"Cold?"

A jerky nod.

Ian reached for another blanket, then paused as he saw her hand rise. Toward him.

His breath twisted in his throat as he gently took her fingers, feeling them grip and tighten, like those of a swimmer finding a lifeline in a storm. He knelt beside her and pulled the blanket closer.

He didn"t speak, understanding the silent war she waged every night in dreams that would have made grown men sink to their knees, broken.

Grimly, he held her hand while her tension ebbed. It felt like hours later that he stretched out beside her, while the peat hissed gently beside them.

As Ian watched the fire, rigid and unblinking, he swore that no one would get past him to hurt her again.

JAMEE SAT UP, shoved her hair from her face, then froze. Ian slept behind her, one broad hand curled about her blanket. His muscled thigh had pillowed her cheek as she slept.

Thank God, she was still dressed. Sweater, jeans, everything appeared to be in place. Maybe she hadn"t had the Dream after all.

She eased to her feet, careful not to wake Ian. Banks of cloud still paled the windows as thickly as before, but some morning light managed to filter through the fog. She washed her face in rainwater from a copper bowl by the far wall, feeling strangely restless. How had she and Ian come to be sleeping only inches apart? Had he heard a sound in the night? Or had she cried out in her dreams, causing him to comfort her?

She could remember nothing.

But her body was leaden, tense, the way she always felt after her recurring nightmare. And as always, she could remember none of the details.

Drawing a deep breath, she looked at Ian. Asleep, he looked younger, though tension still gripped his shoulders and kept his fingers clenched on the blanket.

Like it or not, his mouthwas beautiful.

Jamee frowned, wondering why she felt so safe in Ian McCall"s company. He exuded confidence and power, both discreet, sensed more than seen. That was part of the reason, but not all.

She decided that Ian McCall looked like what he was-a man who had made hard decisions, maybe once too often. The shadows of those choices haunted Jamee every time she looked into his green eyes.

What would it take to know him deeply, to slide past his defenses and smooth the shadows from that hard face?

Not her right. She was a woman who never stayed, a woman who skated over the surface of her life, wary of the dark currents beneath. Yet for a moment, with this man she had felt a hunger for something deeper. A touch that would join, expose and bind deeply.

Definitelynot her right.

Jamee studied the blank windows. Honest feelings were usually dangerous; with this man they would be more dangerous than most.

Sighing, Jamee put Ian McCall from her mind. One thing was certain: they wouldn"t be going anywhere today. After a last disgusted glance at the fog, Jamee picked up her bag. If she was stuck here, at least she was going to finish some work.

IAN TWITCHED, hugged the pillow then sat bolt upright. "Jamee?"

Her bed was empty. He was on his feet when he heard the clatter of pans across the room.

"Where are you?"

"Right here." Her hair was held back by a swatch of indigo satin the same shade as her eyes.

She was dressed in jeans and a fluffy sweater, with a tartan tossed around her shoulders like a shawl. Shadows ringed her eyes. "Sleep well?"

Her radiant smile ran through Ian like 50,000 volts of direct current. He cleared his throat.

"Fine. What about you?"

"Well enough. I thought I"d let you rest, since you looked exhausted." Her head cocked. "Bad dreams?"

She doesn"t know,he thought.She truly doesn"t remember anything about last night. Adam had said forgetting was part of her trauma, but Ian hadn"t believed it until now.

He turned away and pulled on his sweater, afraid she would read the shock in his eyes. "I don"t know. I never remember my dreams." He took his time pulling down one sleeve. "Do you?" he asked casually.

"Sometimes." She frowned and made a sharp gesture, as if shoving a cobweb from her face.

Then her smile slid back, full and utterly real. "Breakfast is served, my lord."

"Excellent. That would be salmon lightly roasted with sage and scones with fresh blueberries."

Ian steepled his fingers. "After that I"ll have coffee, very strong."

Jamee held out a chipped bowl. "What you"ll have, my lord, is oatmeal." She looked rueful.

"Very dark."

Ian"s lips curved. "Wheesht,and how did you know that I was wishing for a bowl of oatmeal, lass?"

"It"s burned, I"m afraid. I haven"t got the hang of cooking over an open fire yet."

Ian took the bowl and settled back on the floor. The cereal was hot and creamy and he ate with relish. "Only a little scorched. What did you have?"

"The last of the granola bars and my chamomile tea." Jamee rested her chin on her palm, watching him eat. "It made me feel very dangerous to be finishing off the last of my larder."

"Don"t worry, I"ll find us something." Ian put aside the bowl, stood up and stretched. "What have you got over there?" He nodded at the line of pots ranged over the long pine trestle table.

"Just dye."

Ian"s brow rose. "Is that an order?"

"Not die.Dye. As in madder. Also logwood, indigo, weld and walnut husks." Jamee lifted a mound of dusky-pink yarn from a pan over the fire. "This is the madder batch. I"ve nearly run out of mordant."

"Mordant?"

