Page 85 of Treachery in Death

“They’re a little creepy, but interesting.” She looked at him now. “You stay home more than you used to. Don’t travel nearly as much as you did before. It would probably be easier for you to handle some of the stuff on site—wherever—but you don’t unless you have to.”

“I have more reason to be home than I once did. I’m glad of it. Every day, I’m glad of it.”

“I changed your life.” She looked down at the peach they shared. “You changed mine. I’m glad of it.” And back up, into his eyes. “Every day, I’m glad of it. I’d like a little pond, and maybe something to sit on so we could watch the creepy, interesting fish.”

“That would suit me very well.”

She linked her arms around his neck, laid her cheek on his. Love finds a way, she thought.

“I didn’t follow logic,” she murmured. “Even when I told myself it was inappropriate, it was impossible. I couldn’t. Everything inside me needed you, like breath. No matter what I told myself, I had to breathe. I’d been loved before. Webster thought he did even if I didn’t recognize it, even if I couldn’t give it back. And I had a different kind of love with Mavis, with Feeney. I loved them. I had enough in me for that, and I can look back at who I was and be grateful I did.”

She closed her eyes, drew him in. Like breath. “But I didn’t know how much there was, what there could be. What I could be, before you.

“Before you, there was no one I’d want to walk with. No one I’d want to sit by a little pond with. No one,” she said again, easing back to look at his face, “before you.”

He took her lips softly, letting them both sink into the kiss, into the moment. Into the tenderness.

Sweet, like the peach that rolled out of her hand as they lowered to the ground—and quiet, like the air that whispered around them with the scents of ripened peaches, summer flowers, green, green grass.

She rested a hand on his cheek, tracing down to the strong line of his jaw. His face, she thought, so precious to her. Every look, every glance, every smile, every frown. The first time she’d seen it something had shifted in her. And everything she’d closed off, maybe to survive to that point, had begun to struggle free.

Love shimmered through her, and joy followed.

She gave, offering him her heart, her body, moving with him as elegantly as in a waltz. Not a warrior tonight, he thought, but only a woman. One with a flower in her hair, and the heart she offered in her eyes.

And the woman moved him, unbearably.

“A grha.” His lips roamed her face while the words he murmured came through his own heart, through his blood, in Irish. Foolish words, tender words she wouldn’t understand, but would only feel.

“Yes,” she said, when their lips met again. “Yes. And you’re mine.”

She touched him, sliding his jacket aside, loosening his tie. And smiled. “Always so many clothes.”

He slid her jacket off as well, released her weapon harness. “Always armed.”

“Disarm me.” In a gesture of surrender she raised her arms over her head.

He watched her as he shoved her weapon aside, as he drew her shirt, her tank over her head and bared her to the dapple of evening sun.

Watched as he skimmed his hands over her skin, as he rounded them over firm breasts. She sighed out her pleasure as her eyes went heavy. Then he lowered his head, sampled her, savored her. Stirred her toward moans as he traced his tongue down her torso.

She felt those nimble fingers unhook her belt, and her breath quickened at their touch, at the anticipation of more. He stripped her, inch by inch, using those nimble fingers, his lips, his tongue to saturate her in sensation—slow, steady waves that rolled over her, rolled through her until she was drenched.

Dazzled, dazed, she reached for him, found his lips again with hers. Struggling to take her time, as he had, she touched, and bared. She sampled and savored.

Undid him, he thought. She undid him. She always could. She could make him feel weak as water, strong as a god all at once, and more a man than he’d ever hoped to be. With her, it was more than the thrill of flesh against flesh, more than the heat and beat in the blood.

Love was a gift shared.

When he eased into her, the gift was sweet, and tender. Again, her hand rested on his cheek. Again he watched her heart fill her eyes. Watched until his own flew into them.

She lay quiet for a time, stroking his hair, content to stay pinned under his weight.

“It was a really nice walk,” she said at last.

“Good, healthy exercise, walking.”

She laughed. “I feel pretty healthy right now. Hungry, too.”

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