“That’s not important right now.”
“Perhaps no one did try to kill you. There was an ungodly fire.”
“I was struck with what was intended to be a deathblow to the head, Shawna.”
“A rafter must have fallen?—”
He let out an expletive with such explosive fury that she fell silent.
“I swear to you, I know nothing about any attempt to murder you?—”
“Prove it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Keep your silence. Help me find the truth.”
“How?”
“For the time being, just watch and listen.”
“And if I don’t help you?”
“If you don’t…” he mused, leaning close, low against her. She was aware of the texture of his face, the tension in his features and throughout him. A strange heat riddled him now, like a low-burning fire that could at any time rage out of control. Could she have moved, she might well have been tempted to leap out the window to escape the portent of violence that seemed to burn and simmer within him. But he sat back upon his haunches again, atop her, yet easily keeping the pressure of his weight from her. “I promise you this, my lady, if you don’t keep quiet, I’ll make you very, very sorry, indeed. And aren’t you forgetting something?”
“What?”
“It seems you are in deep and deadly danger yourself, Shawna MacGinnis. There lies the corpse of a man by the loch who meant to do away with you. So again, I warn you, Shawna. Keep your silence.”
A recklessness suddenly ignited within her. She was tired of being threatened. “What will you do, David? Slay me? Beat me to death? Rape me?”
He arched a brow. Cool green eyes swept over her. He suddenly angled down against her, his face just inches away so she again felt the warmth of his breath and the tremendous power of his body. The warmth and pulse of his sex. He touched her face again, fingers sculpting her cheek, brushing her lips, moving over her throat until she scarcely dared to breathe. His fingers curled in a sensuous cradling motion around the mound of her breast, drawing a startled gasp from her lips, which he ignored. “Rape you?” His voice was a mere taunting whisper. “Hmm. Were it my design, lady, my choice, I’d have had you by now. And I don’t think it would have been rape. After all, my lady, I do believe, in the past, it was you who seduced me.”
She was startled when he suddenly rose. So startled she could not speak. He stood above her, his eyes meeting hers for a last time.
His eyes sweeping over her.
“Hmph.”
He reached toward the candle and pinched out the flame.
She could swear she blinked, and then he was gone.
Gone. Gone!
Just like that. He had left her. Just when she had become convinced that he would never do so that night, not until he had taken from her…her.
She leaped out of her bed and stood by it, not at all sure if she was completely relieved…or disappointed. He had just walked away. He’d threatened her and left. He didn’t want her anymore.
He had wanted her. Oh, aye, he’d wanted her.
As she hadn’t even really realized just how she had wanted him.
Once…
Now he was a ghost; a man risen from a grave he was convinced she’d managed to dig for him.
“Oh god!” she whispered aloud.