury at having his private sanctuary invaded and acute interest at being so close to another human being—a woman—for the first time in a hundred years.

Stifling a yawn, Laura Tomescu finished spreading out her things and creating a space on the ground to both sleep and work. Though she wasn’t entirely sure where to begin, she was itching to get started on the undertaking that had brought her here in the first place, and to explore Castle MacKay, which had apparently been abandoned nearly a century ago.

From the dirt on the floor and the cobwebs coating the ceiling, she could believe it. She shuddered at the thought of what was likely crawling around in this shadowed room. But she knew in her bones that this would be where she’d find the answers to all of her questions, and so she was ready to face almost anything…even the creepy crawlies living in this abandoned keep.

But it was late, and she’d already had a long day of traveling and talking with townspeople from the village below. It seemed that everyone in this part of Scotland knew of the half-man, half-beast who was said to haunt the area.

Whether he truly lived in Castle MacKay, no one could say for sure. What they would say, depending on who she’d asked, was that he was either a saint or a monster. Some claimed that he butchered sheep or stole children from their beds. Others swore that he left gifts of food or clothing on their doorsteps, or had saved them from harm in one way or another.

Laura didn’t know what to believe, and she wasn’t sure it mattered. She was here because of her family’s part in the legend of Dougal MacKay…or perhaps she should say her family’s part in the curse.

And because of the dreams she’d been having about him for the past several years. Dreams that were growing stronger and more vivid with each passing day.

So she would bunk down here for the night, then wake up early to begin her exploration. As eager as she was to solve the mystery eating up such a large chunk of her life, she wasn’t quite as enthusiastic about poking around a dark, dingy, supposedly haunted castle by herself, with nothing to light her way but a flashlight.

Better to wait until morning when she could see, and maybe, if she was lucky, when there would be less chance of running into things that went bump in the night.

Kicking off her boots and jeans, she shook out the hem of her t-shirt until it fell to mid-thigh. As sleepwear went, it was sorely lacking, but it would do for a single night, alone on a dirt floor.

Shoving her feet into the opening of her sleeping bag, she scrunched down and made herself as comfortable as possible. She closed her eyes and yawned again, a faint trace of uneasiness skittering down her spine.

Not for the first time, she felt as though she was being watched, and if her dreams and research could be believed, she had a pretty good idea what—or rather, who—her observer might be. The good news was, she didn’t think it—or he—would hurt her.

But since she couldn’t be positive, that was one more reason to put off her search until tomorrow. Confrontations of this sort were better left for the bright light of day.

Screwing her eyes tightly shut, she gave a slight shiver and snuggled deeper beneath the folds of her sleeping bag. If she started thinking about him, and rats, and all the other creepy-crawly things that might be sneaking around this place, she’d never get any rest.

And the sooner she fell asleep, the sooner it would be morning, so she could wake up and get started on her quest for—literally—the man of her dreams.

She’d been asleep only a few minutes when the dream began. And she knew it was a dream, knew it was one of those dreams, even as she drifted through that delicate space between slumber and reality.

She was in Castle MacKay, curled up in her sleeping bag, but she wasn’t alone. It was no rat or spider keeping her company, either, but a man.

Dougal.

He stepped out of the shadows, all six-plus-feet of him, and walked toward her.

He moved slowly, making no sound as he crossed the earthen floor, giving her a chance to study him. He was bare-chested, wearing nothing more than a kilt and soft-soled, worn leather boots. His hair was black, tousled, and long enough to brush his broad, well-formed shoulders. His green eyes glowed, looking serpentine in the dark, with their thin, vertical pupils.

And his flesh…every inch of that strong, impressive chest that she could see…was covered with a beautiful, almost iridescent sort of tattoo. But not of any picture or form she could make out. Instead, it looked like layer after layer of lovely, colorful…scales.

That might have seemed odd to her, probably had in the beginning, but after so many dreams of this man, she was not only used to the unique markings, but found them attractive and erotic to the extreme.

Even as that thought flitted through her brain, he was upon her, kneeling down and flipping back the top fold of the sleeping bag. Heat radiated from every pore of his body as he stared down at her, taking in her pale pink t-shirt with its hibiscus flowers and hula girl, advertising Hawaii as “a great place to get leied.” The hem had ridden up around her hips, leaving her stark white, French-cut bikini panties in full view.

He murmured a single word, low and emphatic, but in a language she didn’t understand, had never heard before she’d begun having these dreams. And then he was loosening the wide belt at his waist, kicking off his calf-high boots, and letting the blue, black, and green fabric of his family tartan fall to the floor. A second later, he was stretched out full length on top of her.

His mouth covered hers, furnace hot, sending flickering flames down her throat and to her very center. He bit, licked, sucked, devoured her like a starving man at an all-you-can-eat buffet. The firm contours of his muscled chest and arms pressed in on her, his legs straddling her own, the rigid length of his arousal rubbing against the soft material at the apex of her thighs.

She had been wet long before he touched her. One glance at his rippling, masculine body towering over her, and she’d turned liquid with fiery lust. Her nipples were puckered and jutting beneath the cotton of her top as she writhed beneath him.

His lips and teeth burned her flesh, tugged at her lips, skimming her cheek, trailing down the line of her throat. He lifted up only long enough to grab the bottom of her shirt in his large, long-fingered hands and strip it off over her head. Then he lowered his head again and feasted at her breast.

Her back arched on a moan, her fingers threading through his black hair as his tongue circled her areola, the budded tip, and then drew her fully into his mouth.

“Yes, please.” She scratched at his back with her nails, lifting, reaching for more.

The heat of his long, seeking member brushing between her legs made her want him inside her now. Hard, hot, fast. She rotated her hips, trying to hurry him, trying to take him in, even before she was fully naked.

And—thank you, Jesus—he took the hint. His rough, callused fingers traced her waist, and then her legs, taking her underwear with them. Without ceremony, he shoved her legs apart, settled himself between them, and thrust home.

Laura gasped at the feel of him embedded so deeply and stretching her to accommodate his incredible size. She took a moment to concentrate on her breathing, and before she knew it, her body relaxed, going soft and loose around him.

He gave her only a moment to recover before lifting her legs over the crooks of his elbows, growling low in his throat, and beginning to pump.

Her back arched at the intensity of sensations racing through her blood. He was a demon, pounding into her like a jackhammer, harder, faster. And she responded, rising to meet his rapid movements, raking his back with her nails, emitting high-pitched keens of delight from the back of her throat that she’d never heard herself make before.

Almost without warning, the orgasm ripped over her, sharp and powerful. She screamed her pleasure, clutching at him more tightly as he continued to thrust frantically.

And then he stopped, going still above her as he came with a roar, spilling inside her.

As quickly as the dream had begun, it faded away, and she drifted more deeply into sleep. She was exhausted, and now—thanks to one of the most violent orgasms of her life—thoroughly sated.

