Shadow Highlander

EIGHTEEN

Reaghan came awake gradually, carefully. The pain in her head was gone, but her body was sore from being so tense. She rolled onto her back and smoothed away the still wet hair from the side of her face she had been sleeping on.

Her eyes took in the small cottage. The only thing that broke the drone of the rain was the fire. She craned her neck to find the floor littered with sleeping bodies. Curled up at her feet was Braden, whose sweet face looked simply adorable in sleep.

The fire made the cottage cozy despite the rain. Her gaze snagged on something in the shadows near the hearth. She turned over to see who it was.

The scrape of the blanket on her skin reminded her she was naked beneath the covers, just as Galen walked from the shadows, his cobalt eyes holding hers.

His boots made nary a sound as he stepped over the bodies until he stood beside the bed. He squatted down, his back to the fire.

Reaghan didn’t like that his face was hidden in shadows. She sensed something bothered him, something he wanted kept from her. And she feared she knew what it was. Her sickness, her weakness.

“How do you fare?” he whispered so as not to wake anyone.

Reaghan shrugged. “Better.”

“Is the pain gone?”

“Aye. Thank you for carrying me. I could have walked.”

Despite the shadows, she saw him frown. “There is nothing wrong with leaning on someone when you need them. I doona think it a failing that you were brought low by such agony, Reaghan.”

She knew he meant every word, but he was a Warrior. Pain he might feel, but his god healed him of anything. Galen had long forgotten what real pain felt like.

He said the right words, words she had wanted to hear, but she couldn’t help the kernel of doubt that had planted itself in her mind. She felt she was weak, too weak to be the woman Galen might want in his life.

“Are you hungry?” he asked. “Do you think you can eat?”

Reaghan nodded and held the blanket to her chest as she sat up.

“Stay here. I’ll return in a moment.”

Reaghan picked at the warn blanket and let her gaze wander the cottage. Was it just coincidence that Galen and Logan had stumbled upon the place? Or had one of them known of it?

It didn’t look as though it had been used in a while, so it could be one of theirs. The thought of Galen using the cottage as his home didn’t seem as farfetched as she might have thought.

Some bread, cheese, and cold meat from the night before were placed in front of her along with a skin of water. “Eat your fill,” Galen told her.

She looked longingly at the food. “I should save some for the morrow.”

“You should eat,” he ordered her. After a moment he rose and returned with something in his hand. “Your gown is nearly dry. Here is your chemise.”

Reaghan’s hand brushed Galen’s when she reached for her chemise. Heat flared inside her at the touch. He was so tall, so muscular, so warm, that all she wanted to do was lay her head on his shoulder and sleep in the safety of his arms.

His deep blue gaze seared her, made her recall his soft, demanding lips as he kissed her, his gentle caresses, and the feel of his hot, hard body as it glided over her, inside her.

Her lips parted as her heart pounded in her chest. He lifted an auburn ringlet to his nose. His eyes closed as he inhaled deeply. Chills raced over her skin as she watched him, mesmerized by his actions.

“Ah, Reaghan, how you tempt me.”

She knew all about temptation, especially when it came to Galen. Reaghan cleared her throat and looked away before she pulled him down for a kiss. Instead, she tugged on her chemise and began to eat.

“How long did I sleep?”

“A while,” he answered as he sat and faced her on the bed, careful not to disturb Braden.

“And the storm?”

Galen sighed and glanced at the closed shutters. “It doesna appear to be lessening as of yet.”

She tore off a piece of bread. “How did you know about this cottage?”

“I’ve used it off and on since finding it some time ago. Apparently so has someone else. It’s been at least a score of years since I’ve been here, yet the blankets were relatively new and the wood fresh.”

“So someone lives here?”

“I wouldna go that far. Whoever it is, they haven’t been here in at least a week if no’ longer.”

They sat in silence until she finished her meal. The food did make her feel stronger. Reaghan wiped her mouth with her fingers and took a drink of the water. “Will we leave in the morn regardless of the weather?”

“I doona know.” Galen’s brow furrowed and he shook his head. “We need no’ tarry long anywhere, but I fear taking a group of Druids, all female, I might add, out in this kind of storm.”

“You don’t think we can weather it?” Reaghan teased.

Galen’s smile was slow as it spread over his face. “I know you can. It’s the older ones I fret about. It’s summer, aye, but the wind coming off the mountains cuts right through a person, especially with wet clothing.”

Reaghan thought of Odara and Mairi. Then her gaze snagged on wee Braden. “Maybe we should wait then. I’m eager to reach the castle, but not in exchange for lives.”

His hand came up to cup her cheek. Reaghan let out a shaky breath and rubbed her face into his large palm. His eyes darkened, heat flaring in their depths. She burned for his touch, hungered for his mouth. With just one caress he scorched, he enthralled.

He captivated.

