The Dark Highlander

Page 92

There was dust in her hair, on her face and in her nose, she was wearing a dust-covered medieval gown in a castle that had no showers or indoor plumbing, and she couldn’t have been happier. Well, unless she’d been sent back in time to the Alexandrian Library right after Anthony had given Cleopatra the Pergamum Library, bringing the estimated total of volumes housed therein to nearly a million, if anything historians claimed was to be trusted.
“So, according to the journal you found, our ancestors rarely used this chamber, passing the knowledge of the place only from laird to eldest son?” Dageus was saying. His deep burr sent little shivers of sexual awareness through her.
“Aye,” Silvan replied. “I spent a bit of time paging through it yestreen. The most recent entry was made in eight hundred and seventy-two. ’Tis my guess the laird died unexpectedly and, like as not, quite young, and the chamber was forgotten.”
“All this history,” Dageus said, shaking his head. “All this lore, and we never even knew about it.”
“Aye. Had we, things might have been very different. Mayhap some of us would have made different choices.”
Chloe opened her eyes a slit. There’d been a strange, pointed note in Silvan’s voice when he’d made the last comment. She studied Dageus’s chiseled profile, bronzed by the flickering candlelight, wondering what he wasn’t telling her. She’d not forgotten about the curse or his unceasing searching of the old tomes. Though she’d had ample opportunity to ask him yesterday, she’d not wanted anything to mar the wonder of their day together.
Truth was, she didn’t want anything to mar the wonder of this day, either. She would zealously defend it from the merest hint of gloom. She’d never felt so bubbly, so elated, and she didn’t want it to end. She—who always pushed inquisitively, who never took “I don’t know” for an answer—abruptly had no desire to make even the smallest inquiry.
Tomorrow, she promised herself. I’ll ask him tomorrow.
For now, between suddenly finding herself in the past, experiencing passion with such an intense man, and discovering so many treasures, she had enough to contend with. She was having a hard time just keeping pace. Merely pondering the fact that she was in the sixteenth century was overwhelming enough.
As if he felt her gaze on him, Dageus turned his head suddenly and looked straight into her eyes.
His nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed, his gaze hot and possessive. “Da, Chloe needs a bath,” he said, without taking his gaze from hers. He caught his lower lip with his teeth and all the muscles in her lower body clenched. “Now.”
“I’m a bit dusty myself,” Silvan agreed after a brief, awkward pause. “I suspect we could all use a bit of a break and a bite to eat.”
Dageus rose, seeming larger than usual in the confines of the low-ceilinged chamber. He held out his hand. “Come, lass.”
Chloe went.
“Must we chain him like that?” Gwen asked, frowning.
“Aye, love,” Drustan replied. “He’ll kill himself before he’ll talk, if I’m fool enough to give him the opportunity.”
They stepped back, staring through the bars of the dungeon where a lean man with close-cropped brown hair was chained to the wall, his arms and legs outspread. He snarled at them through the bars, but the sound was muffled by his gag.
“And you have to gag him?”
“He was muttering something that sounded suspiciously like a chant before I did. Unless I’m questioning him, he stays gagged. Doona venture down here without me, lass.”
“It just seems so … barbaric, Drustan. What if he’s not even involved in this?”
Drustan collected the assortment of personal possessions he’d removed from the man’s pockets before restraining him. He’d divested him of two lethally sharp daggers, a cell phone, a length of cord, a large amount of cash, and a few pieces of hard candy. The man carried no wallet, no identification, no papers of any sort. He tucked the phone, cord, and candy in his pocket, palmed the blades and wrapped an arm around Gwen’s shoulders, guiding her away from the cell toward the stairs.
“He is. I caught him lurking outside the study doors. When he saw me, he looked as if he recognized me. Then he looked puzzled and finally shocked. I’m fair certain he thought I was Dageus and didn’t know Dageus had a twin. Further, Dageus told me that Chloe told him her assailant had a tattoo on his neck. Though Dageus had no idea what kind of tattoo, ’tis entirely too coincidental that our intruder also has a tattoo on his neck. Aye, he’s involved. And though he’s not talking, he will,” he vowed with grim determination.