Long after the woman had crawled under the blankets and gone to sleep, Dougal watched her. Watched her chest rise and fall with her deep, even breathing. Watched her mouth drift open and her eyelids flutter as she slipped further into slumber.

He wished that he could show himself, go to her and coax her slowly awake with passionate kisses and a slow caress. He imagined stripping her of blankets and that fitted shirt, devouring her as he hadn’t had the chance to devour a woman in a century or more.

When she moaned and rolled to her back, he straightened away from the wall, afraid she may have sensed his presence. He shouldn’t have to hide in his own castle, but nor could he risk discovery.

A moment later, it became obvious she was still asleep, but the moans continued. Perhaps she was dreaming. Of monsters and ghouls and other things that went bump in the night, he was sure. Any woman spending the night alone in an abandoned Scottish castle was likely to be skittish.

His brows crossed, though, when she threw off half of the thick red sleeping bag as he’d pictured himself doing, revealing her torso and the tops of her smooth, shapely legs. And then his brows arched, shooting high up on his forehead as one hand, with its softly painted nails, lifted to cup her own breast through the material of her form-fitting top. The other slid over her waist and under the small wisp of material that covered her private areas.

His erection, which had already been at half-mast simply from observing her for the past few hours, shot to full attention. In his mind, he pictured where he wanted her hands to go, the areas he wished his own hands could explore, and to his amazement, she seemed to follow his silent commands.

She continued to touch herself, making tiny mewling sounds of need, and arching up as though meeting a lover’s caress. The hand at her breast moved beneath the shirt to tease bare flesh. Her nipples hardened to swollen, pointing peaks, sending a lightning bolt of lust straight to his groin.

Clenching his teeth to keep from groaning aloud, he lifted his kilt and wrapped his hand firmly around his shaft. It had been a hundred years since he’d touched a woman, and though he wasn’t shy about relieving his own pent-up desires when the need grew too great, he hadn’t had the luxury of watching a woman in the throes of passion to help himself along for a hundred years, either.

He was hot and heavy, his erection pointing skyward with an arousal he hadn’t felt in recent—or extended—memory. Several feet away, the woman began to thrash, spreading her legs wider, driving her hand deeper into what he knew would be full, slick, pink folds. It took every ounce of his control not to stalk forward, remove her hand and replace it with his eager, raging erection.

What would it feel like to bury himself inside a woman again? To kiss and fondle and thrust his way to completion.

Of all the things he missed from his former life, he thought perhaps he missed fucking a willing lass most.

Her cries threatening to send him over the brink, he tightened his hold on himself, his fingers dancing and tugging on the rigid length. His own breathing grew ragged as he continued to watch the woman pleasuring herself, as his movements sped up and his legs turned weak with impending climax.

It was all he could do not to close his eyes in ecstasy, but he wanted to see her, wanted to watch the muscles in her thighs tighten, her back bow, her face contort as she reached her peak.

When she did, her shout echoed off the stone walls and through the keep, sending his blood past the boiling point. With it went the last of his control as he came in great, wracking spasms. If he’d ever had an orgasm such as that before in his misbegotten life, he certainly couldn’t recall it. It made him almost glad the woman had come to his castle, encroaching upon his invisible but private boundaries.

It even made a part of him wish she might stay a while.

CHAPTER 2

LAURA AWOKE BRIGHT AND EARLY, FEELING RELAXED, loose-limbed, and happy, as she always did after one of her erotic dreams about the mysterious Dougal MacKay. As she dressed and gathered her things, she found herself smiling for no particular reason and actually looking forward to the task ahead of exploring this intimidating, rundown keep.

Also typical of the mornings after having one of her bizarre dreams about a man she’d never met, she wondered how much of them might be true and how much was simply her imagination running wild.

Did Dougal MacKay really exist? According to family stories and journals left behind by her great-grandmother Cosmina, he had at one time, but that didn’t mean that the legends of his continued existence were true. He could have died years ago; many, many years ago, if his age at the time of her great-grandmother Cosmina’s curse was any indication. If the curse had worked, however, he would still be alive and may not have aged a day since the enthralling words were spoken.

She also wondered at the scales that covered his body in her dreams, and the breath that was hot as lava. Were those, too, a result of the hex her great-grandmother had thrust upon him, or merely the way her subconscious chose to picture a man who would have been cursed in such a way.

She didn’t know, but she prayed she would find out. After all, she hadn’t made the trip all the way from the United States to Scotland for nothing.

Outside, the day was glorious, with the sun shining and a gentle breeze ruffling the tall green grass surrounding the castle. To document her search, she’d brought along a number of notebooks, as well as her camera.

She snapped several pictures inside the first initial room of the keep, then walked around outside to do the same. The landscape really was beautiful, and she could understand why someone, hundreds of years ago, had decided to build their castle here, overlooking both the ocean and the valley below.

But the longer she lingered outdoors, and the more she found to photograph, the more she realized she was stalling. Because as much as she wanted to find Dougal MacKay and discover the facts of the legend and her dreams, the truth was, she was afraid. Afraid of what she would find…and afraid of finding nothing. Afraid of learning that the images that had haunted her for years now weren’t real…or that they were.

To further her procrastination, she considered going into town for breakfast, but then decided that was only avoiding the inevitable. She should get down to business and see what she could discover before she was faced with another long, lonely night inside this dreary castle.

Ignoring the tickle of anticipation that skated down her spine, she carried her camera back inside and gathered her other, more well-worn leather tote that contained some of the notes and clippings and research she’d gathered for this trek, as well as several cans of soda and the energy bars she’d brought along for situations just like this, when she might not have the time—or the inclination—to go into town for a bite to eat.

With her camera dangling in the crook of her elbow, she tossed the satchel strap over her shoulder and tore open the wrapper of one of the bars, biting into the yogurt-covered granola while she slowly made her way deeper into the keep. Chewing worked as a bit of a distraction, but still her heart pounded inside her chest, and the muscles of her diaphragm contracted as she struggled to breathe normally.

Nothing will hurt you. Nothing will hurt you, she told herself over and over. She was here for a reason, and even if she was very afraid monsters—at least the storybook kind—really did exist, she was determined to see this quest through to the end.

Sunlight shone in narrow, muted beams through the door and tall windows of the main room, but past that, the structure was still fairly dark and dank. That didn’t keep her from noticing a great number of cobwebs she hadn’t the night before, though.

Her booted feet scuffed through the dirt covering the stone floor as she tiptoed deeper into the structure. It was beautiful, in a way. She could picture it one or two hundred years ago—a fire blazing in the hearth, tapestries covering the walls, a long trestle table crowded with people eating roasted boar and mutton stew.

She lifted her camera to snap a picture here or there as she moved along, but found nothing of exceptional interest. With the exception of an occasional broken-down table or chair, any furniture had been removed long ago.