"Chemical to set the dye." Jamee pointed toward a plastic bottle. "I usually use alum or copper sulfate." She moved restlessly from yarn to yarn, touching each color as if compelled. "This one needs to simmer for another half hour or so to reach the fullest shade. These two are nearly done."

So that"s what she carried in her bag, Ian thought. Mordants and dyes. Madder and indigo. He suppressed a smile. Most women would have packed lipstick and a curling iron, but not Jamee.

Jamee Night was clearly one of a kind.

But Ian was worried about her. He"d cleaned the mud from her body and dressed her before falling asleep. Now the night was a blur, but her memories were still there. They burned in her eyes and in her restless movements. Talking about the trauma would be painful, but it was the only way she"d ever close the book on her experience.

Ian rubbed his jaw. "Jamee, maybe you should-"

"Hmm?" She stirred a batch of simmering yarn the color of ripe plums. "Do you like this one?"

"It"s very nice, but-"

"The landscape is so lovely here, soft and muted. I took this color from the mist on the heather."

She had captured the shade perfectly, Ian thought. But he was far more concerned about what had happened to her last night. "I wanted to ask you about-"

"My materials?" She gestured eagerly, and her wooden spoon struck one of the pans. "All natural. Why wear something dyed with coal tar? Besides, you can"t get this kind of subtle color with an aniline dye." She laughed suddenly and ran a hand through her hair. "Sorry. I do tend to rage on about color."

Ian thought she was a study in color herself, with her hair a dozen hues of red, her eyes and skin gilded by the flickering fire. The fine flush to her cheeks made him want to ease close and- "Ian?"

He realized he was inches from her cheek. He straightened, his breath hot and tight in his throat as he fought the spell she wove around him. Feelings didn"t count, he told himself. Not when he was working.

"I think I"d better have a look around. See what the fog is like." He strode to the back door, making the same circuit he"d made a dozen times since they"d arrived. He checked the narrow back scullery and made certain the bolts were sill secure. There was no way he would be caught unprepared again.

Meanwhile, he was neither Jamee"s priest, nor her guardian, Ian reminded himself. He was here to protect her body, not heal her soul.

Somehow he would have to remember that.

WAS IT SOMETHINGshe had said?

Jamee stirred the plum-colored dye, remembering the wariness that had filled Ian"s eyes before he strode outside. Maybe her monologue about dyes had sent him running. She was a fanatic on the subject, and most men developed glazed eyes at the mention of anything remotely connected to color, texture and fabric design.

All except for her brothers. Jamee had Adam, Bennett and William well trained by now. They could tell the difference between a twill and a jacquard at ten paces.

But Ian McCall was different from her brothers and any other man she"d known.

Finished with her dyes, she sat down before the fire and pulled her knitting needles out of her bag. Back on the cliff she had expected to freeze up when Ian had kissed her. At first shehad.

Then something unexpected had happened, something that welled up from her toes and skittered through her chest, leaving her shaken.

Why had Ian McCall sent her pulse racing when she tensed at the touch of any other man?

Even Noel had made her anxious when he kissed her. He had been willing to wait for more, offering her a nice civilized pact. Nothing intimate-not now and maybe not ever.

Jamee had been the one to refuse. She wanted a real relationship or nothing. Trust didn"t come in fractions, after all.

Ian would never make that kind of pact, she thought. Whenhe loved, it would be all or nothing.

Lucky would be the woman who shared his passion.

She gnawed on her lip as another row of knitting slid away. Maybe she felt at ease with him because of his formality. He was more mature than the men she knew, his control never slipping even when he"d fallen in the stream.

The needles dropped from Jamee"s fingers as a sudden idea unfolded. A wild idea.

An impossible idea.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

"YOU WANT ME TO DOWHAT?" Ian asked as he closed the door.

Jamee had been waiting for him. His first thought had been that something was wrong. His second was that she"d inhaled too much dye.

She asked the question again in one quick breath.

Ian simply stared at her.

Her damp palms skittered over the length of the soft mohair she had just finished knitting.

He propped his hands on his hips. "I don"t think I heard you right."

Jamee closed her eyes. When the silence held, she clutched her yarn and spun around. "Forget I asked."

Ian"s palm covered her arm. "I don"t want to forget it, Jamee. I just want to understand.

Explain it to me." He cleared his throat. "You want me to...touchyou?"

Jamee took a ragged breath. "With you, it"s different, don"t you see? You kissed me on the cliff."

"I"m sorry."

"No, that"s the point. Withyou I didn"t get clammy hands. In fact, I didn"t feel anything at all."

"I"m delighted to hear it," he said dryly.

"You don"t understand." She paced the room. "When you kissed me, it was just that, a kiss.

Nothing else. You see, usually I-I freeze up. Straining body parts and probing tongues make me go absolutelyberserk. "

Ian stared at her. "You"re asking me to be part of an experiment to help you stop...going berserk?"

"I suppose no one ever asked you that before?"

"I can"t say that they have."

Jamee gnawed at her lower lip. "You won"t do it then."

"I didn"t say that." Ian shoved a lock of dark hair off his brow. "I need some time to think about it."