CHAPTER SIX
TABBY KNEW SHE had misheard. “What did you just say?”
“I canna return.”
He was joking, wasn’t he?
“Ye look the way ye did when I took off Angel’s head.”
“Of course you can return!”
His expression hardened. “I dinna have the power to leap.”
Tabby choked in disbelief. “You’re a Master of Time…aren’t you?”
He folded his arms across his chest. “I havena taken my vows.”
Dread began. “Why not?”
He didn’t bother with an answer.
And it struck her then. Macleod was not your everyday mortal, but he wasn’t a Master—he hadn’t taken his vows.
Her spell had brought a very violent, very ruthless, very powerful medieval Highlander to her, one who could kill with a broad-sword or a blast of otherworldly power.
One who did not have much respect for life and, maybe, not much of a conscience.
A superpowered barbarian was standing there in her loft with her!
And he could not get back to his time—she was stuck with him.
Tabby studied his terribly beautiful blue eyes, set in an equally gorgeous but incredibly hard and definitely frightening face. Her gaze dropped. His Highland garb could not hide an equally beautiful, equally hard body. But that body posed a huge threat, because she was so impossibly aware of him.
He tilted up her chin. “Ye want me gone because ye fear being in my bed.”
“Let go,” she said uneasily. She did not want to provoke him in any way, and she did not want to continue the subject he seemed intent upon. She had no wish to be dragged off to his bed, and that was undoubtedly his MO. “How can this be happening?”
He did not release her. “If I wished to drag ye to my bed by yer hair, I would have already done so.”
Tabby grasped his wrist to protest, hardly reassured. As she did so, he clasped her waist with his other hand, and the sensation of holding him, the feel of him holding her, was shocking.
For one instant, she knew she’d gripped him this way before. In that second, she saw herself on her back, grasping his arms as he moved over her, smiling in triumph, filling her. She was climaxing; he was controlling her—and enjoying her rapture.
No, she thought, shocked. Tabby somehow wrenched away from him.
She was imagining their being lovers—it was not déjà vu.
She would never take this medieval man to bed!
He was the antithesis of her type—he was worse than Randall—more powerful, more controlling, more macho.
There wouldn’t be love, because there couldn’t be love.
She was too intellectual to get involved with him, which meant there wouldn’t be sex.
But so much heat sizzled between them that she saw the red-hot current in the air.
He slowly shook his head. “I think ye want to be dragged to bed—an’ I think ye want me to drag ye there.”
Tabby backed away, trembling. “You are so wrong. I like gentle men.”
He began to smile. “I dinna think so. But mayhap, ye believe so.”
He was wrong, but she wouldn’t argue. A long, heated moment passed. Tension was coursing through her body. This was untenable. But even as she decided that, she envisioned him as he’d been at the Met, bloody and burned, enraged and anguished.
He crossed his arms and stared coolly at her.
What was she going to do? He had insinuated that he wasn’t ready to go back. She prayed that was not because he wanted her favors first. Her spell had backfired—she’d brought him from the wrong time. If she tried to send him to his home, was there any chance she could succeed?
She suddenly imagined his winding up in the middle of a Regency ball, with the guests screaming and fleeing. Then she imagined him winding up fighting a lion bare-handed in the Roman Colosseum. She trembled, suddenly at her emotional limit.
The man who’d been in that fire was very different from the man standing before her.
Centuries separated them. The former might need her one day, although she was no longer certain if she was up to the task of helping him.
The man standing before her didn’t need her at all. But he was here because of her spell.
And he’d seen her for a century.
Tabby didn’t want to try to figure that one out—it was too scary.
“Why would you want to stay here?” she asked, her mouth so dry now she had to wet her lips.
“I wish to comprehend yer world. An’ I wish to go to the museum.”
Tabby was shocked.
“Ye’ll take me there,” he added flatly.
Tabby didn’t have to think about it to know that was a very bad idea. The police were looking for him, and even if she got him clothes, she was pretty certain he’d stand out like a sore thumb. And there was no way he should ever be told about his future.
“I saved ye,” he flashed. The pots and pans on the stove rattled. “I saved the children. Ye owe me that much.”
“Damn it,” Tabby whispered. “The police want you dead!”
