“You?You mean you should terrify me.”
He cleared his throat again.“That doesn’t matter.What I’m saying is… no more sneaking into forges and practicing in the dark.Do you understand.This isyourforge.Use it in the daylight.No matter who sees.Now, I have some hemlock to plant, so… enjoy.”
More footsteps, retreating.
There the gold, there the lead, arranged with others alphabetically.
“Wait.”She swung around, found him in the doorway.He stopped but did not turn around.“Would you mind terribly much if I kissed you right now?”
“Holy Hades,” he hissed “How many times are you going to ask that?”The words rumbled out of him, so low and dark they seemed to roll a storm across the room.
“I… I know I shouldn’t.But if you didn’t want me to kiss you, you would not have done what you did, what no one else I’ve ever known has done for me.”
“And just what is that?”
“Care about what I want.”
He threw his hands up.“I don’t care.”
Nothing left to do after that but laugh.“I don’t believe you.”
Then he was on her, one hand on her neck, wrapped tight, tilting her chin up as he bent down.Her lips felt swollen already.He’d not even touched them.
“I don’t care about anyone but myself,” he growled.“And I don’t want a kiss given out of gratitude.”He threw her away.
She steadied after stumbling backward several steps.“I am grateful.How can I not be?”
“It’s easily done.I did it most my life without thinking.”
“Without thinking.God, what I wouldn’t give to do something, anythingwithout thinking.But every step I take is carefully weighed and measured.Because I’m a woman.Because my family’s reputation is precarious.Because any wrong step from me could ruin, further, my brothers and sisters.And here you come.”She strode forward, hands clenched into fists at her belly.“Telling me to be brave, to take what I want.And when I try to.Finally.You tell me to behave.”
“What do you want?”One large step decimated the distance between them.“And what is that?Akiss?Put your back to the hammer, Sybil, and make some other dream come true.”He spun.
She caught him.“Yes.A kiss.And…” A whisper as she slipped her hand from his shoulder to his wrist, tracing her fingers down the wrinkled linen of his shirtsleeves.“And to know…” Hestia help her.She shouldn’t.But she couldn’t deny this newly born part of her, especially not to the one man of her acquaintance who might actually meet her with something other than a scoff, a gasp, a mandatory trip north for her own good.
She closed her eyes, held his wrist loosely like a fine, gold bangle.“There’s an ache between my legs, Apollo.You put it there.And I dream every night of how you might relieve it.”
“No.”He tried to shake her off, but she wouldn’t be denied.
Holding him so tightly she felt his pulse pounding against her thumb, she said, “I want to know.”
“No.”
“Then…” Releasing him felt almost impossible, but she did, managing to turn from him as well.But facing the forge, the dream he’d brought to life for her only broke her into pieces.“I will… I will put this fancy behind me.I must focus on the device, anyway.I do not need distractions.And if… and if I wish to know what you will not show me, I… I’ll find a fellow in the village.To… initiate me into the ways of the world and?—”
A large hand slammed onto her shoulder, whirled her around.They were nose to nose, his chest heaving against her own.“You’ll what?With another fellow.From the village.”
“Find out more about the ache between my legs, what will make it go away.”
Hands like a belt at her waist, he swept her into the air.Her feet dangled as she careened through the room.He plopped her onto the worktable and slapped his palms onto the surface on either side of her hips.His eyes were cold.
“Does your brother know?”he growled.
“K-know what?”She only just kept her teeth from chattering.She’d never seen him so bleak-eyed, so dangerous.
“What a hellion you are.Don’t answer that.Of course he doesn’t.”The ice in his eyes was melting as his gaze roved her face.“You hide yourself well from everyone, princess.”His hand consumed her lower back and pulled her forward as he stepped between her legs.“Except for me.”
Her inner thighs brushed his hips through layers of linen.She squeezed her muscles, shackling him between her legs; an action without thought, a proprietary reflex born of pure lust.
