“Gor, that’s mingin’! Do ye always have to make such a mess, lass?”
Beth blinked at that voice as she sat up, and then turned to peer with disbelief at the man approaching her. Tall with the kind of shoulders and thick arms only a man raised wielding broadswords in the middle ages could usually obtain, Cullen MacDonald, or Scotty, as he had come to be known, had long hair that was a mixture of deep red and dark chestnut. He looked like a medieval warrior walking toward her, except, instead of a plaid, he was wearing black leather pants with his white linen shirt.
“Scotty?” she said now, sure her eyes were playing tricks on her. But it certainly looked like him, she acknowledged as her gaze slid over his face, taking in the familiar gray eyes with silver specks, aquiline nose, and thin upper lip over a fuller lower one. It was a face she’d seen in person perhaps a handful of times, but had seen repeatedly in her dreams. Usually wet ones.
“Aye.” He stopped next to her and held out his hand, offering her aid in rising. “’Tis glad I am to see ye did no’ get yerself beheaded ere I could get here and save ye.”
“Humble as ever, I see,” Beth said with dry amusement, ignoring his hand and getting up on her own.
“Uh, Mr. Scotty?” an anxious voice called. “This guy’s waking up.”
Beth turned her head to see a young ginger-haired immortal standing by one of the rogues they’d run over. The man was moaning and slowly shifting on the ground.
“Shoot him with the dart gun, then, Donny boy,” Scotty ordered, not bothering to glance his way.
“What dart gun?” Donny asked uncertainly.
Biting her lip to keep from grinning, Beth watched Scotty briefly close his eyes and grind his teeth together with impatience. Opening his eyes, he peered at Beth’s amused face as he said, “Pray, tell me, lad, that ye did no’ come a’huntin’ without a gun.”
“Okay,” Donny said after a hesitation.
Frowning, Scotty turned to eye him. “Okay what, boyo?”
“I won’t tell you?” he said, his voice a squeak, and then, clearing his throat, he glanced nervously to the man at his feet who was pulling himself slowly to a sitting position and asked, “Do you have a gun I can use?”
Scotty heaved out an exasperated breath, and turned to walk to the younger immortal’s side, withdrawing his short sword as he went. “Nay, lad. I never carry a gun. I use this,” he said, and, holding the blade upward with his hand firmly around the bone grip, Scotty whacked the rogue over the head with the brass pommel.
Beth winced at the sound of crunching bone and shook her head as the rogue tumbled back to a prone position.
“I think you cracked his skull,” Donny said with awe, staring at the rogue.
“That I did,” Scotty said with satisfaction. “Now go get a dart gun and chains out o’ the weapons locker in the back of the SUV ere all o’ them start waking up. And Donny,” he added, bringing the younger man to a halt just as he started away. When the man reluctantly turned back to face him, Scotty said solemnly, “Lesson number two: never go on the hunt without a weapon.”
Nodding quickly, Donny turned and rushed to the SUV with its nose presently buried in the front of the house.
Scotty immediately spun back to Beth.
“What are ye doing here in Canada, Scotty?” she asked as he returned to her. “Not enough rogues in the UK right now to keep you busy?”
“It has been a bit slow lately,” he said with a shrug. When Beth merely raised an eyebrow at that, he added, “As it happens, I was just debating where to go on me vacation when I heard ye were spread thin over here just now, what with most o’ yer hunters in Venezuela, so I thought . . .” He didn’t bother finishing and merely shrugged.
“You just thought you’d spend your vacation from hunting rogues in the UK hunting rogues here instead?” she asked with disbelief, and then reached up on tiptoe to knock on his forehead as if it were a door. “Hello! Is there anyone home in there?”
“Oy!” Scotty leaned his head back away from her knocking fist and glowered at her. “I swear, ye’re the only lass brave enough to do something like that.”
“Because all the other girls think you’re the bogeyman and are scared to death of you,” Beth said dryly.
“But ye’re not,” he said with certainty.
Beth snorted. “I’ve met the bogeyman, and you’re not him.”
“Aye, I suppose ye have met him,” Scotty said solemnly.
Beth’s mouth tightened briefly, and then she relaxed and smiled as she shook her head. “Enough of this evasion. Why would you waste your vacation working over here in Canada?”
“A change o’ pace,” Scotty said with a shrug. “Change is always a good thing. Life can get boring otherwise.”
“Humph,” Beth said dubiously and narrowed her eyes on the man. He was easy to look at, a whole hunk of sexy manhood, but she didn’t trust him as far as she could throw him. He’d popped up in her life repeatedly over the last hundred and twenty-five years since he’d saved her and Dree from a rogue and his mad minions in England. For the first hundred years when he’d popped up, he’d either looked down his nose at her, or treated her distantly, as if she might be infected with something contagious. He’d also been talking to her bosses behind her back, trying to sabotage her position as a hunter. Now he was suddenly acting all charming and friendly? She wasn’t buying it. He was up to something.
Honestly, if he didn’t smell so good, look so pretty, and feature so frequently in her sexual fantasies, she wouldn’t even talk to the man. Unfortunately, he was a sexy beast, and he did feature highly in her sexual fantasies. In fact, he was the only one she had in her wet dreams. The man might not be trustworthy in real life, but in her dreams he was like the Energizer Bunny—he just kept going and going and going. Worse yet, every man she’d slept with over the hundred and twenty-five years since she was turned had worn his face behind her closed eyes. The man just “revved her engine,” as Tybo had put it. At least physically.
“I hear ye’ve left the Spanish hunters and moved here permanently,” Scotty said now.
Beth blinked her thoughts away and looked at him through narrowed eyes. While she was English-born, she’d spent the past more than two thirds of her life in Spain. During that time, Scotty, despite living in England himself, had interfered in her life repeatedly and often. She couldn’t help but suspect this was another opportunity for him to be sticking his nose in where it didn’t belong. However, all she said was, “Dree’s found her life mate. She, naturally, wants to settle here with him.”
Scotty arched one supercilious eyebrow. “And so ye’re jest going to follow her like a puppy and move here too?”
Beth’s chin lifted defensively. “She’s my family. Of course I’ll move here.”