In short, her senses were bombarding her, and that was a problem.
Because superhuman senses meant superhuman lust.
"Gods, Mariketa," he rasped, "I can feel your eyes on it."
She finally forced herself to drag her gaze away. As soon as she turned from him, she heard him enter the water. With a gasp, she lunged for the side to get out, but he caught her with an arm looped around her waist.
"Let me go!" she demanded, struggling against him, briefly stunned by the rock hardness prodding her.
"I'm enjoying your squirming, but no' your kicking so much. Ach, watch that you doona hit me in the ballocks! We're both going to need those in working order."
Galling! "You bastard - stop poking me with... with that!"
"You keep squirming, witch, and I'm no' goin' to be able to keep my hips still either."
She froze, out of breath and realizing she couldn't fight him anyway. He was breathing hard, too, but not from exertion. She felt his warm exhalations on her neck and ear and shivered, her ni**les hardening against his arm.
"You need my help in here - even if you doona want to admit it."
"You think I can't clean myself?"
"You brushed your teeth for a good ten minutes, and you've washed your hair twice and you'd probably do it again for good measure, but your arms are likely getting tired."
"They're not!" They were. "I'm fine."
"Oh? Then let me see your hands."
She rolled her eyes and raised her hands. At his tsking sound, she glanced down. Her nails were dirty! Her face flushed wildly. Damn him!
When he spun her around, she draped her arm over her br**sts. Glaring at the ceiling, she allowed him to wash one hand at a time. Using the lather, he massaged each finger from base to tip.
Her eyelids began to grow heavy as he firmly pressed his thumbs into her palms, one then the other. "Your hands are so small," he said, his voice pleasingly low and rumbly. "But pretty." She just stifled a shiver.
He finally let her go, and embarrassingly, she swayed. Once she opened her eyes, mustering up the energy to lay into him again, she found him running his thumb claw against the limestone. "What are you doing that for?"
"Dulling the verra edges. Give me those wee hands again." More massaging followed until the fight in her was blissed away. When he began carefully running his dulled claw under each of her nails, she watched his face. His brows were drawn in concentration while he painstakingly went about the task, as if this was very important for him.
"There," he said when finished. "Now for all that hair of yours." He eased her around again.
Still rendered relaxed and cooperating, she let him tend to her. With his claws retracted, he massaged her head thoroughly until she felt she was the consistency of a puddle. And she knew he was wearing that look of concentration as he did it, because he wanted to get this right. What she didn't know was why.
If this was meant to torture her and make her miserable enough to remove the spell, then he was doing a shoddy job of it.
But MacRieve couldn't truly believe she was his. Could he?
17
As he worked shampoo into her long hair, he said, "See, Mariketa, this is no' so bad. If you'd known you'd be treated like this, I probably would no' even have had to blackmail you."
"You had no right to go through my things like that."
"I'd warned you that you'd find me overbearing. Strange, though, when I investigated your belongings, more questions were raised than answered. What is the patch for, the one in your bag?"
She shrugged. "Birth control."
"A contraceptive?" he hastily asked. Bloody perfect.
"Yeah, so?" She stiffened. "Do you think I'm easy now?"
"Sensitive about this, Mariketa?"
"Most guys my age would look at the tattoo on my back and the patch on my arm as tramp stamps."
"Tramp... ? Oh, I see."
"I'm not. A tramp."
"O' course no'," he agreed, trying to keep amusement out of his tone. "Most 'guys your age' just hope that you are one. And would no' know what to do with you even if you were."
"And exactly how old are you, MacRieve?"
"Twelve hundred, give or take."
She glanced back at him, as though gauging if he was jesting. When he raised his brows, she said, "Great Hekate, you're a relic. Don't you have a museum exhibit to be in somewhere?"
He ignored her comments. "Another mystery - I dinna find a razor in your bag, but your legs and under your arms are smooth."
"I was lasered," she said, then added, "I can hear your frown, Father Time," surprising him because he was.
She didn't explain more, but he didn't miss a beat. "Makes a man recall where else you're so well groomed." She shivered from a mere murmur in her ear. "I'm lookin' forward tae touchin' you there again."
"Ha! Why would you think that I would ever let you?"
"I happen to ken that you're a lusty one. And I've taken away your wee alternative. Tossed it into a river." As she gasped, he said, "Took me a minute to figure out what it was - a minute more to believe you actually had it. Then imagining you using it? Had me in such a state, I could scarcely run without tripping over my own feet."
"You're trying to embarrass me again. Give it up. I'm not going to be ashamed because I'm like every other girl my age."
"I doona want you to be ashamed - never in matters like that. And I ken you're to turn immortal soon, know the need must be overwhelming. In fact, most females get confused by all their new lustiness," he said. "Best to have a firm hand to guide them into immortal sex."