Page 119 of Thus with a Kiss I Die

“Rosaline . . .” Cal’s voice beckoned my attention back to him. “Look and tell me what you think.”

Under my palm, his shoulder flexed. I felt the ripple of muscle as he raised himself slightly, and my gaze dropped to view the brown skin, the short black hairs interrupted by the pale bandage, the taut belly.

I lifted my gaze back to his face. Safer, I thought.

I thought wrong. For now, he was watching me, the fire no longer hidden. With a single finger, he traced the line of my jaw, the roundness of my cheek.

I moaned under my breath.

He heard, for he paused. “You also have bruises and marks from your ordeal. You were handled roughly, first in the riots, then dragged you off the brink and back to life. Are you afraid of me?”

I shook my head.

“Am I hurting you?”

I shook my head.

“Good.” With a touch so light it seduced my nerves, he slid his knuckles against my neck, across my chest, hovered over my fully clad and heaving breasts . . .

I didn’t object. I could barely breathe. The man was sucking all the air from the room.

Slowly, so slowly, his face came closer, his mouth angled toward mine. He’d kissed me before—and I had liked it. Afterward, when I discovered Cal had been my seducer, I’d been enraged, but I couldn’t deny I liked it. Now, in the shadowy, silent, Cal-filled moment, my lips parted. I waited . . .

He released me and flopped back on his pillows. “Thank you, Rosie, you’ve answered my questions.”

I still vibrated from his touch, heard the echoes of his seductive words, knew the chill of losing that weight and warmth against mine.

Without turning my head, I looked at him out of the corners of my eyes.

He stared at the ceiling, and he was smiling, a smug, pleased, self-confident, honest-to-God smile, corners of the lips up and everything.

That insolent cur, that whoreson, that unbuttered piece of dry toast!

I took a strong, deep breath and, in one movement fueled by rage, I came up off the mattress and over the top of him. I pinned him to the mattress, my knees on either side of his hips, and yes, my skirts were between us, but if we were enacting the legend of the princess and the pea, I was the princess and that was no tiny pea beneath myfica.

Which gave me some satisfaction, but not enough to quench my fury. I put my hands on Cal’s bare shoulders, leaned close to his face—somewhat like he’d done with me, but with different intentions—and I said, “In our marriage bed, do you think you’re going to have it all your own way? Because,my prince”—I managed to load a fair amount of sarcasm in those two words—“I may be a virgin, as is known and celebrated by every single nosy creature in Verona, but I am also the daughter of Romeo and Juliet, and your slow, thin, bloodless seduction won’t work with me. Sometimes, my friend, we’ll do it my way.” I bounced on him. Three times and energetically.

He groaned in pain and grabbed for me.

I slipped from his hands, leaped off the bed, and stalked toward the door. As I touched the handle, he spoke in princely command. “Rosaline.”

I halted. “What?”Hostile tone.

He sat up on one elbow, his mouth twisted with pain, possessiveness, and humor. ”I am not a virgin, I do have some experience, and I know my slow, thin, bloodless seduction was working quite well . . . on you.”

I exhaled, straightened my skirts, opened the door—and faced a phalanx of men’s faces, expectant, curious, worried (Friar Laurence), and hopeful. Driven by rage, I stepped out of the prince’s bedchamber, dusted my fingers, and smiled the smile of a victor.

Friar Laurence asked, “Child, are you—”

Marcellus took it on himself to answer. “Nothing happened. The prince likes to take his time.” He studied me critically. “And she is unruffled.”

I lifted my arm like a statue of Aphrodite accepting victory in the wars of love.

Through the open door, Cal’s loud, helpless laughter sounded like the pealing of a new-forged bell.

While the men stared, first at me, then in amazement into the bedchamber, I stalked down the long flight of stairs to the main floor, turned the corner, and—thank Blessed Mary, I was finally offstage and without an audience. I stepped into an empty room, shut the door behind me, and the discipline that had held me upright failed me.

Because Cal was right. That seduction had worked marvelously well.

One knee collapsed. I staggered sideways into the wall.

I rolled to place my spine against its support and slithered down to rest on the floor.

“I am the daughter of Romeo and Juliet,” I whispered. “Hear me roar.”

Faint and far away, from a kingdom I could not yet visit, I heard Elder chuckling . . .