Galen’s thumb glided over her bottom lip and a moan tore from his throat, filled with torment and desire and longing.

Reaghan placed her hand over his heart and felt it hammering as rapidly as her own. She didn’t resist when his hand shifted to the back of her head and he pulled her against him. She was eager for his kiss, ready to taste him again, and excited to feel her blood sing with desire.

He whispered her name before his mouth slanted over hers, his beard scratching her face. His kiss was intoxicating, invigorating. Heat slammed into her as her hands glided over the soft material of his shirt and over the lean, hard sinew of his muscles.

The kiss was filled with potent desire and a hunger that made it urgent and soul-stealing. It left her gasping for breath and praying for more. She clung to Galen, her body his to do with as he wished, eager and wanting all he had to give.

He deepened the kiss, and she drowned in the desire that weighted down her body. It was too powerful to be denied, too commanding to try and control.

Her body throbbed, remembering his touch, his kisses. She knew any moment someone could wake and see them, but Reaghan didn’t care about anything or anyone other than Galen. She threw caution to the wind and sank into his kiss.

Deeper and deeper, he pulled her under the tide of heady desire and desperate longing. But Reaghan had never been more ready and thrilled to follow Galen down that path.

“Reaghan,” he murmured against her skin as he kissed across her jaw and then down her neck. “God’s teeth, I want you.”

She heard the desperation, the hunger, the yearning in his voice. It matched her own feelings, ones she was afraid to say aloud.

Reaghan opened her eyes and cupped Galen’s face between her hands. She smiled into his eyes. “Not half as much as I want you. I feared I would never know what it was to experience passion, to know what it was to have a man hold me. You’ve given me all that and more.”

The desire in Galen’s eyes dimmed, but did not disappear.

“Did I say something wrong?” she asked.

He shook his head and kissed her forehead, her nose, and then her mouth. “Never, Reaghan. I just worry about getting all of you to the castle. I wish we were there now. I’d take you to my chamber and make love to you for weeks.”

“Weeks,” she repeated with a laugh. “We’d have to eat sometime.”

“I’d gather us food to last days at a time.”

Her smile grew. “Won’t the MacLeods need you?”

“They’ll have to get by without me,” he said and winked. “When it comes to you, nothing else matters.”

She wanted to believe him. Desperately. But her blocked memories kept her from reaching out and grasping what Galen dangled before her. “I find it difficult to believe a handsome man such as yourself doesn’t have a woman.”

It had been said in jest, but the smile left his eyes and face. “Once, long ago, I dreamed of finding a wife, of having children and a simple life. I fought for my laird because he asked it of me, not for fame and fortune as others did. Had I known it would turn Deirdre’s gaze on me I wouldn’t have done it and then I’d never been cursed with a god.”

“And I wouldn’t have known you.” Reaghan shifted to her knees and laid her head on his chest. She inhaled his aroma of pine, content to stay just as she was the rest of the night.

After a moment his arms wrapped around her and he rested his chin atop her head. “You’re right. I wouldn’t have met you. A tragedy, that would have been.”

Galen meant every word. It would have been a misfortune. He had come to terms with what had happened to him, with what was inside him, but he found it almost worth it to have met Reaghan. Being unable to touch someone because of his power made him cherish each moment he was able to hold and kiss Reaghan.

She was special, and not just because of her powerful magic or because she was the artifact. She was special because of the way she touched his soul, the way she looked at him as if he could save the world.

He had known he was in trouble the first moment he laid eyes on her and felt the strong, undeniable attraction between them.

His body was still aroused, his cock still impatient to be inside her, from that frenzied kiss. Her kisses were like the sweetest nectar, her lips a beacon he had to taste.

She was responsive. Passionate. Fiery.

And he wanted to claim her as his own, to know she was his and his alone.

Galen didn’t know how long he sat there before he realized Reaghan was asleep. He had watched over her most of the night. He couldn’t let her go again, not when he needed the feel of her against him as desperately as he did.

It took some doing, but eventually he leaned against the headboard with her head on his chest and her arm slung over his abdomen.

He could imagine having her by his side every night as he climbed into bed. The more he thought of having her as his own, the more he worried about her memories being taken every ten years.

It was a small price to pay knowing she would be his. But for how long? He didn’t imagine her spell would last forever, but even if it did, would it be so terrible to woo her over again every ten years?

The answer was a resounding nay. He couldn’t lie and say part of it wasn’t that he couldn’t read her mind. It was only one of the things that made her so appealing, but there was so much more.

The way she held her head when she listened to someone. The way her eyes danced when she teased. The way her laugh hit him square in the chest. The way her hair cascaded around her in a tumble of curls. The way her eyes softened just before he kissed her. The way her body melted against his.

And there were a million other reasons. He didn’t know Reaghan’s past or her secrets, but he knew her as he’d never known another woman in all of his two hundred and fifty years.