“I dinna fear yer dark soldiers.” He gave her a dismissive look and walked away from her.
Tabby felt like collapsing. Instead, she sat down on a stool at the counter, breathing hard. He had saved her. He’d saved the children. She owed him. A gentleman wouldn’t expect anything in return, but he, of course, was not a gentleman.
And it was her spell that had brought them to this impasse.
He might very well be trapped in her time—with her—for longer than either of them wanted.
She was afraid to try to send him back, which meant he was staying with her for a while.
And that was the bottom line. So she was going to have to deal with that. With him.
“We need a truce,” she cried, standing.
He sighed. “Do ye have hot water an’ linen, mayhap?”
Tabby’s gaze shot to his right arm, where dried blood crusted the short sleeve of his tunic and the area on his arm above his bicep. “I don’t trust you. But I’m not powerful enough to send you back, and until we figure out what to do, we need an understanding.”
He smiled without amusement but didn’t speak.
“I want your word that you will leave me alone, that you will not try to seduce me or crawl into bed with me while I’m sleeping!”
He laughed. “Tabitha, before this night is through, you’ll be in my arms an’ verra pleased about it.”
She’d come up against a macho brick wall. “My answer is no.”
“But I dinna ask a question.”
Tabby wondered if this man was capable of rape. He’d beheaded Angel, maybe force was a habit of his, too. But the moment she had the thought, she knew he would never use force. She didn’t know how she knew, she just did.
He spoke quietly. “Barbarian that I may be, I have never forced a woman and I willna force ye. I dinna need to use force. Women beg to share my bed—all of them, all the time.”
Tabby grimaced at his conceit. But she had little doubt that most medieval women lined up outside his bedroom door.
She had the sudden, unhappy notion that he pleased every one of those women.
They wouldn’t be uptight like she was. She was the exception, but she decided not to say so.
She just hoped he was a man of his word, and oddly, she had the feeling that he was.
“Okay.” She exhaled loudly. “I feel better now.” That was a vast exaggeration.
She’d probably be on edge until he went back to Blayde.
“Help me with my wound.”
“You said you weren’t hurt.” She was really glad to be distracted now.
“I said I will live. One puny bullet canna kill me.” He flexed his right arm and winced.
Tabby couldn’t help but be concerned. She was going to have to get a grip on her composure.
He’d promised her he’d behave, and immortal or nearly so, he had a bullet in his arm.
“Sit down, Macleod, on the sofa. I’ll clean your wound for you.
” She went into the kitchen and added, “You’re probably hungry.
I’ll fix you something to eat, too.” Cooking always relaxed her, but she was pretty certain it would not relax her now.
Tabby began gathering up first-aid supplies, trying not to think.
It wasn’t easy, because she was so acutely aware of him and the fact that he could not get back to the thirteenth century, not on his own.
Her spell had really backfired. Maybe, one day, she and Sam would laugh about it, but it wasn’t funny now. What should she do with him?
And where was he going to sleep?
Maybe she should stash him in a hotel room.
Carrying a tray with bandages, soap and water and bacitracin, Tabby went back into the living area.
“I’m sorry.” She forced a smile. “We have gotten off to a bad start, and it’s my fault.
I’ve forgotten all my manners, but the circumstances have been extenuating. ”
He looked at her with skepticism.
Tabby sat down on the sofa, instinctively keeping an arm’s length between them. She wished she could trust him and stop being so nervous. “I am known for being polite. I’m teased about it. I never lose my cool or my temper!” She threw another bright smile his way.
He studied her.
She smiled again but really didn’t look at him, dipping a washcloth in warm water.
She reminded herself that she would do this for any human being.
The truth was, she didn’t like being this close to him.
His body was too big and it felt too dominant.
And in the back of her mind, that shocking vision was now engraved of the two of them in bed as lovers.
“Sometimes I get so tired of people saying how nice I am! I’m always being told that I am too polite, too sweet, too kind—and oh-so-elegant.” The cloth was soaking wet now. She held it, dripping water all over the sofa, finally looking up at his face.
He waved his blood-crusted arm at her. “French ladies are elegant,” he said. “In velvet an’ jewels. What garments do ye wear?”