Read Online Lois Greiman by Bewitching the Highlander - Free Book Online Page A

on that sepulcher,” Toft warned, striding forward. “A curse that will strike you down if you bother its keeper. Now go. Go!” he ordered. “And do not disturb the dark Angel again.”
    Released from their trance, the boys scattered like chaff in a windstorm, racing between the markers and away.
    Silence fell on the night again. The old man turned…and gasped.
    A shadow stepped from shadow.
    “So that’s the way of it.” Keelan’s voice was quiet in the darkness.
    “Keelan, I did na ken ye were aboot.”
    “I am cursed.”
    “Nay, lad. ’Twas just the tale of a silly old man who but hopes to keep the lads from defiling the resting place of their elders.”
    For a moment Keelan almost allowed himself to believe, but he had been doing so for too long already, for many months now since the day he awoke, bewildered and alone. Toft had come to his aid, sheltered him, comforted him. Lied to him. “I have dreamed,” he said.
    The old man’s face looked broken. “Naught but dreams, brought on by the blow to yer pate most like.”
    “The blow. How did it happen?”
    “I canna say for certain. ’Twas most likely when yer boat turned and yer poor dear parents were lost. Na one can say for sure. Ye were still addled when I found ye, as ye well ken.”
    “Me mum.” He felt the pain in his soul. “She wore flowers in her hair.”
    The old man nodded slowly.
    “Yellow flowers, nestled in her sable curls.” His voice was singsong. “I thought her the most beautiful woman that lived.”
    “She was bonny beyond words.”
    “Aye,” Keelan said. “Aye, but she killed me.”
    Tears shone in the old man’s eyes.
    “And I her,” he added.
     
    “Angel.”
    Keelan awoke to the sound of Charity’s voice. She was seated on the edge of his mattress, eyes wide with worry.
    “Are you well?”
    “Nay,” he mumbled. His head throbbed. He felt parched and broken and disoriented. “I’ve been beat like a bleeding rug, and I hurt like the verra…” He remembered Chetfield suddenly and flinched inwardly. “What be ye doing in me chamber?”
    “I came down to see what I might do to makeyou more comfortable.”
    The room was dark but for one flickering flame. It tossed its light upon her seal-dark hair, shadowed her whisky eyes, caressed the mounded ivory skin above her bodice. The edges of her simple auburn gown melded with the shadows, making her seem disconnected to any earthly ties, alone in her perfect beauty.
    He shifted uncomfortably and pulled his gaze away, searching for reality. “Where am I?”
    She touched his forehead with gentle fingers, smoothing back his hair, before slipping her hand down his arm. “Surely you remember? You’re at Crevan House. Safe within its walls.”
    He glanced down, marveling at the euphoria of her touch, and found that his chest was bare, his lower extremities lost beneath the softness of a pearly blanket.
    “Am I naked?”
    She laughed. The sound was light and sweet. She took his hand in hers and caressed his scraped knuckles. “Tell me, Highlander, what brought you here to us?”
    Titillating sensations shivered up his arm. “Am I dreaming?”
    “Perhaps,” she said, and smiled.
    He nodded and rested his head back against the downy pillow. “Ye are beauty itself, lass.”
    Lifting his hand, she kissed his knuckles, watching him all the while. Desire quivered through him. “Why have you come here?” she asked again, and turning his hand over, kissed his palm.
    “Mary and Joseph,” he rasped, unnerved by the quivering sensations, “ye should visit me dreams more often.”
    She laughed. The sound was husky, shivering through his battered system like mulled wine. “Perhaps I would if you would answer my questions.”
    His eyes had fallen closed, but then, he was dreaming. It only seemed right. “I came for what is mine,” he said.
    “What?”
    He opened his eyes at the sharp tone, but she drew a breath, loosened her grip, smiled. Candlelight flickered across her