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“Yer lips were near swollen when I came in. Do ye mean to deny it? Or did someone else strike you outside as well?”

Hit by lust, and that blow had Alex’s name on it.

I can feel heat rising all the way to my face.

The traitor in me smiles before I mean to.

Ellen’s eyes widen the slightest bit.

Then, despite her lip, despite the bruise, despite everything, she grins fully.

“Oh,” she says.

I groan and put a hand over my face. “Don’t start.”

“I fully mean to start in like ye’ve done to me so many times before.”

“Ye’re wounded and need rest.”

She scoffs. “I’m not dead.”

“That remains to be seen if ya keep at me.”

Ellen laughs outright now, then winces at the pull of it. “Was it at least good?”

I lower my hand to peer at her over my fingers. “The kiss or the press of his cock into my stomach?”

Her expression turns downright wicked.

“Róisín Regan, ye shameless wee whoor!”

“Don’t say it like that!”

“Like what?”

“Like I’ve scandalised myself.”

“Ye’ve scandalised me with this knowledge,” she says, still grinning. “Though I confess, I’m deeply interested, regardless of what you say.”

I groan again.

She leans closer, eyes alight in a way I have missed sorely these past few hours. “Tell me everything.”

“There’s not much to tell,” I mutter.

“Ach, there’d better be.”

“There isn’t,” I insist, vexed all over again by the memory of it. “Maeve interrupted us before matters could go much further.”

Ellen presses a hand to her chest in mock despair. “Oh, my. What a tragedy.”

“It was,” I say darkly. “I was quite attached to what was happenin’.”

That wins another laugh from her, softer this time.

“So… what happens next?” she asks.

I hesitate only a second.