Charlotte Boyett-Compo- WIND VERSE- Pleasure's Foehn by Charlotte Boyett-Compo Page B

hardness of his shaft subsiding. Shaking the drops from his cock, he walked over to the shower and turned it on, grateful for the roar of the hot water as he climbed in.
    Scrubbing himself down with the lime-scented soap he had Seamus import from an Ghréig , he savored the feel of real water cascading down on his body. Sonic-wave showers would do in a pinch but there was nothing as calming and relaxing as hot water running over his flesh to soothe him.
    “Want some company?”
    Cair jumped and dropped the soap as Amethyst insinuated herself into the tight stall. Before he could order her out, she pressed up against him and ran her hands behind him to cup his ass.
    “We wouldn’t want you to start your day tense and—”
    “Get out,” he said, a muscle working in his cheek. “Now!”
    Though his voice had been as low and as soft as his obvious anger could make it, Amethyst understood the warning in it. The man upon whom she was draped might well have been her lover but he was also known throughout the galaxy as a feared Deathwielder, a scythelord of the highest degree. The merciless glower in his eyes was an indication of his growing fury—a fury no sane person wanted to experience. She jumped out of the stall so fast she fell on her shapely ass, staring up at Cair as he slammed the shower door on her.
    36
    Pleasure’s Foehn
    “Aren’t you going to help me up?” she called out and when she received no answer, scrambled up from the floor and cursing a blue streak in her native an Iodáil language, stormed into Cair’s sleeping chamber and began throwing on her clothes.
    “It’s that female doctor that has him so fucking out of sorts,” Amethyst snarled as she jerked on her long silk skirt. “The stupid bitch has ruined everything!”
    Sighing, Cair bent over and retrieved the soap. He hadn’t planned on washing his hair but now he had no choice. He lathered the thick black curls quickly then stood with his hands braced on each side of the showerhead, his chin to his chest and let the hot water flow over the suds, his eyes closed. The muscles in his neck and upper back were taut and not even the pulsing of the water could rid his body of the sudden tension that had gripped it.
    “You have to do something about that wench,” he said aloud and as he spoke the last word, a slow, evil smile stretched his chiseled mouth. But which wench? He questioned himself as he turned off the shower and sluiced the water from his arms and chest arms with his palms.
    That his mother was responsible for having the female healer sent to the Foehn , Cair had no doubt whatsoever. He didn’t believe in coincidence and upon learning Shanahan was related to the infamous Cat McGregor, he had known immediately who was behind the healer’s assignment.
    He lifted his legs and pushed the water from them then ran his hands through his wet hair to comb it back from his high forehead.
    “Oh, yes,” he said as he opened the shower door and hooked the plush body sheet from the hanger. “You had her sent here as surely as snuel peas make me fart,” he grumbled.
    His mother, he knew, had a way of manipulating assignments and this was surely one of her nastier moments. Perhaps this was not as nasty as her last attempt at arranging his life to her satisfaction, but spiteful all the same. Five years earlier, he had been stunned to find orders to the Foehn awaiting him when he returned from a tour of the front. The shame of it had been almost more than he could bear and when he’d confronted his mother—knowing full well she had been responsible—she had laughed at him.
    “Didn’t I tell you that if you refused to accept Arlana Byrne to wife you would suffer the consequences, Cairnan Douglas?” his mother had purred. “Running off to the front only prolonged the inevitable.”
    “Do you know what you’ve done?” he had dared to yell at his mother. “Once this assignment gets out, I’ll be a laughingstock among the other