Maybe.
A breath of air whispered behind her, and something feather-touched her arm. She whirled, claws out, and raked her nails across flesh. Power gathered, using her, ready to kill again.
Brian stood there, just stood there patiently waiting for her claws and Power to tear him to shreds. Blood welled up across his cheek, flowing just beneath one blue eye and beside that broad nose his genes had stolen from a Neandertal.
The rage flowed out of her. She sagged against the cold stone wall, as limp as if the Power had dissolved her bones. "Oh, God! I'm sorry . . ."
The bleeding stopped, even as she forced herself to stand again. Fresh skin spread across his gouged flesh, and the blood dried and flaked away. Magic.
He shook his head. "My fault. Bloody hell, I should know better than to surprise you. Used to have to wake the troopers by nudging them with a boot and stepping back."
"But Dougal's dead. I'm not crazy anymore."
"Dougal may be dead. But the rest that happened to you, when your were a child . . . Buddy Johnson is alive and well and living in the back of your skull. Your . . . rapist has been there for eighteen years. It'll take more than a few days to kick him out."
Maureen closed her eyes. Goddamn fucking Buddy Johnson.
She started to shake all over. "You didn't even defend yourself. Twice my size, trained fighter, you didn't even try to duck, goddamn it! I could have killed you!"
He reached for her, tentative, and stopped when she flinched away. "If I'd blocked you, grabbed you, then you would have tried to kill me. I'd just as soon not find out how. You had to see that I was harmless."
"You're too damned quiet."
"Kept me alive a score of times. I'll wear a bloody jester's dingle hat, all points and bells and motley, if that'll help."
Maureen stepped back out of the window into the tapestry-draped room of Dougal's castle. Her castle, what was left of it. The corner towers and most of the central keep had survived the fire. So had the kitchens and the cellars and the outbuildings within the walls. Plenty to live in.
Enough for her and Brian, enough for Jo and David if they'd wanted to stay, enough for Dougal's former slaves to live in safety in this fucking land that said that human blood meant the same thing as black skin on an Old South plantation. Even the fairest legends could turn ugly when you started poking around under the rocks.
She grabbed a bottle at random from the sideboard, poured a double shot of booze, and tossed it back. The fire burned down her throat and out into her veins, calming the shakes.
"That stuff will kill you if you don't watch out."
She glared at Brian. "Fuck off. Sometimes I need a drink."
He winced away from her eyes and shook his head. "If you don't want to quit, nobody can make you. All I can say is, a bottle of rum used to make the nightmares worse."
She knew Brian had his own share of horrors, earned in places like the Malay jungles and Aden and the Falklands. He'd killed and bled, come within a hair of dying and held good friends as they died. Sometimes that shared experience helped.
Maureen poured herself another double. Whisky, she noticed, Scotch. Glenraven Special Reserve, smooth and smoky like the nectar of the gods, she'd never even heard of it before. Label looked like it was printed on gold leaf. Bottle probably cost twice what she'd used to earn in a week. Not that Dougal would have paid for it. His kind took what they wanted, like he'd taken her.
Brian didn't touch her unless she wanted to be touched. Problem was, no matter how good it felt afterwards, she had to . . . become someone else, in order to let a man touch her. Even a man she loved. Buddy Johnson could burn in hell forever. She just might send him there, if she got the chance.
"What's the name of that place, the window I was using?"
Brian's right eyebrow lifted at the change of subject, but he looked relieved. "Balistraria. That little part that sticks out from the wall is called a bartizan. Not all that common for a Scots or Irish castle, but it helps you shoot at anyone who gets close in to the wall. Dougal messed with the design a little when he rebuilt the place. That, and the indoor plumbing and the photocell panels on the roof."
"Rebuilt?"
"Yeah. Everyone has an image in the Summer Country. Everyone's an actor in his own play -- Fiona with her cloak of shadow and her witch's cottage, Dougal the Highland laird with his hawks and slaves and hunting beasts. He wanted something more impressive than a crumbling stone tower and a ring of thatched-roof huts. This place was designed to stand against King Edward and those mucking big trebuchets."
"Fat lot of good it did him."
"Most feudal lords had more sense than to sleep with their worst enemy."
Maureen winced and poured another drink. Killing Dougal had served as some kind of catharsis, but it had also created new nightmares. She'd gone to bed with him, and in the morning she'd killed him. Fucking schizoid black widow spider. And Brian was still willing to sleep with her. Either a brave man, or a fool. Maybe both.
The whisky was finally starting to work. She reached out and caressed his cheek, the smooth fresh skin where she'd scratched him. He smelled good, as always, that feral woodland smell that told her that he was the right species. A faint tickle of desire stirred in her belly. Maybe it was time to invoke Jo, the inner whore.
He took her hand, kissed it, and shook his head. "We can't. You asked me not to, unless you're sober."
The kiss sent shivers down her spine. "Don't be
