In my stories, I wrote Malcolm as fire and gold and power, but here in my arms, Colin is cedar, silver, and summer air.

You know... It’s been a long time since I’ve been that nervous.” “You were nervous?” I ask. “Why?” “I’m making love to a romance author,” he explains with a grin. “Your standards are high.” “My standards are fictional.

After walking the Royal Mile, we visit Edinburgh Castle. Overlooking the city from the grassy hilltop of the Castle Rock, the fortress itself looks as though it has been carved from the very stone upon which it sits. It is powerful yet elegant, lavish yet wholly inviting to anyone fortunate enough to find themselves standing at the castle gate. These are doors and walls and windows that have seen kings and queens, saints and sinners, voyagers from all corners of the world. And now us.

Tonight, Dunadhar Castle is ours.

Okay, he’s hinting at something. I may not know a lot about men, but I do know something about dialogue. It’s the only thing my editors say I’m really good at. Because it’s fairly obvious I don’t excel at grammar. Or plausible storylines.

I’m taking it all in and I’m thinking about magic. Not the fairy tale kind of magic or the witchcraft you’d learn at Hogwarts, but the magic that we, as humans, typically tend to overlook. Because it’s everywhere. It exists in everything. It exists in books and in castles, in forests and in mountains. It guards secrets and guides spirits and reassures time and time again that there is more to our existence than we could ever hope to know.

God, can you imagine what discovering the Loch Ness Monster would do to Luke's ego?

There, standing before the mausoleum, Michael’s anxiety skyrocketed. His heart raced. His head spun. His stomach turned. For a few moments, he really thought he was going to have to run to the bushes and puke. He’d never heard of a ghost being able to actually curse someone, but he didn’t want to risk it by vomiting on Bluidy Mackenzie’s front lawn.

Is this one of those bizarre instances where someone stepped on a bug and accidentally rewove the tapestry of fate? Because I'm pretty sure if the universe were in any sort of proper alignment, I would not have ended up in Colin Ward's arms in a hotel room in Inverness.