Thank Brighid for his kilt. The thick fabric was all that had hidden his excitement from Kate’s view. The moment she’d turned into him, bumping against his chest, the smell of her, fresh and flowery, had wafted up toward his nose, making him yearn for her. It had been all he could do not to pull her against him right there and press his mouth to hers.

God, she was beautiful. He’d never doubted she would be pretty, but she was more stunning than he had imagined. She was shorter and more petite than her sister, and her hair was even more blonde than Laurel’s. Her hair had been pulled up messily into a knot on the top of her head, and he couldn’t help but wonder just how long it would drop down her back if he pulled it from its hold.

Her night clothes were unlike any he’d ever seen before. She wore breaches that went up between her thighs, and the thin, shiny fabric was so short he could see every last bit of her legs. And the top—ach, the top—it clung to her, emphasizing the fullness of her breasts. Her nipples had been hard beneath the fabric, as clear to him as his hardness would’ve been to her if not for the saving grace of his kilt.

It took a moment for him to collect himself after she closed the door separating them. As he unpinned his kilt and allowed it to drop to the floor, he couldn’t resist the urge to press his hand to himself to relieve the pressure of his wanting.

His breath shaky from both his sudden need of the woman he’d just met and his excitement from the impending shower, he stepped beneath the hot spray and groaned.

It felt so good. The pressure beat against his back; the heat melted the knots in his muscles. Dirt ran off him, discoloring the water dripping off his body.

He turned toward the spray, reveling in the feeling of it pounding against his trail-weathered cheeks. He sighed and closed his eyes. As images of Kate in her scandalous night clothes danced beneath his lids, he reached one hand down beneath the warm spray to remedy what she’d done to him.

---

After leaving Maddock to shower, once again, I couldn’t sleep. Visions of him running his soapy hands up and down his body, smiling as he enjoyed the sensation of spraying water for the first time, flooded my mind. It made me hot and horny, and I sincerely wanted nothing more than to join him in that shower.

It was a ridiculous thought, but I allowed myself to enjoy the fantasy guilt-free. Any straight woman under the age of ninety—possibly even past that—would’ve had the same thoughts after seeing that man bare chested.

When the sound of the shower stopped, I listened to him rummage around the bathroom, smiling as I pictured him exploring and oohing and aahing at all of the surprising things he’d never seen before.

I hit my head on the headboard when there was a sudden soft knock on the door between us.

I all but jumped from the bed as I rushed toward the door. When I reached it, I placed my mouth up against it so he could hear me.

“Do you need some more help?”

He opened the door quickly, and I almost fell into him again but recovered and righted myself as I stumbled away from him.

“No, lass. ’Tis only…” He paused and pointed toward the lamp on the nightstand. “I could see the light from beneath the door and I wondered if ye were still awake. I doona think I can sleep. If ye canna as well, I thought we could keep each other company.”

He shrugged inside the plush robe he was wrapped in as if he was slightly self-conscious that I would turn him away.

I smiled. “Sure. Come on in. You can tell me all about what my sister’s been up to since she arrived there. I’ve haven’t been able to talk to her nearly as much as I would like to.”

His shoulders relaxed as he stepped into the room. Mr. Crinkles stood up on the bed and watched him carefully. Maddock saw him right away, and when his first reaction was to smile at the sight of my beloved companion, I immediately liked him a little bit more.

“Is the creature a he or a she, lass?”

I moved to the bed to pick him up before carrying him over to Maddock so they could meet one another.

“A he. Maddock, meet Mr. Crinkles.” I looked down at Crink. “Mr. Crinkles, meet Maddock.”

Hesitantly, Maddock reached for him, and I handed him over. If Mr. Crinkles didn’t like him, he’d let it be known quickly. Luckily, Maddock was covered in terry cloth from his neck down to the mid-length of his calf so Mr. Crinkles couldn’t do too much damage if he decided to swat at him.

Crink melted into Maddock’s arms and began to purr much like he’d done with Morna.

“Did you spell him or something? He had the same reaction with the witch, Morna.”

Maddock smiled and rubbed the top of Mr. Crinkles’ head. “No, lass, I wouldna dare, but I’m not surprised that he’s taken to me. All animals are sensitive to magic, cats more so than many. He can sense it, and in some way feels connected to it.”

It didn’t surprise me to hear it. Mr. Crinkles had always seemed a little magical to me. He had, after all, saved my life that night so many months ago.