To her right, a wide stone staircase led to the second level, where she imagined bedchambers and maybe a solar had been located. She was just turning to move in that direction when a noise from the other side of the keep, deep in the heart of the castle, startled her.

She stood frozen, pulse kicking as she slowly turned her head toward where she thought the sound had come from. Something had rattled, like glasses clinking together, only louder.

It was probably just one of those rats she’d envisioned sharing her space last night. But if it wasn’t…well, she was looking for the castle’s rumored inhabitant, so following the noise might be the way to go, whether she wanted to or not.

Taking a deep breath, she slowly spun on one foot and tiptoed across the earthen floor. Far at the back of the keep, to the left of one of the hearths, was the shadow of a doorway she hadn’t noticed before. Stepping carefully and quietly, she entered the cavernous area, her hand tracing the rough stone of the wall to guide her path.

About six steps in, she hit a curved set of narrow stairs leading downwards. She’d left her flashlight behind, but her eyes adjusted to the light enough to keep from tripping and falling to her death.

At first there was pitch dark, but the closer she got to the bottom of the stairs, the lighter it became, a muted orange glow flickering at the base of the steps.

Her eyes narrowed as she considered how that was even possible. This had to be a basement or dungeon area, underground where there couldn’t be any windows. And even if there were, she would expect the light from outside to be whiter, more like daylight than candle glow.

Rounding the corner, she sucked in a breath, realizing it was candlelight. There was a single, thick taper stuffed into the neck of a stout wine bottle in the center of a small, round wooden table, burning strongly enough to illuminate the center of the room and cast shadows farther out.

It didn’t take long for her mind to shake off the sense of surprise she was feeling and make the logical conclusion that for a candle to be burning here, in the depths of the rundown, abandoned castle, there would have to be someone to light the candle.

She swallowed, concentrating on the soft, even rhythm of her breathing as she took in her surroundings. There was a build-up of melted wax running in thick rivulets down the sides of the bottle holding the candle, telling her it had been used for just that purpose many times before. She also noticed several more bottles strewn about…some empty, in a pile in the corner, others full or half-full, standing upright on the table or on the floor.

Along the far wall, there was a pallet—much like her own upstairs—made up of blankets and a single, ratty-looking pillow. Books and old food wrappers littered the floor.

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that someone was living here. Living here, in this old, abandoned keep, where there was no running water, no electricity, no anything but stone and dirt, spiders and vermin.

Until this moment, she didn’t think she’d truly believe she’d find the person she sought. She’d hoped. She’d told herself she would just to bolster her own spirits. But deep down, she wasn’t sure she’d actually expected to find the infamous Dougal MacKay.

Now, though…Someone was living here, exactly where all of her research had led her. And who else could it be but the man the villagers both feared and revered? The man her great-grandmother had cursed to a life of isolation.

A scuffling sound near the stairs had her spinning back around as a tall, dark figure stepped out of the shadows. He blocked the only exit, her only means of escape, and she was chagrined to realize that her brain was indeed urging her to run for her life.

She stayed where she was, though, even as her heart lurched and a scream worked its way involuntarily into her throat. She locked her lips, holding it back, and did the same with her knees, which had turned to rubber.

He loomed over her, making her feel like Jack after he’d climbed his beanstalk to confront the giant. He was covered from head to toe with some sort of cloak, the hood large enough to hide his face from view, and heat seemed to emanate from him in waves, the same as it did in her dreams.

Her fingers flexed at her sides and she shifted slightly, fighting the urge to lift her camera and immediately begin snapping pictures of the man who, until this moment, had been more legend to her than flesh-and-blood fact.

“Hi,” she said cautiously, licking her dry lips. And then, because she couldn’t think of a single other thing to say beyond what was bouncing around in her head, she blurted, “You’re Dougal MacKay, aren’t you?”

Even in the muted light of this underground room, she could sense his surprise and sudden wariness.

“It’s all right,” she continued when he seemed unwilling to answer the question. “I’m not here to hurt you, or expose you, or anything like that. My name is Laura Tomescu, and I believe you knew my great-grandmother. The woman who cursed you.”

CHAPTER 3

DOUGAL STARED AT THE WOMAN IN FRONT OF HIM. Everything about her screamed danger!, and it took every ounce of bravery in his bones not to turn and make his escape.

Running did not come naturally to him. He had been no coward during his mortal years. But after nearly a century of being reviled and hunted, he’d learned well when to flee and how to hide from those who would do him harm.

Last night, when this woman had first encroached upon his sanctuary, he’d thought her dangerous only in the way that all strangers could be dangerous to his safety. If discovered, they would be terrified of his appearance and perhaps cost him his last refuge.

Now, however, he knew that she was a threat to him in much more dire ways.

“Get out,” he ordered, the words scalding his throat as fury and alarm mingled in his gut.

“Excuse me?” Her dark brows rose, and instead of fear, her expression conveyed only a whisper of shocked annoyance.

“You don’t belong here.” He took a menacing step forward, letting the full brunt of his rage sweep forward in his words and the heat of his fiery breath. “Get out or face my wrath.”

If possible, her brows lifted even higher, but she stood her ground, not the least intimidated by either his size or his wrath. Crossing her arms beneath the full swell of her breasts, she cocked her head and tapped an impatient foot.

“If this is how you talked to my great-grandmother Cosmina, I can understand why she put a curse on you.”

Because Dougal was used to people quaking in fear in his presence, he was unsure how to respond to this slip of a woman who not only didn’t flee in horror, but had the nerve to return his ire with a sharp retort of her own.

Perhaps retreat was the best plan of action, after all, he thought, still somewhat taken aback by her behavior. With a huff, he turned for the stairs, intending to leave her here and find somewhere outside, deep in the woods, to hide until the wretched wench was gone. But just as his foot hit the first step, she reached out to grab his arm.

It wasn’t her attempt to stop him that did so, but the fact that she was touching him. No one had touched him in a hundred years. Not even those who had run him off from his own home with torches and pitchforks, screaming that he was demon spawn and cursing him back to the devil. And certainly no woman, of her own free will.

But this one…this one was touching him, not by accident, but on purpose.

A ripple of something he was afraid came too close to abject gratitude and relief shuddered through him and he locked his knees to keep from sinking to the ground. Turning slowly back to face her, he found her staring at him, full in the face, and her expression was not one of disgust or terror, but of awe.

“Don’t go,” she said softly. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

Perhaps not, but that didn’t make her words any less true, did it? Had he learned nothing in the hundred years since he’d been transformed into a monster?

“I don’t even know…” She paused, licked her lips, seemed to struggle to put voice to her thoughts. “I don’t even know if the stories I’ve heard are true. If what the legends say my family did to you are fact or fiction.”

“Fiction?” he snapped, anger once again pushing the boundaries of his self-control. Pulling back his hood, he threw his cloak to the ground. “Does this look to you like the work of an imaginary tale?”

