The Gift of Myrrh: Tavish MacBain, newly appointed Laird of Castle Wynderon, believed his biggest obstacle upon returning to Scotland would be convincing the villagers to respect a man who is half English. He realizes now just how wrong he was. The biggest obstacle he faces is keeping his distance from his brother's widow. A woman who claims she wishes him dead while ensnaring him with a burning desire each time he finds himself wrapped in her fiery embrace.

“God Almighty, ‘tis a ghost,” Mary breathed.

As a rule, Kristiana did not believe in anything as foolish as spirits. And yet, as she stared upon the tall, dark man who resembled her late husband so completely, she knew of nothing else he could be. The hammering of her heart turned to an insistent thrumming that echoed harshly between her ears.

“Inside, Mary” she managed. And then she was dropping the rug she held in a death grip as her feet moved of their own accord to the man’s side.

He slid off his mount’s back to the cold hard ground, his booted feet soundless in the crisp snow. The crooked grin she saw so rarely on Tomas’ handsome face spread wide, and the breath stilled in her throat even as hope warmed her heart.

She drew her hand part way to her mouth, and then paused. “You can’t be…”

“I’ve come home, my lady,” the stranger, who looked so much like Tomas, responded in a deep baritone, the faintest burr accentuating his words. And then he did the most remarkable of things—he opened his arms to her.

Not once had Kristiana sought comfort in her husband’s embrace. No woman was welcome there. But as he stood before her, looking like a man arisen from the dead, a man who could bring some form of stability to a people in dire need of it, she couldn’t stop herself from going into the welcoming heat of his arms. Rising on tiptoe, she glided her mouth to his cheek for a chaste kiss. Only when her lips landed, it wasn’t on his beard-shadowed face, but on his full, sensuous mouth.

She gasped as his steel-muscled arms banded around her, instantly warming her flesh with the unexpected intimacy. Pulling her firmly against him, he used her parted lips to his advantage, sweeping into her mouth, licking and suckling at her inner flesh, devouring her with the potency of his kiss.

She mewled a soft sigh of pleasure when he pulled back, and then his tongue was claiming her again, robbing her of every thought but that of his bold, masculine flavor and deftly, probing tongue. The idea of him using that clever tongue in far more secret places, places that even now grew damp with the juices of arousal, swirled through her clouded brain and further sped the beat of her heart.

His ravenous mouth stayed constant, foraging from her parted lips, while his hands chased through her hair, setting strand after strand free from their confines and tingling her scalp with a heady, light pleasure. Her legs weakened at the surprisingly erotic sensation of his short nails on her scalp, and she curled her fingers into his coat for stability. The same reckless need that pulsed through her, pounded in his chest, just beneath her touch, further spiraling the lust that grew thick in her veins. She could not have denied the appetite that consumed her at this moment if she had wanted. She was starving for this man and he seemed to share her appetite completely.

Kristiana’s thoughts veered far away from the desolation that surrounded them and she responded to his kiss with the same urgency, the same desperation she tasted on his tongue. With a guttural groan of approval, he drove deeper into the recesses of her mouth, tangling and pillaging, taking every bit of what she offered and more. His large, callused hands traveled down her spine and he roughly cupped her buttocks. Could she escape the kiss, she would have gasped at the delicious feeling of his fingers fondling her backside, but she could not escape it, her body wouldn’t allow the separation. Instead, she closed her eyes and arched against his touch, so that his hardness pressed delectably against her belly and sent her limbs atremble.

And he was hard. Hard, male and virile beneath her hands.