Part 9 (2/2)

d.a.m.n Liam O'Shea.

No. That wasn't completely fair. It was Peregrine Sinclair who had set this whole thing in motion.

She brooded silently, trying to ignore the forbidding movements in the vegetation of the roof, until she recognized the absurdity of her anger. In her imagination she could see Homer looking down at her from wherever he was, shaking his head.

For G.o.d's sake, Brat. Look what's happened to you.

He felt so real that she opened her eyes. The darkness was absolute now, and Homer might have been right there beside her.

”It should have been you here, Homer, not me,” she whispered. ”I can't even figure out which end is up.”

What Homer wouldn't have given for this opportunity. A chance to actually see the living past, as it happened. To learn a thousand details no historical account could pa.s.s on. To return to the twentieth century with knowledge no living person possesseda Bull, Homer's imaginary voice interrupted. This is your adventure, Brata”yours and no one else's. You were sent here for a reason.

Mac pinched the skin between her brows. Sent here? That was a very scary idea, and not the first time it had occurred to her, strange as it was. There were patterns here she couldn't begin to understand.

”So what am I supposed to do, Homer?” What happens if I really do something to alter the course of events? What if my even being here is a temporal disaster? No one ever came up with a guidebook for time travel.

No guidebook, maybe, but there had to be rules. Some way to open the wall again.

And when she found it, she'd have one h.e.l.l of a choice to make.

The last of her anger drained away. Liam, undoubtedly certain that he had a brilliant future ahead of him. So vibrant, so arrogantly alive.

Stop it, Mac. Just stop it.

But the thought would not go awaya”no more than the memories of his strong arms lifting her, the handsome and cynical planes of his face, the silhouette of his half-naked body against the tent.

She tossed over in the hammock so hard that it almost capsized. It was a d.a.m.ned good thing that Liam O'Shea was so easy to dislike.

Somehow that thought didn't help.

Chapter Six.

The time and my intents are savage-wild, More fierce and more inexorable by far Than empty tigers or the roaring sea.

a”William Shakespeare IT WAS ALL her fault.

Liam tossed in the cartaret, trying for a more comfortable position. There didn't seem to be one. Thanks to Miss b.l.o.o.d.y-annoying-crazy MacKenzie, he was being robbed of a good night's rest.

By this time he'd expected her to come creeping to his tent, begging for decent shelter from the jungle's nocturnal terrors. He'd been looking forward to seeing her humbled, even if she spit in his eye while making the request.

But she hadn't come, and he wasn't sleeping, and he couldn't think of a single imprecation sufficient to the situation.

He sat up on the cot, scowling into the darkness. d.a.m.n the baggage. Ever since he'd found her in the tunnela”whether by accident or designa”she'd proven to be the most relentlessly annoying female he'd ever encountered, and the most perplexing.

Heaven must be punis.h.i.+ng him for past misdeeds, sending a suffragist avenging angel. Except he'd long since stopped believing that Heaven gave a d.a.m.n about Liam O'Shea, bad or good. And Mac had a far more likely employer.

Perry.

Liam swung his legs over the edge of the cot, not even bothering to check the ground for scorpions. It kept coming back to that same b.l.o.o.d.y suspicion, and he couldn't let it go.

He'd given her every chance to betray herself, but she'd responded as if she didn't even recognize his suspicions, as if she had nothing to hide.

Liam stood and paced the length of the tent, ignoring the sweat that trickled from his temples and splashed onto his bare shoulders. What in h.e.l.l was he to make of her? She had the photograph. She knew Perry's name. She'd shown up the same day Perry had abandoned hima”alone and with no sign of an accompanying party.

But if Perry had hired hera”crazy as the thought still seemeda”his former friend had chosen a very poor tool. If Perry's plan had been to slow Liam down, to delay his journey to the coast and back to San Francisco, it wasn't succeeding.

Mac wasn't even making the attempt. If she'd played the lost and helpless female in need of his help, or the wanton willing to warm his bed in exchange for his protection, he could have made sense of it. But Mac?

She rejected his protection as if it were an insult. She told him crazy stories she expected him to accept as truth.

He'd heard of eccentric female travelers who risked their lives and honor in foreign lands, but he'd never imagined them to be anything like Miss MacKenzie.

Where would Perry have found her? Fernando didn't recognize her, and he'd left with the others before returning to Liam's employ. If she'd ever been with Perry in the jungle, Fernando would have known. But if she hadn't been hired by Perry, who or what was she?

Liam paused at the entrance to the tent and lifted the flap. No light spilled from either champas; she'd probably be sleeping the sleep of the dead just to spite him. That would be just like a woman.

He knew nothing about her, let alone what she might do next. And yet, for all her strange ways, she was still a woman. And like all women, she was weak, needy, fundamentally flawed.

Like Ma. Like Siobhan.

He knew nothing about Miss MacKenzie, but he would learn.

Liam had the lakesh.o.r.e to himself for nearly an hour past dawn before Mac turned up.

He paused with his razor against his chin as Mac emerged from the narrow path. Her gaze swept the length of the tiny lake, a blue-brown jewel in a setting of green, and came to rest on him.

He s.h.i.+fted his seat on the folding camp stool and resumed his shaving, watching her out of the corner of his eye. From a distance of several yards he could see her air of uncertainty; she was as easy to read as a babe in arms. Uneasy around him, to be surea”less certain of herself than she pretended.

A very good beginning to the morning.

He smiled injudiciously and earned a nick at the corner of his mouth. Her rumpled clothing, the s.h.i.+rttail that hung almost to her knees, and her mussed hair lent her an almost endearing vulnerability. She suddenly seemed like a lost child, in spite of her sharp tongue and bold behavior. Certainly as incapable of caring for herself in this wilderness as any child would have been.

But he knew, in spite of her outward lack of curves, that she was a woman. He knew it with his body. He'd felt the pressure of her small b.r.e.a.s.t.s against his chest, lifted her scant weight in his arms.

He felt it even now.

”Good morning, Mac,” he said.

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