Page 36 of Bargaining with the Devil

“’Tis like that, is it?” he said low.

Yes. It’s precisely like that.

His fingers started to move again—and then stopped. “I want to believe you, a stór. I do. I want . . .” He’d gone very tense behind her. Fighting himself?

She’d been fighting herself all this time. Fighting memories. She was tired of it.

“I want you,” she whispered. “I want you to touch me. Perhaps nothing more than that. I don’t know yet. But . . . Please.” She swallowed. “Please.”

She didn’t blame him if he was hesitant now, not after the way she’d acted earlier today. A kiss, and she’d tried to make sense of it with whisky. A confession on the cliffside, and she’d tromped here afterwards. She’d overreacted and pushed him away, and now if he had any sense at all, he’d deny her. Kindly; he wouldn’t mock her. But it was the reasonable action—not touching her.

“I don’t want to cause you upset afterwards when you’ve had time to think it through,” he said carefully. “You’re working through some of it now, sure, and ’tis something grand, that. I’m glad for it, a stór, more than I can say. But I don’t want to be the one, brings back old memories for you.”

“I want new memories,” she whispered. “With you. But I won’t blame you if you don’t trust me to mean that. Not after how irrationally I acted earlier.”

His fingers remained still. “I wouldn’t say ’twas irrational, exactly.” He was still pressed fully against her back; his chest moved with each word. “But I don’t want to wake in the morning and find you’ve struck off for the sea again. Or see regret in your eyes. Or worse . . .”

She waited, but he didn’t finish wherever that thought had been going. “Or worse?” she asked softly.

“Or worse, fear.” His breath was warm on her neck. “I don’t want you fearing me, a mhuirnín.”

Even with it dark already, facing away from him, she squeezed her eyes shut. “I don’t fear you.” With some effort, given the pallet’s condition and the condition of her nerves, she turned onto her back, then rolled to face Quinn. “I’ve never feared you.” She set a hand on his jaw, stubble prickling her palm. “But I understand if you don’t believe me that I know my own mind on this. Or . . . want me.”

He came up beside her on one elbow. Fingers brushed her cheek as he exhaled audibly. “I’ll be straight with you, a mhuirnín, I don’t know if ’tis wise, this.” His hand slipped down along her jaw. “But ’tisn’t for not wanting you.” His lips brushed hers: warm, soft, surprisingly tender. “Do you trust me?”

The quiet, earnest question tugged at her. Trust had never mattered before. She hadn’t known better with Teddy. She’d had little choice with Cuvelier. Although she did not want to think about Teddy right now, or Cuvelier, but perhaps that was unrealistic. Perhaps that was even the point. Quinn was not them. He was only himself.

And this deep ache, this coiling in her stomach, was new. No one had roused it before. No one except Quinn.

“Do you trust me, Lucy?” he asked again.

“Yes,” she breathed. “It was myself I didn’t trust before, but now . . .” She took his face in her hands and pulled him closer.

“We’ll try just a bit of this then and see, aye?” And he let her pull him all the way in.

His kisses were rich, complex, intoxicating, heady as whisky and sweet as wine. She gave herself over to them, to him, and just . . . trusted. Not blindly, like before, but because now she did know better.

She told him, with her mouth, with her hands on his body, with her legs twined to his, that it was what she wanted. But he kept to his word. It was merely kissing, although truthfully, there was no merely to it. But she did want more, and he’d need to hear those words.

“I haven’t changed my mind,” she said when her mouth was temporarily unoccupied with exploring his skin. “I do want more.”

He pulled back enough to touch her face. “’Tisn’t just how good this feels talking for you in the moment?”

“No.” She set his hand just above her knee where the hem of her shift ended. “Not this time.”

“Then we’ll try a bit more.” He slid that hand beneath the shift and gently nudged her thighs apart with the other.

It was agony—delicious agony—as he set about discovering the outline of her leg and the texture of her skin. She was holding her breath by the time his hand moved from her hip across to her navel and then slipped carefully lower. Her breath left her on a rush when one finger grazed over her most sensitive spot. He did it again, and she whimpered.

“You like that, a mhuirnín? Then I hope you’ll like the rest of it.” His voice was low, dark, hungry. It didn’t scare her.

She was hungry too.

She arched under him at the next pass of his finger. Opened her legs farther—or tried to. Her shift wasn’t cooperating.

His hands fumbled it out of the way, enough so she had freer movement. She wanted the fabric gone entirely, wanted him against her, but didn’t quite know how to ask. This was something real. And raw. Perhaps even rare. And she had no script for that.

But he knew, somehow, what she wasn’t saying. “We’ll be getting this wet cloth out of the way. You want to do it or should I?”