Nine

T here came a time in every man's holiday when he had to admit that he had strayed a bit too far from the programme and needed to refocus his energies on the mission at hand.

And if that mission was to burn through a bloody self-care manual as quickly as possible so he could return with equal swiftness to his normal life where he had a computer and things to do that had nothing to do with wondering how the hell it was a woman four hundred years older than he was could possibly be so charming as to trouble his thoughts late into the night, so much the better.

Oliver snuggled down into the beautiful simplicity of that, carefully avoiding any encounters with his thumb or perfectly pitched nursery rhymes. That clarity of purpose was also why he had crawled out of bed at an unseemly hour, indulged in another endless shower just short of boiling, and was currently walking purposefully down the meadow, forcing himself to ignore the utter improbability of watching a vintage Highland miss step through a gate in the grass whilst fretting over the fact that he hadn't been able to see her properly home. As an afterthought, he wondered if he might be arriving too early at the modern-day incarnation of the MacLeod keep for a quick bite of breakfast and a nose through the castle's library. That he couldn't decide was telling.

He would have blamed the length of his holiday for his lack of decisiveness, but he honestly couldn't remember how many days he'd been in Scotland. Five? Six? A brief eternity? Too long, by any count, but nae worries, as Patricia MacLeod would have announced before informing him, no doubt, that she could clear her schedule at any time if he needed questing help.

Hard to argue with a seven-year-old willing to make those kinds of sacrifices for a decent adventure.

He suspected Mairead MacLeod had been that sort of lass at seven, but that would have been somewhere during the 1560s, so he suspected it might be well to pick up the pace a bit, trot swiftly down to Jamie's hall, and throw himself on the mercy of the writer in residence and beg for something distracting to read before he thought any more about any early Renaissance Highland lassies. With any luck, the book might be so enthralling that he also wouldn't have time for any more trips to that damned faery ring up the meadow, thereby avoiding potentially jumping on it as if it had been some sort of daft, cosmic trampoline until it bounced him into a time period not his own.

He pulled himself back to a walk when he reached the hall, took a few deep, even breaths, then walked up to the front door and hoped there was at least someone inside who was an early riser.

The door opened before he could knock and the laird himself stood there with a pleasant expression on his face.

"Ah, Ollie lad," he said cheerfully. "Come for a bit of exercise this morning?"

"It would be an honor," Oliver said sincerely, "but I've actually come to see if I might borrow something to read. Something fictional," he added, because he'd heard about the things that made up James MacLeod's library and he was on holiday after all. "If your wife might lend me something."

"I imagine she would," Jamie said, opening the door fully and waving Oliver inside. "She's upstairs staring off out the window which I've come to learn means she's working out plot issues, not that she's learned to nap with her eyes open."

"Have you accused her of the latter?"

"Once," Jamie said uneasily. "'Twas a mistake."

Oliver would have laughed, but he had no desire to stand between a writer and her methods, so he thanked Jamie for the offer of something hot in the kitchen later, then soon found himself standing at the open doorway of the lady of the hall's inner sanctum.

Elizabeth smiled and waved him inside. "I won't yell at you and no, you weren't interrupting."

"I've been properly warned," Oliver admitted.

Elizabeth put her finger to her lips. "It's the only way I get a decent nap. I'm assuming you're here for something to read."

"As long as it's short."

"I'll just bet. Let's talk subject first. I think you'd be bored with any of the thrillers I keep here for Jamie when he's taking a break from his more esoteric studies, but I have some time-travel romances you might enjoy."

He tried not to wince. "That's a bit too close to home, don't you think?"

She laughed a little. "I suppose so. Maybe a ghost story instead? Patricia could loan you a blanket for comfort if you get scared."

He shot her a look, but she only smiled. "Do you need an early reader for your next book?" he asked. "What's the set-up?"

"Oh, it's just a little cozy mystery series," she said, shifting uncomfortably. "I'm afraid you'd have the culprit identified by the second paragraph, though you know I'll definitely be asking you later for opinions on possible murder weapons."

"Just not pistols small enough to be conveniently tucked beneath the bench of a phaeton pulled by a set of matched ponies, I beg you."

