STORY EXCERPT

Getting through customs was a breeze compared to the stories she had heard, but by the time Paisley stepped out of her taxi and crossed the sidewalk to the Thistle Inn, she had been awake for nearly twenty-four hours. When she tripped on the top step leading into the lobby, she expected to end up sprawled on the floor.

So tired she could barely lift her arms, she was shocked when she did not smash face-first onto the shiny marble floor. Instead, she stopped halfway down when a hard, thick, muscular arm wrapped around her middle. The arm then pulled her back against a body that felt as hard as the floor looked.

“Careful there, lass. Ye dinna wanta hurt yerself so early in the morn,” a deep Scottish brogue said gently in her ear.

Paisley was not sure if it was the brogue, the hard body, the scent of spicy male, or a combination of the three, but her pussy immediately went soft and wet as her libido kicked into overdrive. She thought she felt his nose brush over the top of her head but could not be sure.

Regaining her footing, she straightened, took two steps forward, and turned to face her rescuer. “Thank you…oh my God, it’s you.”

She did not mean to sound accusatory, but finding herself face-to-face with the man she had been dreaming of most of her life was more than a bit of a shock to her tired, travel-weary system.

He looked exactly as she had dreamed of him just hours earlier on the plane, except now he had clothes on. Broad shoulders and a thick chest narrowed to a flat waist and hips with long legs that ended in a pair of hiking boots. Auburn hair with a few strands of silver glinting at the temples flowed to rest heavy on his shoulders while a mustache and close-cropped beard two shades darker than his head with a bit more silver in them covered his face. His eyes glowed with such an intense green they put new spring grass after a rain to shame.

He was even dressed as she had dreamt in some of her dreams, wearing a cream-colored lace up shirt and the same red, green, and white plaid tartan in his kilt.

“It is?” he asked, looking a bit surprised himself. “And jes’ who might I be?”

Though she wanted to blurt out that he was the man she had been having sex with in her dreams for the past month, Paisley bit her lip and kept silent. He would never believe her, and would probably call the Scottish equivalent of the men in white with butterfly nets. And her first trip outside the United States would turn disastrous if she was hospitalized for talking about her crazy dreams with the gorgeous kilted Scotsman she had dreamt about. Especially since his was the first kilt she had seen on a live body since entering the country less than two hours earlier.

“Never mind,” she said, bending to retrieve her carry-on suitcase, which had fallen to the floor.

He smiled gently. “If that’s what ye wish, lass. But I’d be interested ta learn where we might have met afore, fer surely I’d remember crossing paths with a lass as lovely as ye.”

Before Paisley could decide if the stranger was teasing her or not, a second man similar in build, looks, and dress but without the beard, strolled through the front door as if he owned the place. “So, Ewan, have ye found her yet?”

“Wheesht, boyo. Hold yer tongue,” the beard growled at his cohort. “Canna ye see I’m talkin’ ta this lovely lass?” He looked at the newcomer, and it seemed the two shared a silent communication before the newcomer nodded and bent slightly from the waist.

“Oh, aye, fergive me for interruptin’ then, me laird.” With that somewhat snarky apology, the second man stepped around them and crossed the lobby to the reception desk.

Ignoring the second man, Paisley found herself trapped in her rescuer’s green gaze and unable to look away. As they continued to stare deep into each other’s eyes, time continued without them, as if they were caught in a bubble where time had stopped, alone together, and no longer a part of the rest of the world.

“What’s yer name, lass?” he asked in a soft tone as he took her left hand with his, cupping his palm around the back of her hand and weaving their fingers together.

She thought it was a strange way to hold hands, but maybe it was a Celtic thing. The touch of his work-roughened palm against her skin seemed to short-circuit her thinking to anything beyond responding and keeping him talking. “Paisley Gill,” she answered in a whisper for fear of shattering whatever this thing was between them.

“And I’m Ewan MacGregor of the clan MacGregor.”

Paisley grinned as his response immediately brought forth memories of one of her favorite movies about Scotsman who would live forever unless his head was cut off. “Do you really introduce yourself that way? Or only to gullible American tourists? Because I’ve got to tell you, it’s a little hokey, but I like it. Ewan MacGregor of the clan MacGregor.”

“And I’m findin’ ye quite ta me likin’, Paisley Gill of America. What would ye say ta a wee drink while we discuss our future tagether?”

Her heart and loins wanted to skip the drink and take him upstairs as soon as she could claim her room key. But her brain, and practical common sense, overruled them. Gently pulling her hand from his, she forced herself to take a step away and turn, effectively breaking the intense stare-down they had going on. Instantly she wanted to return to his side and throw herself into his arms.

