Page 31 of Bargaining with the Devil

He stripped off his outer layer, followed by his coat. Both were soaked through. She shrugged out of her dripping cloak and hung it on a loose nail. “If you hand those here, I believe there are a few nails that will do to hang them.”

He passed the sopping fabric to her. “Aye, ’twill dry faster that way, but they won’t do us much good tonight keeping warm.”

As if he’d summoned the response from her, she shivered. The hut wasn’t so airtight as to prevent the wind from forcing its way in as it gusted and roared.

The candle guttered but stayed lit. Quinn moved it to a more sheltered location out of the draft’s direct line and rummaged around in a wooden crate, coming up with a tattered woollen blanket.

He shook it out. “’Tisn’t the cleanest one I’ve seen, but no mice fell out, so that’s something.”

She asked despite herself, “And if mice had fallen out?”

He smiled. “I’d be using it anyway. Sharing with them, I suppose. Don’t know if I’d have the heart to deny them their snug bed. Of course, I might be sleeping with them anyway. ’Twould be a surprise if there aren’t a few nesting in the straw.”

It tickled her fancy, envisioning a man as hard as Quinn too tenderhearted to move mice from their beds. She tried to hide her smile.

“Ah, ’twould be grand if you did that more,” he said softly.

“Do what?”

“Smile like that. It lights your face, a mhuirnín.”

It was not, as compliments went, the most fulsome she’d received nor the most polished . . . and she liked it far better than any of those.

He had his waistcoat buttons entirely undone. The sodden fabric plopped on the floor when he tossed it aside. He started tugging his shirt hem free from his trousers.

She started. “What are you doing?”

“You have eyes in your head, a stór, and fine blue ones they are. What does it look like I’m doing?”

“Keep your clothes on.” She felt the slightest bit alarmed. Not by him, in and of himself, but by the prospect of his partial nudity, again. When his skin showed, she couldn’t seem to keep control of her eyes around him, to say nothing of her hands.

He paused, eyes meeting hers. “’Tis nothing here you haven’t already seen.”

Nothing I haven’t already seen . . . She had, hadn’t she? Looked for quite a bit longer than she should have, all things considered. And see where that had led her afterwards, back against her chamber door. Then kissing him like a starved woman yesterday.

But just because she’d wanted those things didn’t mean him undressing at this precise moment was a good idea. In fact, it was a very bad idea.

“Stop.” Her voice held less authority than she intended because he’d unbuttoned the neck of his shirt and his collarbone showed.

His collarbone. She was entranced by his collarbone. Ridiculous.

He sighed, pausing for the barest moment. “I’d like to respect your sensibilities. Truly, I would. But I’ll not catch my death of cold in wet clothing. ’Twasn’t my choice to have them end up in this condition.”

“No?” And now she was irritated again—by him undressing and by her response to it, colored by guilt. “You needn’t have followed me.”

“No?” he echoed. “An’ I hadn’t, ye’d have washed up on the coast below Rascarrel sometime next week, I reckon.” He’d lost his humor again, his brogue thickening, except his voice was much flatter than hers had been. “The fuckin’ tide was halfway in already when you started across. ’Twas falling dark. And any fool could read what these waves mean, what the sunset clouds were bringin’.”

“Are you calling me a fool?”

“Aye,” he said. “I suppose I am.”

“You needn’t have followed me,” she repeated.

“I told you afore, a stór.” His gaze was very direct. “’Twas no choice at all, that. Followin’ you. And what I said earlier stands, marching across the bay.”

“Which part?” He’d said a lot of things.

“The bit about letting it out. Getting mad or sad or anything at all, other than not dealin’ with it, stops you caring about endangering yourself.”