She laughed. "It sounds like you're pining for a few Regency delights, actually, so I have just the thing for you."

He followed her across what he had to admit was a lovely library. She stopped in front of one of the floor-to-ceiling bookcases there, then pointed to the middle shelf. It was stocked with a collection of very thin books, which was a relief.

"Regency era romances full of duels, debutantes, and debauchery," she said, "but very light on the debauchery. There's always a little mystery involved, but again, that might be boring for you."

"They look short," he noted.

"They are short," she said dryly, "but just packed to the brim with period goodness."

Oliver could only imagine. He hunched over to look at what a quick estimate told him might be a hundred books, then almost landed on his arse in surprise. He felt his way down onto a wee step-stool, then looked up at his hostess in shock.

"The author is Constance Buchanan?"

"Have you heard of her?" Elizabeth asked in surprise.

"Just rumor," Oliver managed.

"Well, she should have been the absolute queen of Regency romance in her day, but somehow she just missed that boat."

"What a pity."

Elizabeth shot him a look that made him smile, then patted a handful of her collection. "They're actually very good, so it might be. I have the complete set—well, I had the complete set. I'm missing number eight-two."

"What's the title?" he asked, though he suddenly suspected he already knew.

She took out the last book and flipped through the first couple of pages. "There's a list of the whole series here… and it's number eighty-two, The Duke and the Kitchen Maid ."

Of course it was. "Exciting," he said hoarsely.

"Well, it was a nail-biter for me when I was a teenager and had swiped it from my grandmother's bookcase, that's for sure."

"Were these hers, then?"

Elizabeth nodded. "She left them to me because she knew how much I loved them. They had very modest print runs, so it's hard to find copies unless you want to dig through used bookstores or musty trunks in barns." She smiled. "Are you expanding into antique books now?"

"Might be," he conceded. "At least for this one. I wouldn't want to lose any sleep over the fate of the kitchen maid."

"I'm sure that's the case," she said with a smile. She put the book she was holding back in its spot, then pulled out the one next to what he could see was an empty spot. "Take number eighty-three. The hero's a Highland laird, so you might get extra points for it."

"If there's any time traveling involved, I'm not taking it with me."

"Just phaetons and women named Fanny," she promised. "Let me feed you, then you can trot right back to Moraig's and get started. There are ninety-nine—well, ninety-eight more where that came from if you find yourself hooked."

He was fairly certain he would need a distraction during his trip to the nail salon, so he wasn't about to say no too quickly. He accepted a piece of wrapping paper in a manly shade of black, wrapped his treasure up—ostensibly to preserve the vintage quality, not for any other reason, no, not a damn one—and followed the lady of the hall from her library.

He had a quick meal with the family, assured the spawn that he was indeed holding firmly to the schedule with his sights on a jet-black Bugatti when the time came, then excused himself and made his way back to Moraig's.

He found himself, honestly without quite knowing how he'd gotten there, standing on the threshold of her croft and suddenly wondering what he was doing with his life. It was absolutely absurd, but given that such seemed to be a decent description of his entire life at present, he didn't fight the thoughts. He would certainly kick up a bit of protest at the outset, though, just to make himself feel better.

He was staring down the barrel of thirty-two in a couple of months, true, but he had a ridiculous amount of sterling piled up in a trio of Swiss bank accounts thanks to his hard work, he had a job he loved, and he had his health. He wasn't entirely ugly, he dragged himself to the gym when he wasn't simply outrunning—or running after—bad guys, and he could, when pressed, converse on several esoteric topics that should have impressed the usual rabble of birds he met over drinks instead of leaving them blinking at him owlishly before declaring a pressing need to visit the loo after which they invariably hopped up on the windowsill and legged it anywhere he wasn't.

He stood there on that threshold and didn't fight the ridiculous feeling of broodiness that swept over him, though that was only part of it. The other part, the more important part, was a woman to share his life with. The wave that swept over him at that thought was substantially larger and more wrenching, particularly since he couldn't seem to get a particular woman out of his thoughts even when she was obviously safely inhabiting her own time period.

Obviously he'd been unplugged for too long.

