Her fingers brushed the tip of him through his trews, though she slowed her exploration at his warning.
A groan escaped his lips before he moved them to her neck, realizing that he needed to distract her before this got too far. A kiss was one thing.
Thatwas quite another.
Diarmid slid one hand onto her breast, rubbing his thumb over her peaked nipple. He captured her moan of pleasure, returning his lips to hers, kissing her so thoroughly thatthiswould be the kiss she always remembered. He was rough. Demanding. Hungry.
He made certain she felt how desperately he wanted her.
He made certain he ruined her for all future kisses.
He didn’t stop until both of them were out of breath and their hands couldn’t keep from roaming to dangerous places. And when he did finally pull away, he grabbed his shirt off the ground and started walking.
Before he got himself into real trouble.
Chapter Twenty-One
Perhaps, Cara admittedto herself over dinner that eve, kissing Diarmid had been a mistake. She didn’t doubt for a moment that it had helped her grow comfortable enough with the act to attempt it with Sitric. No, that part had worked according to plan.
It was everything else that had gone sideways.
That kiss had woken something within her, something that had been stirring since she’d met Diarmid. It had all come back to her as he held her in his arms, as his lips danced with hers. Cara remembered more of the person she’d been before Torna.
It had also piqued her curiosity. Cara had expected the kiss to be as dull as all her previous experiences with intimacy had been. Though Torna had filled her with desire, the moment he’d touched her everything went cold.
She had expected to feel absolutely nothing. Instead, she’d been about ready to takeher ownclothes off. And she’d been devastated when the kiss had ended, leaving her oddly aware of her own body, and the fact that it was no longer pressed against Diarmid’s.
Worst of all, Diarmid seemed more determined than usual to avoid her. She promised him that if he helped her with the kiss, she would leave him alone. Apparently, that was what he wanted, though she’d rather hoped not.
She should want Sitric to accept the betrothal. She shouldn’t want Diarmid to fight for her, to show any interest in her at all.Which made it all the more infuriating that she continued to glance his way, hoping for one of those smiles.
After dinner, the servants cleared away the meal and brought out more wine, more ale, and plenty of game boards and knucklebones. Sitric, much like Diarmid, appeared determined to wring as much enjoyment from his life as possible. Though Cara wasn’t overly fond of gaming or drinking, she realized that she could learn a thing or two from their habits.
That, and the longer she stayed in the hall, the greater a chance that Diarmid would have to acknowledge her eventually. Cara didn’t know precisely what she wanted with him, she just knew that she couldn’t lose the first friend she’d made in five years. Not yet.
When she didn’t rise to leave for her room, Sitric looked at her askance, smiling. “Are you going to join us?”
“I’ve not played a game since I was a child,” she told him. “I thought it was time to give it another try.”
She dared a glance at Diarmid, who still didn’t look up.
“I’d suggest knucklebones, then,” Sitric said, emptying a small leather bag that sat before them. Five white bones tumbled onto the worn tabletop.
“We take turns trying to play the trick. If you fail, you take a drink. If you succeed, everyone else does. Of course, if you’d rather not drink, I’d be happy to drink your share.”
If she was going to play, she was going to do it properly. She’d not had a lick of drink since that night. Surely, one game wouldn’t kill her. “I prefer wine, if that’s acceptable.”
From the corner of her eye, she saw Diarmid’s head spin toward her.
“For the first round, you toss them up, then catch them. Like this.” Sitric threw the bones and caught all five in his hand, just as he’d instructed, before handing them to Cara. Everyone at the table took a drink.
“It seems to me,” Cara observed, ignoring the warm, tingling trickle of the wine down her throat, “that someone with larger hands is at an advantage in this game.”
“I’m afraid you’re right,” Sitric agreed. “And you’ll be at a further disadvantage since we’ve been playing every night,” he chuckled.
Cara took the bones from Sitric, testing the weight of them in her hands. There was nothing for it. She tossed them, just as she’d seen Sitric do, and dropped all but one. The table erupted into shouts for her to take a drink, which was oddly comforting in spite of her horrendous failure. She felt a connection to the other players as they laughed and waited their turns.
“You made it look deceptively easy,” Cara accused Sitric, taking her second drink of wine in as many turns.
