him. “I saw a squirrel and there are birds galore. They love your flowers.”
Phelan’s smile grew. “I’ve got to check a few things around the place. Give a shout if you need me.”
She gave him a little wave and turned back to the view. Phelan put away the groceries and then went outside. He moved the Ducati to the shed on the other side of the house to keep it out of sight.
After checking the amount of firewood, he examined the plants. With cutters, he trimmed off the dead and wilted flowers in the front before pulling weeds. He walked around back once those were up to his standards.
Phelan loved sitting on his porch and looking over the loch, but the two chairs and small table situated in the middle of his rather large flower garden in the back ran a close second.
He found contentment in getting his hands in the soil and watching the plants grow. One of his favorite things was watching his garden come alive with color in the spring after the winter snows.
Phelan knelt next to one of the flower beds and began to pull weeds. The others would probably laugh if they saw him now, which is one reason he kept so much to himself.
Charon was the closest thing he had to a family, but Phelan didn’t share everything with him. It was just in the last few years that he even called anyone
For four centuries he had been his only friend and confidante. After leaving Cairn Toul and Deirdre’s clutches, Phelan had searched to discover who he was.
He wandered aimlessly while learning what society was and how he fit in. He had to learn about money, work, family, and relationships.
Phelan squeezed his eyes closed for a moment. Those first fifty years had been awful. He learned the hard way that he fit in nowhere.
When Isla freed him and she lay dying, she’d told him to seek out the MacLeods. Perhaps he should have, but he managed on his own. It had been painful, grim, and difficult most days, yet he’d gotten through.
He still didn’t know much about family and less about relationships of any sort. He’d bedded his first woman a year after leaving Cairn Toul.
For the next week, he’d learned everything he could from the woman. Her husband returned from sea, and Phelan moved on to the next woman, and then the next.
He versed himself in how to charm women, to seduce them until they were putty in his hands. While other men studied economics, law, or medicine, Phelan’s knowledge turned to carnal pleasures. There wasn’t anything he didn’t take the time to learn.
Women were his teachers and his studies. For the few hours he was theirs, they shared their bodies and pleasure. But no more.
Never more.
Phelan knew it was because he had a hard time relying on anyone. He’d never felt the need to spend more than one night with a woman, and then not even the entire night. Which is why he was having a difficult time wrapping his head around the fact he had brought Aisley to his home.
He pulled out a dead plant and tossed it aside. Next he checked the roots of the plant beside it and made sure it was covered adequately with soil.
Phelan wondered if Charon knew their friendship was something new to him. Most likely Charon did. It had been him, after all, who had told Phelan the story of how Warriors came to be and the role of the Druids.
For centuries, Phelan assumed all Druids were the same. He’d felt the difference in their magic, but to him, they were all evil creatures using their magic against everyone.
It wasn’t until those at MacLeod Castle took a last stand against Deirdre and her new accomplice, Declan Wallace, that Charon convinced Phelan to join in and help the others.
The centuries of peace had been good, but he was a Warrior. He was meant for battle, blood, and death. And it had felt damn good going into the fray.
His god, Zelfor, the god of torment, had been truly satisfied during those skirmishes. There was no getting away from what he was. He could pretend he was just a man, but the lust for death, the joy of using his claws to slice open an enemy felt too good.
He was a monster with a tightly leashed primeval god inside him. His skin might turn a metallic gold when he unleashed his god. With gold claws, gold eyes, and impressive fangs, there wasn’t anything tame about him.
Phelan looked down at his hand in the dark soil and saw the gold skin. He pulled his hand from the dirt and flicked off the remains from his claws.
“This is what I am,” he murmured.
Zelfor rumbled his agreement inside him.
Phelan ran his tongue over the fangs that sprouted in his mouth. Aisley said she knew he was a Warrior, but how would she react if she saw him now?
That made his chest clench in dread. She was like that frightened kitten he’d found—skittish and afraid of its own shadow.
One wrong move and Aisley would disappear again. Phelan would track her the rest of his life if he had to, but he didn’t want it to come to that.
He wanted her.
In his bed.
But more than that, he wanted her to need him.
CHAPTER
TWELVE
Aisley finished drying off. It had been months since she had the chance to soak in a tub without constant fear hounding her. She couldn’t sense magic, so Jason could have sneaked up on her at any time. At least with Phelan, he’d alert her to another Druid’s presence.
She turned to hang the towel up on the hook and paused to look at the magnificent flower garden. From her vantage point in the tub all she’d caught was a few glimpses of tall flowers, but this was a surprise.
It was probably a good thing she hadn’t seen it before she got in the tub, or she’d never have taken the bath. There was a memory she’d held onto of when she was six years old and her parents had taken her to Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh.
Aisley smiled, recalling how much she’d loved running up and down the paths, flowers flowing on either side of her. She had felt just like a princess that day.
Phelan’s flower garden rivaled the botanic garden. She couldn’t believe the array of flowers he had. From white to dark red, bright yellow, vibrant purple, and every color in between. It was like a rainbow had exploded and dripped the colors upon the flower petals. His caretakers must spend hours every day out here.
She was clasping her bra when movement in the garden caught her eye. That’s when she spotted Phelan on his knees tending the plants. His hands were quick and thorough, proving he obviously knew what he was doing.
This Aisley hadn’t expected. She hurried to dress and went into the kitchen to make some tea. The kitchen window over the sink looked out to the garden, and Aisley found herself watching Phelan instead of the flowers.
She poured two mugs of tea then headed outside. When she came to the steps leading into the backyard from the porch that wrapped around the sides of the house, she paused.
Phelan seemed more relaxed since they’d arrived. She’d seen him in battle, knew how fierce and savage he could be. But the man who was tending the flowers was a contradiction she didn’t know how to puzzle out.
His long dark locks were pulled back in a queue and tied with a leather string. She smiled. Phelan might live in modern times, and he might have experienced over five centuries of time, but he was still a medieval Highlander.
That appealed to her on a level that made her take a step back in caution. She thought she’d known the Warrior before her, when in fact she knew nothing other than his ability to fight with deadly accuracy.
Had he been the one to kill Mindy in the woods? She knew without a doubt she’d have met the same fate had she been the one to chase after the Warriors.