He let himself inside the cottage without a key just to make himself feel a bit more himself and set Miss Buchanan's finest on a side table for later consumption. Those pressing tasks seen to, he considered the rest of his day and found himself back where he'd started. The checklist had to be attended to as quickly as possible so he could get back to his usual life as quickly as possible before he completely lost any sense of himself.

He exchanged a perfectly acceptable grey tracksuit for Highland gear and a sword, not because he had any intention of being anywhere he wasn't supposed to be or seeing anyone who should have been safely tucked back in her proper time. He just wanted any stray tourists wandering over MacLeod soil and looking for natives to gawk at to feel as though they'd been properly rewarded for the effort of ignoring Jamie's No Trespassing signs.

He was generous like that, he had to admit.

He selected reasonable snacks from the largess in the kitchen along with a bottle of water… and then he hesitated.

There was no reason not to take a second one, was there? One never knew when one might become extra thirsty, especially when one had made a career out of always having every contingency considered and possessed the reputation of never being surprised. That casual command of every situation required careful planning.

He grabbed a second bottle—and a third to potentially share—then thought it nothing but prudent to select another undemanding snack or two. Those things collected, he decided there was no time like the present to be off and sniffing, followed immediately by sneezing and sketching. He would make serious inroads into his self-care scheme and feel very pleased with himself by the end of the day, he was certain.

He packed everything into a worn canvas satchel he found hanging on a peg by the door, helped himself to an obviously well-loved National Trust woolen blanket to keep his tender backside off any potential patches of nettles, then checked one last time to make certain everything was turned off. Moraig's was reassuringly still in the current day, which he supposed was occasionally not the case, then took a deep breath and stepped over the threshold.

He jumped a little at the sight of a medieval clansman standing there under a tree. His relief at realizing that Patrick was in jeans and trainers was unhappily mitigated by the look his current swordmaster was wearing.

Oliver pulled the door shut behind himself, then patted his satchel. "Off to do constructive things."

Patrick eyed Oliver speculatively. "You had a visitor, I hear."

"Did Lady Sunshine tell you?"

Patrick slid him a look. "I do keep an eye on what goes on in my forest." He paused. "That and aye, Sunny told me."

Oliver wasn't surprised and there was part of him that was perhaps a bit more grateful than he'd expected to be. Whatever Patrick's flaws might have been when it came to his treatment of men in his circle, he was unfailingly kind to the women. Sunny—and Cameron, for that matter—would have been concerned that Mairead be looked after if she wandered astray and Patrick no doubt would have wanted to keep her safe as well.

"You can't let her come again."

Oliver returned Patrick's look steadily. "She's an adult."

"Very well, you shouldn't let her come again."

"I know."

Patrick studied him for a moment in silence, then shook his head. "You poor sod."

"Her life in the past is unpleasant."

"It will be substantially more so if someone finds out she's been traipsing through the centuries to fraternize with you."

Oliver dragged his hand through his hair. "I won't be in Scotland more than another week or so."

"And that makes it better?"

Oliver looked at him seriously. "A few days to make memories to last a lifetime isn't better?"

Patrick rolled his eyes. "You should be writing greeting cards."

"Too much time spent lingering in the sitting rooms of grannies with valuable antiques placed strategically behind cards from their progeny has left its mark." He sighed. "You won't tell Jamie, will you?"

"What, that you're dating a woman who's four hundred years older than you are?" He snorted. "What am I, your mother?"

Oliver smiled faintly. "Thank you. And I'm not dating her. We're just friends."

Patrick only shook his head and sighed. "Be careful with her."

Oliver nodded. "I understand."

"I'm not sure you could," Patrick said bluntly, "but I also know it won't be for a lack of trying." He turned away, then stopped.

Oliver suddenly didn't care for the feeling in the air. He watched as Patrick turned back to look at him.

"Jamie has been poking into the late 16th century for a pair of years, you know."

"I hesitate to ask why."

"Because crowds get swept up into things they wouldn't if cooler heads prevailed."

"Even here in the Highlands?"

"Aye, even here. I wonder what he's found in the past that troubles him."

"Something foul, no doubt."

"That foul thing might be you."

Oliver closed his eyes briefly, then nodded. "If I see her again, I'll convince her to stay where she belongs."

Patrick only waited.