He expected to see revulsion in her eyes, to hear the shrieks that had grown so familiar to his ears over the years. Instead, he saw a strange curiosity. Fascination, even.

Her gaze roamed over him, over every inch of exposed skin that even now flushed with the shame of his disfigurement. She looked her fill, taking in the reptilian slits of his eyes, the multi-colored patches marring his face, the rough scales that covered his hands and arms.

And then she reached out…reached out and touched him, flesh to flesh. He made a sound of protest and tried to shrug away, out of instinct and self-preservation. But she held fast, her grip tightening on his wrist, not the least aghast by the feel of his flawed skin.

He held himself rigid, still awaiting the moment when she would realize he was a fiend and she needed to run for her life, but as the seconds ticked by, eagerness began to pour through his blood like an elixir.

She was touching him, caressing him now, and she wasn’t afraid. How long had it been since he’d experienced such a gift? Too long. A century, at least, since his last clear memory of human contact.

He swallowed, every muscle of his body growing tense as her fingers continued their exploration. His mind spun back to the evening before, when he’d watched her writhing in pleasure and imagined her touching more than his arm, stroking him with lust more than mere inquisitiveness.

“It really was you,” she whispered, the words breathy and low as she lifted her head and met his gaze.

Her fingers continued to move in slow circles over the roughened flesh of his forearm, sending streaks of longing straight to his groin.

“Last night. Every night. It really was you in my dreams.”

Laura didn’t think she imagined that they both stopped breathing at the same time. The entire situation was incredible to her. He was incredible to her.

He was real. The man who had been plaguing her…and pleasuring her…in her dreams for so long was real, and solid, and standing right in front of her.

Despite his appearance and the cruel reaction he seemed to expect from her, he was beautiful. Not something to be hidden away or scorned, but to be admired and celebrated.

The same colorful tattoo of scales that marked his arms circled his neck and fell in patches over his face. And his eyes…his eyes were like nothing she’d ever seen before. A bright, glowing green with black, almost serpentine pupils at their centers.

A shiver ran down her spine, but not from fear, from delight.

It was him. The man she’d been dreaming of for what felt like forever. The man who had touched her, held her, done unspeakably satisfying things to her body night after night.

She’d nearly convinced herself that he was some strange, erotic figment of her untamed imagination, but even she hadn’t truly believed her subconscious could concoct someone with eyes and skin just like his.

He was even hot to the touch, the same as he’d been in the dream.

It was startling, amazing, and though he was standing directly in front of her, with her hands resting gently on his arms, she still had a hard time wrapping her mind around the fact that fantasy had just become reality, and she had finally found the man she’d been dreaming of, the one at the center of so many of the stories her family told and the legends passed down from generation to generation.

“You…dreamt about me?” he asked, no longer looking as though he was desperate to get away from her. His voice was low and deep, and tinged with the Scottish brogue she was just beginning to get used to.

“Last night,” she responded with a small nod. “So many nights. I thought I was going crazy, but then…I remembered the stories I was told as a little girl, of the man my great-grandmother cursed to live as a beast, and I started to wonder. I’ve been looking for you.”

Confiding that to anyone else would have made Laura feel like a fool. But with Dougal, she felt completely comfortable, as if she’d known him for years. And though they were only fantasies that came to her in the darkest hours of the night, she’d had him inside of her too many times to count. If that didn’t build a certain level of familiarity, she didn’t know what would.

His lips twisted into a snarl and the rough timbre of his voice grew even rougher. “Your grandmother did this to me?” he asked—the words part statement, part question, all accusation.

Beneath her fingers, his muscles tensed, growing rock hard and hot to the touch.

“I’m afraid so. Will you tell me why and how?”

She knew the stories, knew what her family said had happened, but she wanted to hear it from him, hear his opinion and his telling of the tale.

Momentarily releasing him, she moved to the small table in the center of the room and set down her camera and tote. Reaching into the bag, she pulled out a couple of energy bars and cans of soda.

“Here,” she said, holding one of each out to him like a peace offering. “We can sit and have a bite to eat while you tell me what happened, why my grandmother felt the need to do this to you.”

He made a sound low in his throat, but followed her when she moved to the far wall and sat amongst the blankets and rags that made up his sleeping pallet. Taking a spot beside her, close but not touching, he opened the bar she’d given him and began to chew, slowly and methodically.

The minutes ticked by while she did the same, throwing them into an eerie but relaxed silence. When she’d finished her bar and sipped half the soda, she shifted slightly in his direction, once again meeting his dark, intense gaze.

“Tell me,” she pressed when he showed no signs of speaking, once again letting the tips of her fingers slide over the scaled flesh of his forearm. “Please, I really do need to know.”

Dougal finished off the chunk of granola Laura had handed him and tossed the wrapper aside. His lips pursed as he considered how much to tell her.

She was a stranger, yet she claimed to be a descendant of the woman who had damned him to this unending life of hell on earth. He had spent the last hundred years alone, in hiding, with only himself for company, yet the pain of that isolation was quickly giving way to the desire to speak, to share, to take advantage of the opportunity to converse with another human being.

And if he understood her earlier remark correctly, at the same time he’d been watching her—watching her pleasure herself while he, in turn, pleasured himself—she’d been dreaming of him, as well.

She’d never seen him before, had certainly never seen his markings and disfigurement, yet her subconscious had apparently caused her to dream of him in a most erotic manner. Not once, but multiple times.

Like a match tip flaring to life, heat raced through his body, bringing his shaft to rock-hard attention. His blood boiled with want and need and memory, and a sense of possibility he hadn’t experienced in a century.

Swallowing hard, he drew his attention back to her face, even as his mind lingered on thoughts of yanking down her trousers and having his way with her, pinning her to the wall and taking her until every ounce of pent-up passion and desire poured out of him.

“I was young,” he began. “Young and arrogant and foolish. I was the firstborn son of the great Laird MacKay, and I thought I had the right.” How wrong he had been. But then, with age came wisdom, and though his physical body showed no signs of the span of his life, he certainly had the years to claim great insight.

The wild yearning humming in his veins slowed to a low simmer as he spoke, and he expected the second, less pleasant memory he was being forced to recall to begin a sour roil in his gut and burn his tongue like acid. But a hundred years had apparently dulled the pain and degradation of that moment, for he felt himself relating the story as though it was just that—a story, an unfortunate incident that had occurred to someone else.

“It was a harsh winter that year, with little food to be found, and when I discovered a band of gypsies…” he cocked his head and met her eye, “your ancestors, I presume…hunting on my family’s land, I tried to drive them off. One of the old women—your great-grandmother—was not impressed by my grandiose behavior or my threat to remove them bodily if they refused to leave of their own free will. She cursed me. Threw a bottle of some thick, amber liquid at my chest, which she claimed were dragon’s tears. It soaked immediately through my clothes and onto my skin, not burning, but tingling. I could feel it seeping into my pores, spreading through my body.