“I’m sorry, but besides it being too early for alcohol, I need to check in, and maybe take a nap. But thanks for keeping me from smacking the floor.”

“Any time, dear lady,” Ewan said from behind her. “And if the Fates be kind, we’ll meet again soon. Maybe then ye’ll be willin’ ta join me in a cup of tea.”

Paisley could only smile as her cheeks burned even hotter in response to his burning green-eyed gaze. “Maybe.”

ADULT EXCERPT

Opening her eyes, she saw they were still in the Highland meadow on their dream picnic. But instead of wearing the clothes they had fallen asleep in, they were now as naked as Adam and Eve had been before eating the apple that had changed the course of human history.

Her cheek rested just at the edge of the pelt of chest fur that extended from nipple to nipple. It angled up his body to the base of his throat and down to a point at his belly button. Her timid side suddenly rising up, she did not look further down his body to check out his cock.

Rubbing her hand up and down the center of his chest and belly, she smiled when he sucked a breath and made a sound of pleasure. “Ye keep that up lass and we’re sure ta have a problem.” His words rumbled under her cheek, and her smile widened as she poked a finger into the indentation at his navel.

“I can take anything you can dish out, big boy,” she teased, though she wondered if she could.

“Hmmm, ye probably can,” he said before rolling them so she lay flat on her back and he leaned over her looking so gorgeous her mouth went dry. “I’m jes’ no’ sure I could.”

Before she could unravel the meaning of his words, he leaned down and kissed her. His lips were firm as they mated with hers. His beard and mustache tickled as he tilted his head to deepen the kiss. She parted her lips to allow him entrance willingly, eagerly. Her tongue reached out tentatively to meet the bold thrust of his.

When he pressed his cock into the side of her hip, she gasped around their dueling tongues. It was long and thick and hard as it pressed into her soft flesh, making the impression that Ewan MacGregor of the clan MacGregor was as well-endowed in manly flesh as he was in self-confidence.

In response, her pussy overflowed, her fluids dampening her inner thighs in preparation. She gave a soft moan as she shifted, trying to get closer to the man who continued kissing her without going any further with the seduction. She needed so much more than long, slow kisses and brushes of skin against hers. She needed him thrusting his cock deep inside her.

He seemed to feel her urgency but refused to act on it. Instead of rolling over her and inserting tab A into slot B, he broke the kiss and pulled back.

Opening her eyes to frown up at him, Paisley realized they were no longer dreaming. The blue sky that had been over them was now the cold white ceiling of the hotel room.

But her body continued to feel wet, ripe, and ready for sex.

“What the hell?” she asked, looking down and finding that, like in their dreams, they were both naked. “What happened to our clothes?”

* * * *

Ewan was just as shocked as she was that their dreams had affected the natural so intensely. He shifted back then bent his left arm and rested his head in it as he contemplated how to answer when what he really to do was rise over her and fuck her until neither one of them could think past their next heartbeat in order to do it all over again.

Taking a deep breath to hold himself back, he said, “The realm of dreams and the realm of reality is no’ so far apart that one willna affect the other, and in our case they seem ta be bleedin’ tagether, just as Fergus predicted.”

Watching her, he could see she did not believe him. Like most Americans he had met over the years, it seemed she had lost the whimsy in her life, and was unable to see the magic of the unexplained that filled the world around them on a daily basis. While some of Fergus’s predictions had been too farfetched for even him to accept, Ewan had secretly kept track of them over the years and knew her success rate was better than ninety percent.

Instead of launching into a dissertation of Fergus’s theories and his own experiences with the way of dreams and wishes and the magic of nature, Ewan decided to continue their actions of the dream here in the natural. “Does it really matter how we got this way? We’re both hurtin’ with the need fer each other. And frankly I’m grateful ta whatever magic it was that took care of the disrobin’.”

He could see she was still skeptical, still wary, but also still very, very interested in seeing where this could take them. Leaning down, he began to kiss her again. The inferno that had raged in their dreams quickly flared to life again. Before he could shift over her body, she rolled up on her right side and lifted her left leg over his hip.

“Fuck me. Oh God, please fuck me now,” she pleaded as she kissed his cheeks, chin, and then back to his mouth.

Having been raised a gentleman when it came to all things female, Ewan did the only thing he could. Reaching around her hip and between her legs, he positioned the head of his cock at her wide-open entrance. He then forced himself to hold still until Paisley looked up at him, her dark eyes flashing fire.

“Please,” she pleaded.