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His eyes glitter in a way that is decidedly not helping my heartrate. My eyes keep drifting to his naked torso, his muscled body painfully pleasing to look at.

Focus, Burns.

“Um … they should make you feel good,” I run my hands over the surface of the water. “But again, dating someone—having a girlfriend or boyfriend—is not the same as what Ruth and Rob had. They were soulmates, and as far as I can tell, soulmates bring out the best in each other.” Unlike all my exes, who’d brought out my worst traits.

“They’re the ones you’d want to spend all of your minutes with,” Pestilence adds, connecting this conversation to the earlier one we had. He’s looking at me like he’s having a lightbulb moment.

“Uh, yeah,” I agree. I didn’t realize how carefully he’s been hanging onto my words. “I think when you find the one, you’d want to spend all the minutes you have with them.”

“And how does one know when they’ve found … the one?” Pestilence probes, his gaze searching mine.

I give him a hopeless look. “Beats the hell out of me. I’ve never met a man who’s made me feel like that.”

Liar, a traitorous part of my brain whispers. This conversation is getting dangerously close to Things that Make Sara Burns Wickedly Uncomfortable.

Pestilence scowls at that answer.

Abruptly I rearrange my body, my leg sliding out of the horseman’s grip. At the action, the horseman’s gaze drops to my exposed breasts.

He looks utterly transfixed by the sight of them.

You know, it ain’t half bad, being the first woman this dude has come across. My body is riddled with flaws, yet he stares at it like it was crafted by a master hand.

What would happen if I gave into that look?

It’s alright to care about him—even to love him.Ruth’s words echo through my head.

This isn’t love, but itissomething.

Acting on impulse, I move my slick body onto his thighs.

Don’t overthink this.

Leaning forward, I brush a kiss across his lips.

His hands skim up my torso, his thumbs grazing the underside of my breasts. But that’s as far as he’ll go. I bite back an impatient moan. Moving myself onto his lap should be evidence enough that I want things to progress, but Pestilence doesn’t understand cues, and even if he did, I’m not sure the noble horseman would act on this one anyway.

Going to have to spearhead this.

I take his hands, and place them over my breasts.

He sucks in a breath. “Sara—”

“You can touch me,” I say. “I would like it if you touched me.”

His hands remain unmoving.

Okay, if he doesn’t do something in the next few seconds, I might die of mortification.

“Please.” It slips out, completely by accident.

Oh, motherfuckery.

Pestilence lets out a groan.

“I shouldn’t,” he says, his eyes transfixed on my chest, “not when you fling that word at me, and not when you offer up your flesh. But I find … I do not have it in me … to resist this plea.”

Bless all the freaking saints, I nearly climax at the feel of his hands as they kneed my breasts.