Content that my cat wasn’t going to scratch Maddock’s eyes out, I looked around the room for a place for us to settle in. It was a very large room, but aside from the bed, there was only one other place to sit—a large chair in the far corner of the room. It looked like it weighed about eight hundred pounds.

“Why don’t you bring him back over to the bed? We can sit there and visit.”

He raised his brows in surprise. “Ye are inviting me to yer bed, lass?”

I chuckled nervously—God how I wanted to—as I turned my back toward him and walked over to the bed. I crawled up onto the mattress, propped up the pillows against the headboard and sat down cross-legged on top of the covers.

“I’m inviting you to sit on top of my bed.”

He winked at me and set Mr. Crinkles down on the bed. “I jest, lass. Can I ask ye something?”

I shrugged. “Of course, but only if you sit down.”

He hesitated then sat down on the edge and leaned over to lay across the bed and rested his face into the palm of his hand.

“If I sit as ye are, ye might see enough of me to give ye nightmares.”

I laughed and swallowed the words that first came to my mind: Or wet dreams.

“Okay, what’s your question?”

“Why would ye want to leave here? Why would anyone want to leave this time? Ye have pleasures and wonders here I couldna dream of, and all I’ve truly seen is the shower.”

“When your need for a fresh start outweighs your need for convenience, it’s an easy decision to make.”

The honest confession slipped out before I could stop it, and I immediately tensed after spilling the words. They were the truth, but they made it clear I wasn’t happy here, and I never liked anyone to know that I wasn’t truly happy.

I could tell by Maddock’s guarded gaze that he’d noticed my face shift. Whether it was out of politeness or disinterest, he didn’t press me further, and for that, I was grateful.

“Now, let me ask you a question. Is he good enough for my sister? Laurel called me yesterday to tell me she and Raudrich were engaged.”

His brows pinched together in confusion. “She called ye?”

“It doesn’t matter. Is he?”

He shook his head without hesitation. “No, but he loves her verra much. And in fairness, I couldna love yer sister more if she were my own kin, so I doona know if I would ever think anyone was good enough for her.”

“I agree. No one is.”

“What of ye, Kate? Yer sister mentioned that ye’ve a love of yer own. Is he sleeping in another room, or did ye leave him behind for this new life of yers?”

Had it been any other circumstance, or perhaps with any other person, I would’ve squirmed away from the topic of Dillon. After spending so many hours spinning out about him earlier, he wasn’t really a topic I wanted to discuss. But he was, even if I didn’t want to admit it, still on my mind, and for some reason, none of my normal defense mechanisms rose up at Maddock’s question.

I couldn’t tell if it was something about his presence that calmed me or if I was just simply too exhausted to put up my usual defenses—perhaps I was jet lag drunk. Whatever it was, it felt nice to speak honestly without my words causing me some sort of physical or emotional pain, so I did so freely.

“I ended things with him a few weeks ago. He won’t be coming with us.”

His lips pulled to the side in a sympathetic expression as he spoke. “Ye must be grieving for him. ’Tis never easy to say goodbye to those we care for, even if we know ’tis right for us to do so.”

“Perhaps I should be grieving, but it was never right between us.”

“Did ye love him?”

I waited a moment before answering. I wanted to be sure that my first reaction was truly how I felt. “I thought I did. I do love him in the sense that I care about him. I would never want anything bad to happen to him. I hope he’s happy, but I don’t think that I was in love with him. I don’t miss him, and I don’t believe I ever shall.”

“Then you werena in love with him, lass.”

I nodded in agreement. “Right? I mean, I just believe it should be more intense between two people than it was with Dillon and me. I want that jolt to run through me every time I look at the person I’m with; I want to light up when I’m in a room and he glances my way; I want…” I paused to see him watching me closely, and warmth spread through my whole body. It was an intimate, knowing glance, and something silent passed between us that made me wonder if perhaps his reaction to me wasn’t so different from mine to him. “I just want more.”

He shook his head to relieve the intensity between us. “Ye deserve more, lass. Do ye mind…” He pointed to my missing right arm. “Does it pain ye to speak of the fire?”

Usually, it did, but I didn’t feel like it would be so painful to talk about it with him.

“Sometimes, but my therapist would tell me that speaking about it will only make it easier for me to move on.”

He said nothing, giving me plenty of time to talk through it at my own pace.

“It was a normal night. I worked a little later than usual. I was over at a client’s house finishing up a decorating job. I came home thrilled that the client had loved the new bathroom I’d designed for her, but I was also exhausted.

