“Kiss me, Helen.”
She shook her head. He took his hand off her mound.
“Kiss me,” he commanded.
She turned her face back to him and he was shocked to see tears in her eyes.
“Ye. Said. That’s. Enough. Kissing.”
He suddenly realized every time she spoke in this staccato cadence, these choked words, she was keeping herself from crying. But she hadn’t been able to keep herself from crying this time. For whatever reason,that’s enough kissinghad hurt her more than anything else he had ever said or done during their acquaintance.
“I meant at that particular moment.”
“Do ye know what yer problem is?” She got up on an elbow. “Ye have nae imagination. Ye should be putting yerself in my mind. Thinking ‘oh, if I were an untouched maiden, I would want such and such.’ And in my case, that might be unlimited kissing. But nae, ye do what ye want. Ye treat me as if I were a trollop who had been pleasured by hundreds of men.”
Jack’s temper flared. “And you? Are you thinking ofme?What I want?”
“Do ye think I have ever told any other man they are like a sunrise or the stars?”
“So you don’t really think that? You said it just to please me?” he growled.
“Nae, ’tis true. ’Tis what I think about ye. But even if it were true about any other man, I widnae have told him. Only ye. Because I thought ye would like it and would want to hear it.”
He had liked it. He had wanted to hear it. Her words had stroked and soothed a wounded part of him he kept stuffed away. But how had she known?
“Why did you think I would like that?”
“Because ’tis how ye yerself talk to women. Ye give yerself away.”
He shook his head. “I’m a scoundrel.”
“Be careful, Jack Pike. Ye keep saying that, someday ye will believe it.” She sat up. “I’m going back to my own bed.”
He grabbed her arm. “No. I’ll give you unlimited kissing.”
“’Tis late. I’ll give myself my own relief, and ye can train me tomorrow.” She wrenched herself away and leaned over, feeling on the floor for her nightdress.
“Who knows what will happen tomorrow, Helen?” He stroked her naked back, her delicate spine and ribs cushioned only by muscle and skin. “I could be set on by a wolf and killed. You would never get your training.”
She sat back up and met his eyes. “Or I could meet a mercenary Highlander heading home from the wars. One with an enormous cock who thinks I’m the perfect sweetheart for him. And he could give me my training.”
Even though he knew she was taunting him, he did not like the sound of this mercenary Highlander and his enormous cock. Not at all.
“The wars are long over.”
“There are nae more wolves in Scotland, Jack.”
“I know what the duke wants, Helen. A mercenary wouldn’t.” He willed himself not to let his gaze slip to her breasts but to keep his eyes on hers.
She shook her head. “Och. Ye look at me with those earnest puppy eyes,mo luran, and what am I to do? How can I leave yer bed?”
“You can’t.”
“Well, hurry up. ’Tis late. The dawn will be here before ye know it.”
“You can’t hurry a painter, Helen.” He stroked her cheek with one finger. “Or a poet. Or a lover.” She snorted. He leaned forward. “May I kiss you?”
“Aye,” she whispered, suddenly all softness.
