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In which there are drinking games and most enthusiastic consent.

Arabella…

When I wake up, the house seems to be quiet. Venturing out of my room and into the big main space, Logan’s the only one there, chopping something by the stove. His hair is wet from the shower and he pulls on a shirt as he spots me, an action I note with some regret. His gorgeous, broad shoulders flex and pull with muscle and I want to spend a few hours asking about the wolf tattoo across his back, drawn so vividly that it looks like it’s snarling as his muscles flex.

It’s not right that one man should be so unreasonably attractive.

“Good morning! Well, evening I guess.” He smiles at me, leading me out onto the deck that overlooks the water. There’s a few little tables and chairs scattered over the flagstone. “Are ye hungry?”

“It smells wonderful. Where is everyone?”

“Analyzing the data we retrieved. I’ll have to introduce ye to Xenia later, she’s our tech queen and the very definition of evil genius.”

Chuckling politely, I’m irritated by a stab of something in my gut. I have no business feeling jealous of a brilliant woman that Logan seems to admire so much.

Are they dating?

I am an eejit.

As he’s plating the food, I notice a bandage on his left hand. “You got hurt! Please tell me that’s not a bullet wound.”

Logan glances at the bandage and then at me. “Not a bullet wound.” His smile is a little strange. Since he dinnae seem inclined to offer any more information, I let it go.

He pulls out a chair for me before bringing our dinner out. As we eat, the sun sends its last rays of red and orange across the water.

“Oh, my god this is good,” I moan, devouring my open-faced sandwich. It’s a thick bread covered with shrimp and capers and some kind of tasty veggie spread.

“It’s called sm?rrebr?d ,” he says, wolfing down one that looks like it’s topped with smoked salmon. “The rye bread makes everything taste grand.”

He’s got a bottle next to him, a Glengoyne and if my catering knowledge is correct, this is a fifteen-year single malt. “Care to share that fine bottle of whisky?”

Logan raises a brow. “A wee bit of a lass like you, handling the hard stuff?”

The audacity of this man.

“Did ye just give me the, ‘Ach, lass, you’re too delicate a flower to drink with the manly likes of me?”

Logan gives me an impertinent grin, bordering on smug and also bordering on me wanting to wallop him across the back of the head with that expensive bottle of Glengoyne.

“It’s science, sweetheart. I outweigh ye by seven stones, most of it muscle. So, aye, I can outdrink ye.”

Slinging my arm across the back of my chair, I eye him thoughtfully. The arrogant bampot already made his way through about an eighth of the bottle. “Looks to me like ye already got yourself a handicap, like in golf, ye know?” I push my glass toward him. “Let’s start from here.”

How can a man be such an arrogant prick and yet so hot that I’m prepared to forgive him for it? “Ye can tap out at any time, Bella, no judgement from here.” He winks, pouring us each two fingers.

“Here’s to drinking ye under the table,” I toast, clinking my glass with his.

Ah, that’s good. The first swallow is wonderful, smooth, and full-bodied. I can never afford an expensive whisky such as this for myself, but every now and then I’m treated to a fancy drink. I taste the lovely notes of vanilla and oak, and something a bit fruity. Running the glass under my nose, I close my eyes and smile. It’s smoky, likely from the use of peat in drying the barley and it even smells warming, just like how it feels going down.

Logan chuckles and drinks half his glass in one go. I watch the strong muscles in his throat work as he swallows and there’s a… tingling. Nothing overwhelming, just me shifting a bit in my seat, wondering what his lips would taste like.

Enough of that! I scold myself.

By our third drink, the bottle’s running low and Logan is describing in explicit detail how to rig a detonator with a wire scavenged from an extension cord and the foil from a gum wrapper.

And it is fecking fascinating.

“So, how did ye determine safe distance from the blast zone?”

“In that case, I was definitely not far enough,” he admitted, filling our glasses. “Broke my shoulder on that go-round but ye should have seen it, the explosion shot out horizontally and it flattened trees around it for half a kilometer.” His grin is rapturous and I can visualize the intensity of it; how powerful it must have been to see what he could do with so little at his disposal.

“I must admit, when I saw that flame shoot up from the ground clear to that glass room back at Anselm’s compound, it was… shite. It was thrilling,” I admit. “I dinnae know if it meant help was coming but watching it roar up to the sky was magnificent.”

“I do believe you’re a bit of a pyromaniac,” he says approvingly. “Now it’s time for ye to confess, sweetheart. You’re no lightweight.” His long, tattooed fingers turn his glass in circles on the wet table as he watches me. “Did ye grow up drinking the good stuff?”

“Hardly,” I laugh, ruining my drinking cred by hiccupping a bit. “At Uni, my boyfriend Ted loved throwing parties. I suspect he might have been single-handedly responsible for the high rate of alcohol poisoning on campus.”

“You’re not together now,” he says with complete certainty. Of course, he would know that. With his clan’s business, I’m certain he can get all kinds of background information on his targets.

Is that what I am, a target? I brush the thought away.

“Well…” This time I pour, handing him his glass. “No. When the party life got too much for me, too bright, too disorienting, too much of everything, he bowed out. He said being with me was too much work.”

“Ye want me to kill him?” Logan offers. He looks completely serious about it, which is unsettling.

“No, ye ridiculous creature! Ted’s punishment is being him for the rest of his life, which should be shortened considerably by the time the cirrhosis hits. No one’s liver can take a beating like that, not even a proper Scot’s.”

He chuckles a bit, I feel the vibration more than hear it, his knees are pressed against mine now and he’s slouching a bit in his chair. The lanterns around us make a soft light, flickering a bit as a breeze comes across the deck. The moment feels heavier.

“Can I propose something?”

“Aye?” I finish my glass.

“Before we open the second bottle and crown the winner of this competition, I would like to ask ye for something.”

He looks positively devilish in the shadows, his smile flashing white in his beard.

“What are ye asking me for, Logan?”

“Your most enthusiastic consent.”

I howl with laughter, slapping the table and spilling a bit of that very expensive whisky. “You’re a bold one, thinking we’re headed in that direction.” My laughter dies as he takes a drink, hazel eyes narrowed. He never bothered to button the white shirt he pulled on after his shower, the sleeves are rolled up and his forearms thick with muscle.

Logan MacTavish is a beautiful specimen of the male species. And a dangerous one, especially to what’s left of my common sense. He shifts in his seat and my mouth grows dry as I look at his sculpted chest, he has just enough dark hair to make me want to see where it leads to. He smells like good cologne, expensive liquor and bad decisions.

“If, and I mean if we ended up in such a situation,” I say haughtily, “ye would have my consent.”

He leans forward, bracing his elbows on the table. “I would require your most enthusiastic consent, Arabella.”

It’s late. I’m tipsy and heading rapidly toward blootered. All my sensible notions are gone and there’s nothing but the two of us in the intimate pool of light from the lanterns.

Lifting my glass, I give him a devilish smile of my own. “My very most enthusiastic consent.”

Clicking his glass to mine, Logan gave me his rakish pirate grin and we both drank.

Blootered - Scottish slang for extremely drunk