"And I won't go myself," Oliver said, blowing out his breath.

"You likely shouldn't."

He nodded, then watched his current swordmaster go, no doubt making his way without thinking to his own castle where his lovely wife and children waited for him.

Lucky bastard.

Oliver shook his head at himself, then turned and made his way toward the meadow, enjoying the silence of the forest and—heaven help him—the lack of technology. The horrors of being unplugged hadn't abated, of course, but he was equally horrified to find he was beginning not to care.

After all, men had gone centuries with nothing more than the same sort of skills he'd honed over a dozen years of boarding school, namely eavesdropping, being keenly aware of one's surroundings, and extricating oneself from impossible situations with just one's wits and a few tools in pockets and down boots, hadn't they? He wasn't sure Renaissance Scotland's food could possibly be any worse than what he'd eaten at St. Margaret's, so there was also that to consider.

Which didn't mean he was going anywhere, of course, but it was an interesting intellectual exercise. In fact, he might just make a new section of his self-care notebook completely devoted to the beauties of Being Unplugged . Surely there would be at least a pair of lads who would understand when he bound them with one set of cords and did electrical experiments with the other. He had to acknowledge that that was more on the plugged-in side of things, but perhaps there was no need to quibble over details.

He supposed the details he should fuss over—if he were contemplating a trip to a time not his own—included what to leave behind: his watch, any sachets of indigestible condiments he might or might not generally keep in the glove compartment of his car, and his fairly comfortable Cameron plaid boxers.

He took a deep breath and carried on, forcing himself to empty his mind. If that didn't count for meditation, he didn't know what would.

He walked until he came to the invisible border that lay between MacLeod and Cameron lands, then turned to face the more-than-visible doorway that had simply opened up between the centuries.

On the other side of that threshold stood none other than Mairead MacLeod, who he was beginning to suspect had a level of curiosity that rivaled his own.

There was a little voice in the back of his head that told him he was about to make a colossal error in judgment, but he ignored it. He was being polite, nothing more.

He made her a bow. "Good morning, my lady."

She smiled. "And to you, good sir."

He clasped his hands behind his back and found, to his utter lack of surprise, that small talk eluded him. Unfortunately, his companion seemed to be just as bad at it.

"How is the weather there?" he asked, finally.

She looked at him, then laughed.

Oh, that was bad on so many levels. He needed to keep his wits about him, concentrate on getting himself free of Scotland, and convince that woman there that she should remain in her proper time. But if her smile was like sunlight after weeks of rain, her laugh was closer to having an angel standing above his head, pouring that same sunlight onto only him.

"Damp and cold," she said politely. "And on your side of the doorway?"

"Warm and sunny."

"Are you certain you're in the Highlands?"

"At the moment, my lady, I'm not quite certain of anything."

Her smile faded a bit. "I wanted to see if I'd lost my wits entirely."

He shook his head. "Still there, I'd say."

She hesitated, then nodded. "I should likely turn for home, then."

He could think of a dozen reasons why that made the most sense of anything he'd heard in days, but he couldn't bring himself to voice a single damned one of them, so he settled for an innocuous platitude.

"Probably so," he agreed.

"I shouldn't come through the gate again."

He nodded slowly. "Probably not."

"It would be… imprudent."

He nodded again. "A bit."

She said nothing else, she simply stood there and looked at him, silent and grave.

He considered all the reasons why he should give her a friendly wave, tell her to behave herself, then turn and bolt for Moraig's. He reminded himself of Jamie's single lifting of a single eyebrow on his way out the door that morning that warned him he was playing with fire. He even groped mentally for the modicum of good sense that would surely bellow at him that if he were going to date, he should likely find someone who was born in at least an adjacent century, not four hundred years in the past. He marshalled all that good sense and prepared himself to do the right, if not the difficult, thing.

And found himself holding out his hand toward her.

She closed her eyes briefly, then looked at him and put her hand in his.

He pulled her into the future and heard the gate close behind her with a soft click. She looked over her shoulder in alarm, then back at him.

"Will it open again?" she asked breathlessly.

Hopefully not was almost out of his mouth before he stopped it. He managed a smile instead.

"If not, there are others."

