Page 54 of A Treacherous Trade
I swallowed, finding myself incapable of meeting his gaze.
Did he know what transpired between Night Horse and me this very night? Had he any feelings about it one way or the other?
Why would he?
“We shouldn’t be speaking of such things,” I said, sounding as if I’d run apace.
“Why not? If desire is what you require… you need look no further than an offer I’ve made to you in the past.” He straightened, running two fingertips over the glossy surface of his desk as he carefully made his way around it only to lean a hip against the front ledge.
Now we had no barrier between us but a few steps and the layers of our clothing.
“I owe you a boon,” he said, his lids falling to half-mast. “One I could repay to you in my bed, if you asked.”
For some inexplicable reason, moisture flooded my mouth.
And temper flooded my veins.
“You truly are ruthless,” I said. My gloves made a rude noise against the half-forgotten champagne glass I still clutched. “Ruthless and—andaudacious.”
His expression was all bemused innocence as he pressed a hand to his chest. “Moi?”
I stood, discarding my glass to a table so I could gesture at him furiously. “You’d get me to take you to bed, to give you my virginity, and then have the nerve to call it a favorto me?I’d laugh if I wasn’t so flabbergasted just now. The utter cheek of it!”
His devilish chuckle washed me in chills. “Has it ever occurred to you, Fiona, that I’m just that good?” He began a slow, graceful advance as alarming as it was unthreatening. I was struck by his fluid, lithe beauty. By the perfection in which his suit molded to his body and the precision of his shave against his regal features.
They said Lucifer was once the star of the morning. That he was favored and brilliant and the loveliest of angels.
In that moment I believed it, as I was afflicted with awe until Jorah stood before me, over me, vibrating with masculine vitality.
“You saved my life, Fiona.” He reached out, toying with a ringlet at my temple. “But you would see God before I was through with you.”
Something so girlishly giddy happened inside me that my astonishment escaped on an incredibly unladylike snort. “Oh please,” I said, desperately suppressing my surge of hysterical mirth.
Did people actually say those kinds of things to each other?
Certainly not to me.Me. Possessed of round spectacles and rounder hips.
His frown turned into a scowl, then something infinitely darker. “A less confident man would be offended,” he said drolly.
“No, no, please, forgive me.” I rushed to recover myself as he turned his back and marched to the fire, fully aware that this man’s displeasure—his offense—was often as deadly as the blade’s. “I meant nothing by it, I just—I couldn’t—” I couldn’t finish a sentence. In fact, I was afraid to address the situation one way or the other.
Again, he seemed to read my mind. “You can be honest, Fiona, as your reluctance in this regard is more insulting than anything you could say to me.”
I cocked my head. “How so?”
He speared me with a wolfish look I might have calledwounded,if the flames didn’t lick amber into his eyes. “Do you truly think I would hurt a woman for denying me her body?”
I lifted my chin. “I can’t speak to what you would do, as I do not know you. To me—to the world at large—you seem capable of anything.”
He leaned his head to one side and then another, as if weighing my words. “A fair assessment,” he concluded before turning to gaze into the fire, his features like stone. “I absolve you of all offenses, then, and give you leave to speak freely without fear of reprisal.”
If it was honesty he wanted, then… “I find that the more arrogant you are, the less attractive you become to me.”
“I find that is odd,” he replied. “And very probably wrong.”
“I beg your pardon, but I know my own mind!”
“You can beg me for anything, but it is my experience that women do not get wet for an uncomplicated, vulnerable man.”