“I’ve always been a very heavy sleeper. I’m hard to wake, and when I’m tired, I sleep like the dead. Anyway, the fire started in the apartment above me. The old man that lived there left his stove on and something caught, and the entire building went up so quickly. The alarms sounded, and most people woke up and were able to evacuate, but I slept right through it.

“By the time Mr. Crinkles managed to wake me, the apartment was filled with smoke. We nearly made it out before part of the ceiling caved in and pinned us both to the ground. Debris flew into Mr. Crinkles’ eye causing him to lose it, and my arm got pinned beneath the ceiling. It’s a miracle that firefighters were able to pull us both out and that all we lost were an eye and an arm.”

He shook his head and his gaze looked sad. “I canna imagine how frightened ye were. How great the pain must have been.”

“In all honesty, I wasn’t frightened. It happened too quickly for me to be scared, and the pain was nothing then.” I shuddered thinking about the weeks and months of recovery afterward. “That came later. Luckily, I didn’t have too many burns on my body. That was the one blessing about the way things fell. The part of the building that landed on me and Crink didn’t actually catch on fire, so we were shielded from most of the flames.

“You asked before why anyone would want to leave here. Visiting with you has driven home my reason even more. My roots are too deep in Boston. Every place I go—my work, Laurel’s apartment building, all of my favorite restaurants—everyone knows me. Or at least they did know me. Now, they look at me as if I went somewhere in that fire. They don’t look at me the same because they know who I was before. I changed. I know that, but I didn’t die. I’m still here, but I’m not sure everyone else knows that. All you can see is who I am now, and that’s more refreshing than I know how to express. I’m ready to leave everything behind. I don’t think I ever could’ve really healed there.”

He leaned forward with his hand that wasn’t holding up his head and gave my knee a gentle squeeze. “I thought yer sister was the bravest lass I knew. I doona know if I can say that anymore.”

I laughed and rolled my eyes. “Brave is the very last thing I am. I’m scared of everything.”

“O’course ye are. We are all scared, but most of us allow that fear to keep us from doing things. Ye doona do that.”

We spent the rest of the night talking. We spoke of the other men on the Isle and of Laurel’s throwdown with Machara. We spoke of serious things and silly things. By the time the sun began to peek through the windows, I was certain I’d never been so happy to start a day on so little sleep.

“I think ye should go and speak to yer mother about what is troubling ye now, lass. Before the castle wakes and the day truly begins. The time just before ye sleep and just after ye wake hold a special sort of magic. People are more prone to honesty; to bearing their soul, if ye will.”

At some point in the night, we’d circled back around to the topic of Dillon, and I’d mentioned my worry over my mother’s insistence that I speak with him. He was right, I wanted to find out what was up.

Standing and stretching from hours of sitting there on the bed, I smiled at him. “You sound as if you know this from experience.”

He motioned between the two of us. “Look at us, lass. We hardly know one another and yet we met each other during that magical time of day I just mentioned, and we spent the whole night speaking to one another like old friends.”

Or lovers. I kept that thought to myself.

“You’re right. I’ll go talk to her now.”

---

Stepping out into the hallway, I could see that the light in Mom’s bedroom was already on as I’d suspected it would be. She enjoyed rising early.

It never occurred to me to knock before entering. I turned the knob and flung it open without a second thought.

The only way for me to make sense of my ridiculously delayed reaction is to chalk it up to shock. Every fiber in my being had known precisely what I would see when stepping inside my mother’s room. I would find her propped up in bed, reading glasses on and a book in her hands, enjoying the quiet minutes before everyone else was awake.

My brain simply didn’t know how to comprehend what I was seeing.

Mom was propped up in the bed, but she wore no reading glasses, and there wasn’t a book in sight. Instead, she was naked, and her breasts greeted me as I stared at her in confusion.

“Mom? Did you sleep nude?”

It should’ve been so obvious to me, but I just wasn’t getting it.

Her panicked voice was immediate. “Kate! You don’t just go around opening doors without knocking.”

I snorted, still astonishingly slow on the uptake. “Seriously? You’re one to talk. Do you even know how to knock? I mean…”

There was the briefest of shuffling noises, and for the first time since stepping inside the room, I glanced toward her bathroom.

David stood totally naked in the doorway, both palms spread wide to cover up his junk.

He and I must’ve stared at each other for a solid five seconds of horror. Eventually, as my mouth still hung wide open from shock, he spoke. “Good morning, Kate. I guess the cat’s out of the bag.”