Page 92
Lately she’d even caught herself wondering what it might be like if she took him into her bed.
To be sure, it was one of the worst ideas she’d ever had. He might kill her accidentally. For the love of mercy, he could hardly hold a pencil without breaking it.
But somehow she couldn’t imagine he would be as rough and hasty as Gil. For all his size, Mad had a gentle way about him.
“There are some good words that start with K,” she said casually, drawing closer to him. “You wouldn’t want to spell ’em wrong.”
“What words?”
“King.”
Mad responded with a surly shake of his head. “Don’t need that one.”
“Kite.”
“That one neither.”
“Kiss.”
Mad looked at her alertly, his scowl fading. His arms loosened and lowered. June’s nerves started jumping as the silence between them lengthened. She knew he was wondering what she wanted. But she stayed quiet, curious about what he would do.
He turned to the sand tray, drew a precise K with a fingertip, and turned back on the stool to face her, one long leg braced on the floor.
June inched forward until she stood between his thighs. Cautiously she drew closer, closer, while he held stock-still as if to keep from scaring her off. His beard was so heavy that even close-shaven it left a shadow beneath the skin. She pressed her lips against his face, close to the corner of his mouth, and heard him stop breathing. The heat and bristle felt pleasant against her lips. And the smell of him was nice, a mix of leather polish and horses and soap.
Drawing back a few inches, she looked into his light gray eyes.
Without breaking their shared gaze, Mad reached over to the sand tray and drew another K.
Cheeky bugger, June thought, her quick laugh riding on a shivery breath. His hands came to her face, cupping her cheeks as if he were holding something fragile.
She closed her eyes and waited. A light, warm pressure came to her lips, as soft as a lick of firelight or a brush of silk. The kiss lingered sweetly, easing her into something she’d always imagined a swoon was like, a dreaming-awake feeling. Eventually his head lifted and he took in her reaction.
June hadn’t been aware of moving, but now she found herself tucked right between his thighs, her hands resting on the broad expanse of his shoulders.
He glanced at the sand tray, reached out once more, and gave it a deft shake with one hand to smooth the surface. This time he wrote a K so huge, it covered the entire tray.
A giggle fluttered in her throat. She felt girlish as she hadn’t in years. She leaned against him willingly, offering up her lips as his arms went around her. This was nothing at all like the puckering or mashing kisses she’d had in the past . . . he was feeling her mouth with his . . . playful and sensual. Learning what she liked, what excited her. It wasn’t a kiss that took but gave.
When his dark head finally lifted, June felt weak-kneed and stunned beyond words.
Mad reached up to straighten the cloth she’d tied around her hair and toyed with a few tiny curls that had sprung free at the edge. “I’ll learn K for that,” he said, and turned back to the sand tray to start practicing.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Temper in a Teapot
There are times when ignoring the elephant in the room only encourages it to demolish the furniture and chew up the ficus.
During the three days since the tertulia, John’s ongoing effort to pretend the situation was ordinary only seemed to underline how different it had become. His interactions with Reina were now brief and gruesomely polite, with none of the lively debates they’d had before. As they discussed errands to be run, items to be ordered, a meeting or luncheon she would soon attend, Reina never quite met his gaze. Her cheerful façade had cracked and frayed at the edges like an oilcloth umbrella.
He wondered if she regretted that night. God knew he did. Every bloody minute of it.
The kiss most of all.
Whenever they were in the same room, the memory of that kiss hung in the air like one of those painted railway signs: DO NOT CROSS THE LINE or COMMIT NO NUISANCE.
He couldn’t stop thinking about the taste of her skin, tear-salted and honey-sweet. The beautiful arcs of her collarbone, and the feel of her breathing against him. The supple power of her yielding beneath his hands.
