“My lord,” the Ladeshian said, turning to Logan. “We mourn your loss.” He bowed again and walked out.
Logan shook his head. “Was that a bachelor joke?”
“I don’t know. I visited Ladesh once, and I never did understand their humor. Maybe I should take this upstairs.”
“Here I thought we were about to have the big father-son dialectic about marital intimacies.”
Count Drake smiled. “You put it so primly.”
“Serah’s pretty prim,” Logan said.
“Believe me, there’s nothing prim about marital intimacies, Logan.” Count Drake looked at the arrow in his hand and put it aside. “Well, the first thing you have to understand about lovemaking is . . .”
Viridiana rubbed her shoulder and said, “It’s so nice to see someone nice I thought this place was going to be awful to work at after how mean Mistress Bronwyn was you don’t mind do you?”
“No, not at all,” Kylar said, not really sure what he was not minding, but sure that he wasn’t supposed to.
As if it were the most natural thing in the world, Viridiana untied the laces of her bodice, which Kylar had already noticed was unusually tight. “Oh, that’s better,” she said, drawing a deep breath. She closed and locked the door and then walked over to the buckets, peeling off her bodice and dropping it.
“Um,” Kylar said. Then Viridiana bent over to pick up the water buckets again.
She must have had six feet of cleavage, because Kylar was totally lost in it. His mouth opened, but no words came out. It was with an unseemly amount of effort that he pulled his eyes up. Viridiana was watching him, and even as his face got hot, he saw that she was anything but displeased. With a deft twist, she released her tightly bound hair, and it cascaded around her face in long curls. “Are you ready for your bath, my lord?”
“No! I mean—I mean—”
“You want to bathe after,” she said, walking forward. She reached behind her back and started opening buttons.
After? Kylar stepped back, but his resistance was crumbling. Why not? What the hell have I been waiting for? For Elene? Viridiana filled his vision, full lips, gorgeous hair that he could practically feel already in his fingertips, on his chest. Those breasts. Those hips. And she wanted him. It would be sex, just sex, not lovemaking. Not some grand expression of romance and commitment. Just passion. Simpler. More like Momma K’s version of things. Less like Count Drake’s version. But damn. Her body was more persuasive than a room full of scholars.
His calves hit his bed and he almost fell. “I, I don’t really feel very comf—”
Her hand came up to his chest, and then she slammed it into him. He was falling back as her other hand came up from behind her dress in a glimmering metallic arc.
By the time his back hit the bed, she was straddling him, her knees pinning his arms to his sides, one hand grabbing his hair, the other pressing the knife to his neck.
“Comfortable?” she asked, finishing his sentence. She wasn’t kidding with the knife; it was pressed against the side of his neck just at the point where a little pressure would break the skin, and it was poised over an artery. As his lungs filled with gasps of air, he had to try not to move his neck.
“Ah, shit,” he said. “You’re Hu Gibbet’s apprentice, Vi. Viridiana, Vi, how’d I miss it?”
She smiled joylessly. “Who’re you working for? The prince was my deader.”
“Seriously. How embarrassing. To be taken in by another wetboy. Hmm. Or are you a wetgirl?”
“Not the way you’re hoping.” She ground her hips against him and he blushed.
She pinched his cheek. “You aren’t too ugly, you know. It’ll be a shame to kill you.”
“The shame’s all mine, I assure you.”
“Don’t feel bad,” she said. “Part of my Talent is a glamour. It’s to your credit you weren’t actually drooling.”
“You mean those are an illus—”
“Move your hands and die,” she said. “The body’s real, thanks.”
“I should say thank you, but this knife at my throat is muting my appreciation some.”
“If you’re trying to charm your way out of this, you need practice. Who’re you working for?”
“You’re working for the king,” Kylar said. “Aren’t you?”
“Backbone,” she said. “I like that.”
“Wetting myself would be awfully messy for both of us,” Kylar said. She chuckled and he smiled as charmingly as he could. “Was that better?”
“Better. I’ll give you one for effort. I took this job