“That was when she began to chant. A language I couldn’t comprehend at first, followed by one that I could. She told me I would be forever hunted, trapped in a form between man and beast, the bodies of man and dragon becoming one until I learned the gifts of kindness and generosity, of putting others’ needs before my own.

“Almost immediately, I began to change. I grew hot, nearly unbearably so. My flesh, my blood…I could barely breathe from the heat and the pain, but when I did, those breaths hissed with smoke and sometimes fire. I could feel my eyes changing. To this,” he said, waving a hand in front of his face to encompass what he knew Laura saw when she looked at him.

“At some point, I lost consciousness. When I woke, the gypsies were gone, as though they’d never been there to begin with. I staggered home, thinking I’d imagined the whole thing, or perhaps that whatever the old crone had thrown at me had caused me to hallucinate. It wasn’t until I arrived back at the keep—not this one, but one built later, where my family resided—that I came to understand it was all too real. By then, the scales had broken out to cover most of my body. As soon as the villagers and my family saw me, they began to scream, and cast me out for the demon I had become.”

Story told, he fell silent, and for a moment, Laura remained so, too. Then her brow puckered and with censure clear in her tone, she said, “Your own family did that to you? Couldn’t they understand? Didn’t they at least want to know what had happened to you?”

He shook his head, once again stunned by her quick acceptance of both him and his accounting of past events, as well as the fact that she instantly jumped to the defense of the youth he’d once been.

“It was a different time. Things that today would be considered merely unfortunate were then thought to be the work of the devil. They ran me off with curses and prayers in the middle of the night. I came to this keep, which had been empty many years by then, to hide, and have been here ever since.”

“Still…”

Laura didn’t know what else to say after that, so she let her words trail off, her mind racing with the comparisons between her great-grandmother’s version of the incident with Dougal MacKay and what he had just told her.

She’d listened to Dougal’s deep, Scottish brogue with keen interest and more than a modicum of exhilaration, not doubting his claims for a second. Any other sane person might have, but she knew better. Though his tale had been flavored by his personal viewpoint, the details were too close to what she already knew of the legend not to believe and know that what she’d heard all of her life had really happened. That this man, cursed to life in the skin of a beast, really existed.

There was no denying that the markings on his body and the vertical slits of his eyes made him look like a dragon, which had been one of the hardest parts of her great-grandmother’s story to believe. But if that could be true, then everything else could be, too.

“Can I see?” she asked, slowly climbing to her feet and drawing him up with her. Her palms gently explored every inch of bare skin she could find.

She found him fascinating, and handsome beyond belief. It didn’t help, either, that she remembered every touch, every kiss, every moan and thrust from the many erotic dreams he’d starred in while she slept.

Dougal didn’t move, didn’t tell her she could or couldn’t look her fill, so she continued to explore, loosening the ties at the front of his shirt.

Everywhere she glanced, there were scales. The flickering, orange-ish glow of the candle still burning in the middle of the room actually accentuated the colors, making the pale greens, blues, pinks, lavenders, and yellows glitter and glow. It was like staring into a bowl of precious gems or standing directly before a disco ball.

Wanting to see it all, she slipped her hands beneath the bottom hem of his shirt and peeled it slowly upwards. He raised his arms without prompting, letting her lift it up and over his head.

She bit back a gasp at the sight of him. He was glorious, a true masterpiece. And it was only moderately due to the dragonlike markings lining his chest and abdomen, wrapping around his waist to his back, spreading down beneath the waistband of his pants.

They were beautiful and fascinating, no doubt, but his body would have been a work of art even without them. He was sculpted and firm, each muscle smooth and well defined. He was the epitome of manliness, every woman’s fantasy.

Her fantasy come to life.

Her hands trailed along his washboard abdomen, around his waist to his back, where the same rough texture of scales covered the skin there, as well. She let her fingertips drop lower, just inside the top of his pants.

His stomach muscles tightened as he inhaled sharply, and a thrill rolled through her own belly. She was being exceptionally bold, not at all like her usual self, but she simply didn’t care.

She knew what she wanted…Dougal, again, just like last night.

“Laura…” His voice was a harsh whisper of sound through clenched teeth.

His hand clamped on her wrist, keeping her from dipping any lower, but she flexed her fingers, tugging against his hold in an attempt to delve deeper beneath his waistband.

“Laura,” he growled again. “Don’t. You don’t know how long it’s been…how much I want…”

His words trailed off as excitement skated through her veins. If he’d been hiding from humanity for a hundred years, then it was a pretty good guess that he hadn’t had sex in that long, either. The thought of being the first woman he’d touched in a century turned her wet in an instant and made her ache.

He let her have her hand, and she immediately moved it to the clasp at the front of his pants.

“I do know,” she told him softly. “And I want, too.”

If she thought there would be any gentleness in a man who’d been celibate for a century, she was dead wrong. The minute she spoke and he realized she wouldn’t try to stop him, he caught her under the arms and backed her against the nearest wall.

She gave a yelp of surprise, her fingers slipping from the front of his trousers. But it didn’t matter. Holding her to the wall with his body, he reached between them to wrench open her own jeans and strip them down her legs.

In one swift motion, he had the pants, her underwear, and her boots completely off, leaving them in a pile on the ground. Then he moved back to his own zipper, shoving his pants down just enough to free his rigid erection.

She watched his every motion with a sense of awe and anticipation. Inside the cups of her bra, her nipples puckered painfully, and she licked her lips, eager for what was to come.

Rising out of a nest of tight black curls, his arousal was long and thick and covered with the same pattern of scales as the rest of his body. She didn’t think she’d ever seen a man this hard, this enflamed, with each ridge and vein of his straining erection standing out in stark relief.

She reached for him, wanting to feel that heat and sturdiness, but he slapped her hand away. With any other man, she might have taken exception to that and walked away, but not with him, not during this particular encounter.

His hands clamped on her ass, lifting her off her feet while he pried her legs apart with one knee. She knew what he wanted. She wanted it, too.

Wrapping her arms around his neck, she crawled up the back of his calves and thighs until she was at just the right height for his entry. Ankles locked behind his back, breasts rubbing his chest through the thin cotton of her top, she held on tight and bit her bottom lip as he plunged inside, filling her to the hilt.

He started to thrust—no preliminaries, no tenderness, just pounding into her again and again. Her breath was coming in pants, her nails raking his sweaty back and scraping at the rows of scales there.

She moaned his name, arching even closer, her inner muscles squeezing and milking him, begging him to come. Instead, he stopped. His chest was heaving, his breaths blowing in and out in huffs of exertion.

Her own breathing was none too steady. “What’s wrong?” she gasped out. “Why did you stop?”

