Page 36 of Loched in Love

“I’m a virgin,” she utters.

Water spews from my mouth, startling us both as I begin to cough and choke until tears are stinging my eyelids.

Bleeding hell.

Chapter 12

LACHLAN MACBETH

She’s a bloody virgin.

“That’s why I don’t know what’s come over me. It doesn’t make any sense. I’ve never invaded anyone’s privacy like that before and it’s not like me,” she continues, obviously getting more agitated by the second.

Her cute face is scrunched in confusion as she pulls at the linen napkin in her lap and avoids my gaze. Like she’s done some great travesty by looking upon me in the morn, her mate by all supernatural rights.

A virgin means I’ve done well to keep my mitts to myself, and I’ll definitely need all of my strength and power to keep from hurting my wee mate. Though she’s got more curves than the ocean and is soft in every way a man could want, I could hurt her easily, and I’d rather cut off my own tail than ever harm her.

“Elena, look at me,” I say.

Those big blue eyes I hope to gaze into for all my days turn to me, and the want to take her into my arms is almost overwhelming. I open my palm and wave it around, magically cleaning up the mess of water I just sprayed everywhere, and force it to evaporate with my hand.

“I’ve magic, my flower. And we have a bond between us that’s only begun to expand. These intense feelings of wanting to see what I look like, or more, I feel them too. But until I get my trident fixed, I’m a liability. I’ll not mince my words, and I mean to tell you the full truth of it, and the whole of the story.”

“You have a trident? What story?”

“How I came to be cursed in that moat you saved me from, and why I’ve got to get us both to Dozmary Pool before we can make our way to my loch,” I tell her plainly.

“Alright,” she says easily. “What’s at Dozmary Pool?”

“The Lady of the Lake,” I tell her, and her gaze widens. “She cursed me and broke my trident, the main source of my power, and incidentally the only way to open the door to my home. All because I spurned her and told her I wouldn’t mate bond with her, as I was saving myself for my true mate, you. A witch helped safely lock me into the moat at the castle until you arrived and released me,” I finish, leaving out the tiny details.

“Wow,” she replies.

She blinks as if absorbing the information, but doesn’t seem overly perturbed by my having to make a pitstop to fix a magical object. Perhaps there’s hope for us after all.

Silence stretches between us with only the hum and clack of the train sliding along the metal tracks to fill it, and I wait for her cue to see how to react.

She sits in the chair, her leg folded under her, with one elbow propped on the arm, her face skewed into a look of concentration. “So, let me get this straight. The Lady of the Lake cursed you because you wouldn’t mate with her, and broke your house key slash trident, and we have to go visit her and ask her to fix it?”

“Yes.”

“We’re going to see your very magical and powerful ex who’s basically a legend that I thought was a myth, to fix your magical trident?” she repeats.

“Would you like to see it? I should probably make sure it’s still packed safely, and not broken or leaking,” I say, rubbing the back of my neck sheepishly. “I’ve not thought to check on it since we left the castle.”

“Leaking? What do you mean leaking?” she asks, her blonde brows furrowed.

I smile, thinking to myself how differently this conversation could be going with how this morning began. My attention snags on the waiter opening the door and pushing a cart no doubt holding Elena’s breakfast, and an idea forms.

“Let’s get you fed and then I can show you my trident,” I say.

“Alright,” she agrees.

A few minutes later and I’m pulling the mid-sized luggage Whitley packed for me from under the seating area, and presenting it to Elena on the bed.

“Whitley somehow already had this ready to go before our travels. She’s my best mate, and she thought of everything on how to get it here safely.”

I unzip each side and open the compartment that holds the simple jar protecting my most prized possession, and pull it out for her to see.