And that, unfortunately, was where his glib tongue left him stranded. He looked at his 16th-century miss and wondered just what it was a modern man did to entertain a woman who most definitely shouldn't have been lingering in a time not her own. Then again, he should likely have been cursing himself for inviting her out on something that couldn't possibly be considered yet another in a long series of first dates.

But if it were going to be a single first date, he would do his best to make it memorable.

He offered her his arm. "Let's find somewhere comfortable to sit."

She looked at his arm, then at him, then hesitantly tucked her fingers just under his elbow. He wasn't entirely certain what passed for inappropriate fraternizing with the opposite sex in 16th-century Scotland, so he simply nodded toward the rock where he usually sat and hoped for the best.

He set his gear down and unsnapped the little tab holding the blanket together in its folded state. He watched Mairead take one end of it and study it as if she'd never seen anything so fine. She looked at him in astonishment.

"Did the angels fashion this?"

He smiled briefly. "I imagine just some industrious weaver here in Scotland. Let's stretch it out and see if they did the sheep proud."

She gaped at him when he started to put the blanket on the ground. "Are ye daft, ye wee fiend?" she asked in astonishment. "Next you'll tell me you plan to sit on it!"

He suspected that if he spent any time with her at all, he would never look at anything the same way again. He smiled because he couldn't help himself.

"That's the purpose of it," he said. "I imagine there are other blankets inside Moraig's that are softer for wrapping around yourself, though your shawl is more lovely than anything we would find there."

She shut her mouth, then slid him a look. "I've never heard you say so many words in one go."

He smiled. "The day is lovely, you are lovely, and you're going to help me take care of a few of these tasks my former friends left me to do. Help me spread this out and we'll have something to eat."

She did so, then simply stood there, watching him with her arms wrapped around herself. He froze, then searched quickly back through his recent babblings to see where he might have drifted off into eejit territory, but couldn't lay his finger on anything overly offensive.

"Did I say something?" he asked, deciding quickly that beginning to scratch his head so early in the day would set a bad precedent.

"What did you call me?"

He put his brain in reverse and quickly backed up to examine the road, then he realized exactly what he'd said.

Which he'd meant.

He pulled the satchel over his head and set it down, then gestured to a spot on the blanket that he thought looked comfortable enough.

"I called you lovely, which you are, and if you make me say anything else I'll end up flustered and saying stupid things. Are you hungry?"

She sat down with a bit of a thump, looked at him, then nodded.

He imagined she was and he was obviously missing some sort of nutritional infusion to his own brain, but what else could he say? Outside of very fast cars and shiny things worth buckets of sterling, he didn't like things that were so perfect as to seem fake. He had dated—one time each, of course—more than enough women who were so beautiful that they were hard to look at. Nothing against perfection, of course, but perhaps it was time to set his sights on a woman who was lovely and artless and had a smile that lit the room and a laugh that broke through the clouds like a lovely ray of sunlight.

He was painfully aware that his wishes in that area didn't matter a single damned bit, especially when a woman he thought he might like to ask out on a second date was utterly beyond his reach even if she'd been amenable to a second date.

But at the moment, he couldn't bring himself to care. He'd spent a lifetime doing what everyone expected, surviving, trying to live a half-decent life while not standing out and attracting the attention of those who were, as the saying went, gunning for him.

He had the feeling Mairead might understand that very well.

Maybe it wouldn't destroy the fabric of time or send the world spinning in the wrong direction if he simply took an hour or two and did exactly what he wanted to do for a change.

He took off his sword, drew it, then laid it down on the edge of the blanket before he executed a bit of modest sitting that even Her Maj might have nodded in approval over. He fished out a bottle of water, took the cap off, then handed it to her.

"Drink. And it's not poisoned."

She pursed her lips. "I didn't truly think you would poison me."

"You thought I had a tail and horns."

"Your future garb did nothing to allay my suspicions, though you were very handsome in it." She shot him a look. "For a demon."

He smiled and unpacked lunch.

One morning. One picnic that had been casually shoved in a bag instead of packed properly in a hamper. One woman and one man who had beyond all reason and in a truly cosmic piece of serendipity encountered each other in a way he suspected neither of them would have dreamed of.

One morning.

What could it hurt?