He leaned forward, resting his brow on hers. “You made a noise. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

She tried to laugh, but it came out as nothing more than a strangled, oxygen-deprived wheeze. “You weren’t hurting me,” she told him without a hint of hesitation. Her fingers tunneled through his hair, clutching the back of his head as she gave a demanding little tug. “If you hurt me, I’ll yell ‘ouch,’ otherwise, keep doing what you were doing.”

One dark brow winged upwards. “You’re sure? You want me to…”

“Yes,” she stressed, tightening her grip on his hair. “Fuck me, please.”

It took a second for her words to sink in, but only a second. In the next instant, his eyes turned stormy and narrowed with erotic intent. Then his mouth swooped in to cover hers in a kiss so hot, it nearly singed her eyelashes.

His grip tightened on her butt and he was moving again, banging into her like he was drilling a hole through the stone wall at her back. She loved it, every pump, every flex, every grind. She thrust back, angling her hips and meeting him halfway.

Sliding his hands from the globes of her bottom, he let them skim her hips, her waist, up under the material of her fitted tee to her chest. His palms were rough and callused, heightening the sensations of his touch as he pushed her bra up and out of the way so he could cup her breasts.

He kneaded the soft mounds, pinching the nipples and scraping them with the side of his thumb and tip of his nail. The action sent rockets of ecstasy into every cell of her being. And where they were joined, each time he filled her, he hit her clitoris, making the sensations even stronger.

Pulling her mouth from his, she made sounds she’d never heard come from her own lips before, and she even thought she might have exhaled a puff of smoke, testament to the heat that pulsed through Dougal’s entire system.

The muscles of her throat tightened as she threw her head back, cracking her skull into the stones at her back. She barely felt the sting, focused instead on the excruciating pleasure building in her veins, in her belly, deep in the engorged tissues of her feminine channel.

Her nails dug into the meat of his shoulders as his thrusts gained even more speed. “Yes,” she groaned, spurring him on, wanting more, harder, deeper. Everything now, now, now.

He gripped her buttocks again, yanking her forward and back as he gritted words through his teeth in a language she didn’t understand. And then she broke apart, coming hard enough to shake her to the core and make her scream.

Beneath her, Dougal pounded into her twice more before stiffening with a shout of completion and pouring his essence into her. She felt every burst, every tremor, the walls of her sex rippling with a second orgasm as it tried to suck up every drop.

For long minutes, they stayed as they were, propped against the wall like two marble statues. Struggling for breath, lacking the strength or energy to move so much as an inch.

When Dougal finally recovered enough to lift his head from the crook of her shoulder, it was to center his glowing, serpentine gaze directly on her face.

“Thank you,” he whispered, and then he kissed her, a light, almost reverent brush of lips on lips.

CHAPTER 4

THEY ENDED UP COMPLETELY NAKED ON THE PILE of blankets in the corner through the rest of that day and into the next. Between bouts of incredible, combustible, mouthwatering sex, Dougal told Laura more about his life since being cursed…How he’d survived, how he’d remained hidden from the world for so long, how he’d tried in as many ways as he could think of to do selfless deeds and remove the magical enchantment her great-grandmother had forced upon him.

She found him fascinating. His struggle and subsistence; how intelligent he had to be to have remained invisible, yet find everything he needed, such as food and clothing.

And she told him a little of her life, of her family, of the dreams and compulsions that had brought her here to find him. To her amazement, he didn’t hold her great-grandmother’s actions against her or carry any animosity toward her family. He had, it seemed, learned his lesson about messing with gypsies.

At his request, she explained some of the details of the modern world, things he’d never had the opportunity to see or experience. She wanted to take him out and show him everything, introduce him to society and help him acclimate back into a normal existence. Not to mention find a way to help him remove her great-grandmother’s curse.

Though he held no grudge against her for her ancestor’s actions, she felt the guilt of it all the same. Yes, he’d been cruel to her people when they’d been desperate and starving, just trying to survive. But that had been more than a hundred years ago, and she thought that whatever his crime, he’d certainly paid enough of a price for it by now.

And if his version of events was accurate, they knew the key to removing the spell and returning him to his regular appearance—an act of selflessness, or becoming a more understanding, generous person. She wasn’t sure exactly how to achieve that, but certainly there were things they could try.

Dougal, however, didn’t seem nearly as interested in the idea of venturing out into the world as she’d hoped, and she supposed she understood why. The last time he’d revealed his markings to someone other than herself, he’d been threatened and ostracized.

She didn’t want to believe the same thing would happen to him in this day and age, but she couldn’t be certain. And it was possible that even if he weren’t reviled for his affliction, he might be enough of an oddity for scientists and the media to turn his life into a nightmare of flashbulbs and needle pricks.

So maybe he was right. Maybe it was better that he stay here, at least for now. They could discuss other options later.

At the moment, his attention was focused on more important things, anyway…like making love to her as frequently and creatively as possible.

She’d had her share of lovers in the past, and would have thought that a few of those encounters qualified as being quite risqué. Now she realized that for all her experiences, before meeting Dougal, she might as well have been a nun.

He did things to her body that made her eyes roll back in her head, took her to heights she hadn’t known existed, took her in ways she hadn’t thought possible.

After reviving enough from their energetic bout against the wall to go at it again, he’d turned her over onto her hands and knees and taken her from behind until she was panting for release. He’d sunk between her legs and consumed her like a man dying of thirst who’d finally found an oasis. And when she recovered, she was only too happy to return the favor.

As much as she’d enjoyed every touch of his hands and mouth and body, and every earth-shattering orgasm he’d wrung from her, she thought she enjoyed having him in her mouth even more. She liked his taste and smell, the unique texture of his long, hot arousal against her tongue. She liked leaning over him, being able to explore his body with her hands while she watched his face contort with pleasure.

Her hands smoothed over his flat abdomen, narrow hips, and muscled thighs, slipping between to toy with the soft, twin globes of his testicles. The extra caress drove him crazy, causing his hips to cant off the floor in an effort to get deeper, closer to the pleasure she was bringing him.

Hiding a grin, she licked the plum-shaped tip like a lollipop, around and around in one direction, then back around and around in the other. His moans grew lower and more frequent, the thrust of his pelvis more powerful. And she moved with him, rolling, riding, never letting her concentration waver until she’d brought him off as thoroughly and violently as possible.

Crawling back up the length of his amazing body, she smiled and kissed his cheek before nestling close to his side. He tucked his arm around her, using his other hand to brush a stray strand of hair away from her face.

“Mo gaol,” he murmured, pressing his lips to her forehead.

“What language is that?” she asked. The tips of her fingers drifted through the light sprinkling of hair covering his chest, circling his nipples and counting the lines of his rib cage while she rested her head on his shoulder. “You’ve used it before, but it’s not one I recognize. Is it Scottish?”

“Aye,” he answered in a low voice, his brogue slightly more pronounced than usual. “Scottish Gaelic. It’s what my family spoke most often when I was growing up.”

“And what does that mean—what you just said?”

