Page 34 of Into The Light

“I think he thought I might kiss him or something, which I wouldn’t. It’s just after he feeds on me, I feel... I can’t explain.”

“Please. Please try.” He lurched forward onto his elbows, expectant eyes wide with anticipation. “Jenny just shrugged when I asked. I need to know. I’m living vicariously through you. I would kill to have that man sucking on my neck... or on my... sorry, go on.”

I giggled and shook my head. “You know that feeling that builds right before you have an orgasm?”

“I know it well.”

“It’s like that, but everywhere. Not just down in the happy bits.”

“Happy bits?” He bit his lip to suppress a smile.

I shrugged off his inquisition. “Whatever. Anyway, it’s like the orgasm is pulsing through my blood, my muscles, my everything. There’s no release like the other kind of orgasm but the peak is ten times higher. It’s... amazing.”

He sighed. “I’m so jealous. It sounds like tantric sex. I’ve never had the patience to withhold an orgasm, but it’s supposed to be mind-blowing.”

“If it’s anything like this, it’s awesome.”

“He’ll be up any minute. Almost time for your orgasm.” Mark wiggled his eyebrows and pushed up from the table.

The thought tightened my stomach. I began to wish he had to feed more than once a day. It had crossed my mind to put it out there that I’d be game if he got hungry again. Hell, he could live attached to my neck and I would be just fine with that.

When the sun dropped behind the horizon Mark grabbed a newspaper and headed off to Aiden’s room. Apparently, he did this every night. Not because Aiden asked for it, but because before I came, Mark’s loneliness made him resemble a puppy waiting for his owner to come home from work.

While waiting for Aiden to come feed, I wandered into the study just off the main sitting room and I walked over to the large tapestry covering the wall. Embroidery of a large circle with a hand and a dagger emerged from it.

“My clan’s badge.” Aiden’s voice startled me, and I spun around clutching my chest. “This, over here, is the white banner of MacKay.” He gestured to a large flag hung on the opposite wall. A blue X formed across it. A gold and red lion emblem sat dead center. “We flew it when we charged into battle.”

I tried hard to picture Aiden, so formal and well-spoken, draped in a tartan, hair flying behind him covered in mud charging into battle. The not-at-all-unpleasant vision now invaded my mind and it caused me to stare at him and try to envision him in nothing but a kilt.

Yep. That worked for me.

“Were you in a lot of battles?” I asked, my mind still undressing him and putting him in different barbarian clan outfits.

“It was a way of life back then.”

With a shake of my head, I broke the fashion show and forced my eyes elsewhere. “What are these?”

Carved wooden sculptures covered shelf after shelf along the end wall. They ranged in size from peanuts to one the size of a football. The beautiful, intricate pieces mesmerized me. Animals and statues of women and warriors dotted each shelf. I reached for one, a horse rearing, his mane blowing in the breeze, but jerked my hand back, realizing I shouldn’t touch it without permission.

“It’s all right, go ahead.” He nodded and encouraged me to pick it up.

Pulling the tiny figurine off the shelf, I turned it over in my hands. “It’s beautiful. Where did it come from?”

“I made it.”

My head snapped back. “You? You carved this?”

“I carved all of them.”

Stunned at the skill and the beauty in each piece, I looked back to examine him again. A wild Scottish warrior with a gifted artistic side lied buried beneath that cool exterior. I had seen glimpses of him and now I really wanted to see more.

“Where did you learn to do this? They are incredible.”

“My father. At night when I was a young boy, we would sit by the fire and he would teach us how to whittle wood.”

I had a hard time picturing Aiden as a child. It was easier to think he’d popped out of the womb a full-grown man already brooding. But at one time he had been a child. Carefree and wild, racing through Scottish fields and likely pulling his sister’s hair. The thought of it made him a little less intimidating.

“I’m sorry for running off last night. It was rude and I apologize.”