“Stop looking there, woman!”
Her eyes swept up to his. “Nobody looks like you. And no one speaks like you, except maybe Sean Connery in The Highlander. See? Proof positive that I’m dreaming. You’re a figment of my overtaxed, sleep-deprived, traumatized mind.” She nodded firmly.
“I assure you, I am most certainly not a dream.”
“Oh, please.” She rolled her eyes. Closed them. Opened them. He was still there. “I was in the museum and now I’m in a bedroom with a nude man named Sin? How foolish do you think I am?”
“Circenn. Cir-cin,” he repeated. “Those who are close to me call me Cin.”
“You can’t be real.”
He had sleepy, hooded eyes so dark that they seemed rimmed by kohl. His nose was strong, arrogant. His teeth—and God knows she was getting a good look at them with all the scowling he was doing—were straight and white enough to make her dentist weep with envy. His forehead was high, and a mane of midnight hair fell to his shoulders. Although none of his features was current model material, except for his sensual lips, the overall effect was that of a savagely beautiful face. Warrior-lord was the word perched on her tongue.
The tip of the sword gently poked the soft underside of her chin. When she felt a bead of moisture on her neck, she was amazed by the verisimilitude of her dream. She brushed her fingers over the spot, then gazed at the drop of blood in astonishment.
“Does one bleed in a dream? I’ve never bled in a dream before,” she murmured.
He flicked the baseball cap off her head so quickly that it frightened her. She hadn’t even glimpsed the movement of his hand. Her hair tumbled over her shoulders, and she lunged for the cap, only to draw up short on the point of the sword. The top of her head barely reached his chest.
“Give me my cap,” she snapped. “Daddy gave it to me.”
He regarded her in silence.
“It’s all I have from him, and he’s dead!” she said heatedly.
Was that a flicker of compassion in his dark eyes?
He extended the cap without a word.
“Thank you,” she said stiffly, folding the bill and stuffing it into the back pocket of her jeans. Her gaze dropped to the floor as she pondered the sword at her throat. If it was a dream, she could will things to happen. Or unhappen. Squeezing her eyes shut, she willed the sword to disappear, then swallowed tightly as cold metal bit into her neck. Next, she tried willing the man to disappear; the tub and fire she graciously conceded to keep.
Opening her eyes, she found the man still towering over her.
“Give me the flask, lass.”
Lisa’s eyebrows rose. “The flask? This is part of the dream? You see this?”
“Of course I do! Blinding though your beauty is, I am not a fool!”
My beauty is blinding? Flabbergasted, she handed over the flask.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
Lisa sought refuge in formality; it had served her well in the past as a compass through unknown territory. This dream certainly qualified as unknown territory. Never before had she dreamed so lucidly yet been so out of control of the elements of her dream, nor had her subconscious ever before conjured up a man like this. She wanted to know from what prehistoric corner of her soul the leviathan had come.
“Would you mind dressing? Your … er … state of, uh … undress is not conducive to a serious discussion. If you put on some clothes and put down your sword, I’m certain we’ll be able to sort things out.” She hoped he would find the note of optimism in her voice persuasive.
He scowled as he looked down at his body. Lisa could have sworn that the color in his face deepened as he realized his state of arousal.
“What do you expect of me when you have clad yourself in such a fashion?” he demanded. “I am a man.”
As if I’ve been suffering doubts on that score, she thought wryly. A dream of a man, no less.
Snatching a woven blanket of crimson and black, he tossed it over his shoulder so that it draped the front of his body. He grabbed a small pouch, stuffed the flask into it, and finally lowered his sword.
Lisa relaxed and took a few steps back, but as she did so, her hat fell out of her back pocket. She turned around and bent to retrieve it. Turning back to face him, she caught his gaze fixed in the vicinity where her behind, encased in tight jeans, had been only an instant ago. Dumbfounded by the realization that the flawless apparition had been perusing her derriere, she glanced at the fabric he’d wrapped around himself, then cautiously at his face. His dark eyes smoldered. She had a sudden insight that wherever she was, women didn’t usually wear jeans. Perhaps not even trousers.