He hesitated a moment, and she felt him tense beneath her. She was about to lift her head and look at him, to find out what the problem was, when he answered.

“My love,” he told her, tone rough with emotion. “Mo gaol means my love.”

A wide grin spread across her face while a blossom of happiness she’d never felt before unfurled in her chest. At any other time, with any other man, it might feel as though things were happening too fast. But here, now, she knew it was absolutely right. Thanks to the stories she’d heard about Dougal since childhood and the dreams she’d been having about him on a regular basis since adulthood, she felt as though she’d known him forever.

“Is that what I am?” she asked. “Your love?”

She held her breath, waiting for his reply, a thousand thoughts racing through her brain depending on his response.

“Yes,” he said finally in a near whisper, “I think perhaps you are.”

At that, she inhaled sharply, tipping her head back to meet his eyes. Her own felt suspiciously damp. “I think you are, too. Mo gaol.”

With a growl, he swooped in to capture her lips, kissing her with more than passion, more than desire…this kiss was filled with love.

A noise from the upper floor of the keep woke her some time later. From the second guttering candle on the small tabletop, she suspected hours had passed while she and Dougal had slept the sleep of the exhausted and thoroughly sated.

The sound came again, and she sat up, Dougal doing the same beside her as they both became aware that someone else was in the castle with them.

He rose, grabbing his clothes and quickly starting to dress. Scrambling across the dirt-covered floor, she found her own jeans and t-shirt and wiggled into them.

Dougal headed for the stairwell, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“Wait,” she said in a hushed whisper. “Let me go up and see who it is. I’ll try to get rid of them so you won’t be seen.”

He hesitated, and she felt the rigid muscles of his forearm twitch beneath her fingers. But then he nodded, and she started forward.

She jogged silently up the stairs, wanting to catch whoever was snooping around before they reached the back of the keep and discovered Dougal’s secret lair.

Near the front entrance of the castle, a man stood by her things, leaning on a gnarled walking stick as he surveyed her sleeping bag, camera bag, and the other assorted things she’d brought for her stay at Castle MacKay. He was older, with white hair and a full white beard. His worn and patched work pants were held up by a pair of red suspenders over a plaid flannel shirt.

The ball of dread that had been sitting so heavy in her stomach broke up and disappeared as she recognized him as one of the patrons of the small cafe in town where she’d stopped before making the rest of the trek to the keep. Mr. Abernethy, she thought was his name.

“Hello,” she said, stepping forward, her fingers buried casually in the back pockets of her jeans.

Mr. Abernethy’s head came up, and he smiled, backlit by the bright morning sunshine of another beautiful Scottish summer morning. As he turned, she noticed the walking stick wasn’t the only thing he was holding. He also had a long, dangerous-looking shotgun tucked under his other arm.

She swallowed hard, stopping in her tracks.

“Hi, there,” he said, his accent similar to Dougal’s. “I came to see how you were doing up here in this place all alone.”

“Oh, I’m fine,” she told him. She forced her lips to curve, her shoulders to relax in an “I’m not hiding anything” pose. “Taking a lot of pictures, making a lot of notes. It’s beautiful up here.”

“Good, good.”

When he started forward, still scanning the place with blatant curiosity, she quickly did the same, moving closer to the front of the keep to keep him from getting near the back. She had no doubt Dougal was standing at the top of the stairs, just on the other side of the opening that led to his underground room, and she wanted to keep Mr. Abernethy as far away from that spot as possible.

“They say this castle is haunted, did ye know that?”

Not haunted, she thought, occupied. There was a difference.

“Yes, so I’d heard,” she responded, doing her best to nudge him back outside. But he seemed happy right where he was, and didn’t move. “That’s part of the reason I wanted to visit.”

“Have you noticed anything, then? Anything…out of the ordinary?” he asked, his eyes moving all the time, scanning the surroundings.

Not unless he considered a man cursed to bear the traits of a mythical beast out of the ordinary.

“No, nothing. It’s a great place, but I haven’t seen or heard any signs of otherworldly inhabitation yet.” She gave a light chuckle, trying to lighten the mood and emphasize again that there was nothing going on here that he needed to be concerned about…on her behalf, or his own.

“Well…” He scratched his chin through the thick hair of his beard. “I guess I’ll be letting you get back to your work, then. If you need anything, just let us know.”

“I will,” she said, happy that he was finally leaving. “Thank you.”

Abernethy started to turn, but before he was all the way around, he stopped, his head swinging back to stare over her right shoulder with a keen, sharp gaze.

“What was that?” he asked, his voice going cautious and alert.

“What?” she repeated, turning in the direction of his gaze, even though she was pretty sure she knew exactly what he’d seen. “I don’t see anything.”

And she didn’t. But it was possible Dougal had peered around the corner just long enough for Abernethy to spot him. Dammit.

“There’s someone back there.” Abernethy took a single, dogged step forward, his boot crunching on the dirt of the floor.

“Mr. Abernethy, there’s no one there,” she told him firmly, moving directly into his path. “I’ve been here all day, exploring, taking pictures. If anyone else had come into the castle, I would know it. I knew you were here, didn’t I?”

But her assurances didn’t sway him one bit. His gaze never faltered from the dark doorway to the underground room.

“There’s someone there,” he said, lower this time, and with a distinct edge to his tone.

Bringing the barrel of his shotgun up and positioning it for easy firing, he stalked forward.

“No.” She threw herself in front of him, shuffling back as he advanced. “Mr. Abernethy, no one’s here, and I’d appreciate it if you would leave.”

He didn’t even acknowledge that she’d spoken, but continued as though he was hunting an elusive prey.

“Mr. Abernethy. Mr. Abernethy, please.”

She pushed at his chest, pressed up against him, and used her body weight to try to halt his advance. Finally, he stopped, but it was only to raise the shotgun to his shoulder and aim it at the darkness that concealed Dougal’s presence.

“Somebody’s back there.”

Her heart was racing, her stomach twisted in knots. But before she could deny his assertions again, Dougal stepped out from the doorway to tower at her back.

She stopped breathing, waiting to see what would happen, and she knew the exact moment Abernethy saw Dougal’s reptilian gaze and the colored scales marring his face and neck.

Abernethy’s eyes widened, his mouth going slack with fear. The barrel of the gun lifted slightly so that it bypassed her and pointed straight at Dougal’s heart.

“Get out of the way,” Abernethy ordered, both his voice and his hands shaking.

“No. Mr. Abernethy, it’s not what you think. Dougal belongs here. This is his castle.”

But her words were falling on deaf ears. She could see it on his face and in the twitch of his finger on the gun’s trigger.

The rest happened so fast, her brain could barely register it all.

Dougal took a step toward her, his hands brushing her arms.

Abernethy took his actions as a threat, raised the shotgun a fraction higher, and fired.

Laura screamed, a high, drawn-out, frantic “Noooooooooo!” and tried to throw herself in front of Dougal at the same time his hold on her arms tightened and he pushed her to the side, away from danger even as he walked directly into it.

