She grinned. This was too easy.
“Naturally,” she agreed. Rule one: always agree. “You’re better than the rest of us mere mortals. Superior.” She slipped one foot out from the blanket.
His look turned biting.
“I’m willing to bet,” she started and the slow arch of her leg tapped against his.
He didn’t look down. He was too controlled for that. He didn’t dare address the contact. She ran the tip of her shoe up his calf, applying just enough pressure so he could feel it through his boots.
“ThatIcan make you slip.”
Despite the cold of the carriage, tension and heat simmered between them. She could feel it. Hehadto feel it, his body had reacted when the mood turned electric. It was subtle, but it was there…or she could be entirely wrong. Infernal blast it, she hated not being sure.
Her last word seemed to catch him by surprise and a single eyebrow shot up. “Slip?”
“Lose control. Give in.” She narrowed her eyes and playfully twirled a strand of her hair around her finger. “Succumb to desires so intense that even your considerable..” her eyes dipped with her tone, below the belt and hopefully feeding his ego while exciting him at the same time, “resolve shatters completely to ecstasy.”
He stared at her, face considerate. Like she had just asked him which sort of tea he preferred. “My willpower is quite practiced, Miss Blair—”
“Sera.”
An argument looked to start on his lips, but with her Game hovering between them he conceded. “Very well, Sera. This is not a bet you will win.”
“Are you sure?” Her foot reached his knee and then she settled her leg, fully extended, into his lap. Her heel came dangerously close to indisputable evidence that her tactics were working. Either she was wrong or Kieran North was a savant of control. “I can always check, if you like.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, but otherwise did not acknowledge her invasive leg. Or the tiny rubbing motions of her ankle.
“What do you hope to gain?” he asked, with a tick of his head.
“Some fun, I guess.” She shrugged.And a way to make your willpower crumble so, when I need to, I can grab Seth and run. “You’re attractive. I’m turned on. What more do two adultsneed? If you’re so confident of my chances, you lose nothing by agreeing.”
“I lose plenty by agreeing. You constantly throwing yourself at me would be an incessant annoyance.”
He was so clinical. But she was not about to lose this leverage. “Fine, we can work on some ground rules. Do you accept?”
“Since you will not succeed, I will consider accepting once we’ve established rules.” He settled a hand under her calf over her stockings, letting his fingers run down the delicate curve to rest at her ankle. Tiny fissures of pleasure erupted over her skin. She’d underestimated the proficiency of his hands. “Of course, I assume I’m allowed to play?”
“I… what?” She blinked, breathless and entirely focused on the slow glide of his hand.
North shrugged as the carriage drew to a stop, but his fingers continued their languid dance over her skin.
“In fairness,” he started, as his hand closed around her ankle, drawing her leg up his chest. The move forced her position to arch downward, setting him at a more intimate, dominating angle.
Her breath was gone. Stopped. Anticipation and desire pooled between her thighs as he stared down her leg and into her eyes like nothing but her existed.
“I should be allowed my chance to rattleyou, Seraphina.”
No one called her Seraphina. No one. And fuck if the smooth, liquid timbre of his voice didn’t make her own name erotic.
Oh shit. This wasnothow the Game was supposed to work.
He shifted her leg away from his chest. And dropped it on the seat beside him.
“I believe we have arrived,” he said, entirely at ease.
Her body was humming. Vibrating even as his words had doused her as efficiently as ice. Well, that cleared up one thing. He was no fucking innocent in any form of the word.
She breathed through clenched teeth. As her heart settled into a less frantic rhythm, Sera seethed while he remained the picture of unassailable. Shuffling toward the door, Sera balled up the blanket and threw it into his face.
