Page 151 of Blood Stone

They both stared at her.

“I’m sewn into it,” she explained. “You’re literally going to have to unpick stitches to get it off me.”

Garrett looked stricken. “Roman – you worked for that tailor…”

“I did his books! Fuck, don’t melt, Calum. They’re tiny threads.” Roman waved him away. “Show her the bedroom. I’ll scare up some scissors.”

Kate giggled as Garrett pulled her up the stairs. “Clearly, you’re better with a blade the size of a broadsword than a little pair of scissors.”

Garrett looked about at the top of the stairs, spotted the bedroom and led her into it. “Roman’s more used to domestic stuff than me. He’s been married. I never got there.”

“Not once? Not even living with someone?”

Garrett shrugged. “Roman, on and off, but living with a man is different. You share accommodation and go on your usual way. Living with a woman changes you. I’ve watched it happen to Roman. After Mary I wouldn’t bring that sort of risk to another woman, so I suppose you could say I never got domesticated.”

Kate stared at him in horror. Five hundred years, alone?

But he wasn’t looking at her. He was glancing around the bedroom. “Well, he’s still a Byzantine at heart.”

Kate pulled her attention away from Garrett and looked around herself.

It wasn’t gilded the way the Hagia Sophia was, but there was no doubt where this room got its inspiration. Rich tapestries, glowing colours, silks, satins, embroidery, filigree and tassels adorned the bedding, the cushions, the rugs, pillows and furnishing, even the canopy over the giant bed and the curtains across the windows, turning the room into a decadent chamber.

She spotted the door to the bathroom. “Relief,” she murmured and hurried in and used it. It took time to reassemble the yards of material about her legs, so when she emerged, Roman had arrived, bearing scissors.

She turned her back to him, and pointed to the waist and sides. “I lost weight, so he took in tucks over the zip. You have to unstitch them to undo the zip.” She straightened up her spine. “Try really hard not to cut the material, huh?”

“So I should cut you, instead, if I need to make the choice?” Roman asked.

Garrett laughed and sat on the bed to watch.

“At least he’s trying, highlander. You turned white around the gills at the idea,” Kate accused him, as Roman snipped at the back of her dress.

“And I get my hands on you first, too,” Roman said. “I wasn’t born yesterday,” he added in a wise tone.

She pressed her lips together, trying not to laugh.

“Stop shaking,” Roman told her.

“Sorry. Can’t help it.”

He stood and stepped around in front of her, the scissors in one hand. With the other, he grabbed her chin and kissed her. It stole her breath and vaporized any need to laugh under a white hot jet of want that whooshed through her. Roman’s tongue thrust deep into her mouth, sliding against hers.

His hand traced down from her chin, her throat, to her shoulder, to fall from there to the back of her waist in a series of little featherweight touches along her spine. Then he pressed her up hard against him and Kate caught at his shoulders for balance. She felt flesh and silk under her fingers and stroked the sensuous mix. The flesh felt nicer and she pushed her hands under the lapels of the jacket and traced the rounded contours of his pecs, down to where her breasts were pushed against him, then along his sides, to his hips and around to his ass. She stroked, delighted by the shape.

Roman gave a guttural groan and stepped away, pulling his mouth away from her with a muttered word in Greek. “Garrett, keep Kate distracted, or I’ll never get this done.”

Garrett had moved from the bed. He stood a pace away, his eyes dark with lust. He’d been drawn to them.

Roman shrugged out of his jacket and threw it onto a chair sitting in the corner, then stepped back behind her again.

But Garrett didn’t take his place in front of her. Instead he knelt at her feet.

“What are you doing?” Kate asked.

“Something else I’ve wanted to do all night,” Garrett told her. He tugged on the bows at the back of her ankles, unravelling the ribbons. He coaxed the satin ribbons to coil into curls around her feet, running his fingers the length of her ankles and down to her toes. He drew her lower leg out of the shoe and pushed it aside.

Kate caught at his shoulder for balance as he slid his tongue along the top of her calf, up to the inside of her knee and higher still, until the silk of the dress stopped him from further progress. She was shivering when he was done.