It all happened in slow motion, only speeding up again after the boom of the shotgun blast finished echoing in her ears and through the stone walls of the keep.

Pushing herself up from the ground, she immediately turned to see what had happened to Dougal. She let out another shout when she saw him—lying on the ground, motionless, a splotch of bright red spreading sickeningly across his chest.

CHAPTER 5

“NO, NO, NO,” SHE CHANTED OVER AND OVER, tears streaming down her cheeks as she huddled over Dougal’s prone body. She tore her t-shirt off and used it to staunch the flow of blood seeping from the wound in his chest. With her free hand, she brushed the hair back from his face, trying not to panic at the cool and clammy feel of his skin.

“Don’t just stand there,” she snapped at Abernethy, who had gone as pale as his beard, “go for help. Call 9-1-1 and get an ambulance up here. Hurry.”

Apparently realizing what he’d done, and as worried as she was that Dougal would die, he spun on his heel and raced from the castle.

Turning back to Dougal, she leaned even harder on his wound.

“Please don’t die,” she begged, throat clogging with emotion. “Please, Dougal, don’t die. I don’t want to live without you. I think I’m in love with you, and now that I’ve found you, I can’t lose you. I’ll stay here with you, I don’t care, just please don’t die.”

His chest heaved with a ragged breath and he stirred, lashes fluttering as he fought to open his eyes. Lines of pain bracketed his mouth, his lips white with it.

“Oh, God.” She didn’t know if his regaining consciousness was good or bad, but his blood had already soaked through the material of her shirt, covering her hand in a warm, sticky layer of red.

“Hang on, Dougal. Help is coming, just hang on.”

Though it cost him, he raised a hand to clutch her arm. “I love you, too. I waited…a hundred years for human contact…but don’t regret…a single moment…because in the end, it brought you to me.”

His voice was little more than a hitching rasp, but she heard every word as clear as day. She sucked in a breath, struggling not to break down even as her vision clouded and her heart took an unsteady dip.

Before she could respond, tell him again that she loved him desperately and didn’t want him to die, his head rolled to the side and his body went slack.

“No. No, no, no.” Pressing on his chest, she scrambled to feel for a pulse, for any indication that he was still alive, growing more and more terrified as the seconds ticked by and she couldn’t find any signs of life. She slumped forward, her head resting on his unmoving chest as she sobbed out her overwhelming grief.

He couldn’t be gone. He just couldn’t.

Only moments ago, he’d been so vital and hot to the touch with his amazing life force. Now he was still and cool.

Shuddering with misery, she took a deep, stuttering breath only to let it out again in a wave of fresh tears.

She was ready to lie down beside him and die, too, when his lips suddenly parted to suck in great gulps of air. His eyes popped open and his chest heaved, bowing his body up and off the ground.

Laura jerked back, watching him writhe in agony, gasping for breath. Her eyes widened and her own heart nearly stopped beating as the scales on his face and neck began to lighten, the colors becoming paler, the bumpy texture becoming smoother. His pupils slowly rounded from slits to a more natural, human shape.

She was too stunned to say anything, too shocked to even move. She simply sat there, legs folded beneath her, arms hanging limply at her side, mesmerized by the transformation taking place in front of her.

Seconds later, the spasms seeming to wrack Dougal’s body stopped and he stilled again, his chest rising and falling slowly. Normally. His lashes fluttered as he blinked a few times, taking in his surroundings.

“Dougal?” She called his name softly, crawling forward to hover over him. Her fingers skimmed his face, coming to rest on the side of his throat where his pulse beat steady and strong. His skin was warmer than before, but not overly so, not burning the way it had when they’d made love.

Swallowing hard, she very carefully lifted the blood-soaked t-shirt she’d used to cover the bullet wound in his chest. The thought of what she might find underneath made her stomach clench, but though the area was red, the hole in his shirt jagged, there was no matching hole in his flesh. She reached out to touch him and was startled to find the spot totally intact.

“Oh, my God,” she murmured.

Pushing up on his elbows, he looked down, then probed the area himself.

“Your eyes…” she told him. They were still a gorgeous, glorious shade of green, but the slits were gone, leaving them as human and normal as any she’d ever seen. “Your scales…”

He raised an arm, studying the back of his hand where the colorful markings used to be fully visible. Then he lifted that hand to his neck and face, feeling for signs of the scaling he’d lived with for the last hundred years.

“They’re gone,” he breathed, awe and disbelief evident in his tone.

All she could do was nod, her eyes turning damp again at the realization that he was alive and well…better than well, if his new appearance was anything to go by.

“So is the bullet wound,” she said, voice shaky. “You’re alive.”

Pushing to his feet, he pulled her up with him. The bloody shirt fell to the ground and he quickly shrugged out of his own ruined garment, tossing it aside. His sculpted chest was smooth now, bare and clear, but no less attractive for its lack of iridescent scales.

“I guess throwing yourself in front of a panicked gunman to save my life counted as enough of a selfless act to lift the curse,” she told him with a watery laugh, crossing her arms beneath her breasts, covered only by her white bra, which was now smeared in places with Dougal’s blood. “We’re going to have some explaining to do when Mr. Abernethy gets back with help, though.”

“Let’s clean up a bit, find something else to wear, and figure out what we’ll tell them. My presence alone will make them wonder.”

He turned toward the darkened doorway that led to the underground room, but stopped when Laura made a small sound of dismay she couldn’t hold back.

“What is it?” he asked, cocking his head to look at her.

“Your back.” She stepped forward to run her fingers over the beautiful rainbow of color there, rising out of the waistband of his pants to the right of his spine and curving upwards toward his shoulder blades. It was a peculiar shape, almost like one of those twisting Chinese dragons itself, but absolutely stunning to behold, and looked almost as though he’d had it tattooed there on purpose.

He twisted his body, trying to catch a glimpse of the new markings, which had apparently been left behind as a reminder of the years he’d spent living under the gypsy woman’s curse. His brows crossed as he scowled, a low growl working its way up his throat.

“I like it,” she said, moving close enough to wrap her arms around his waist and hug him tight. “It reminds me of the dragon I fell in love with. And it will certainly be easier to explain than the rest when I take you home with me.”

His fingers feathered through the hair at her temples, tucking the jet-black strands behind her ears as he tipped her face up to his. “Take me home with you?” he asked, humor lacing his tone. “Like a stray cat?”

She shrugged one shoulder, holding his gaze even as her insides turned liquid with nerves. “Or like a lover. Or a husband.”

His eyes, still the most gorgeous she’d ever seen, flashed with heat and desire. “Husband,” he said, testing the word on his tongue. “I like the sound of that.”

He lowered his head to capture her mouth, his kiss burning through her as hotly as it had while he was still cursed and breathing fire.

“So do I,” she whispered when they came up for air. “So do I.”