Page 20 of Bargaining with the Devil

He just shook his head. “Do you have any conditions?”

Conditions? “Like what?” This was so absurd.

“I have one, but only the one, and ’tis this: So long as we’re doing it, unless you say otherwise, we talk to each other through the door. Your turn to say it, if you have any.”

“I . . .” Did she have any conditions? She’d never, not once in her life, considered a scenario like this until the devil standing in front of her suggested it.

Lounged, really. He looked far more relaxed than she felt.

“No,” she finally managed. “I cannot think of any conditions I have.”

“You change your mind, you tell me, aye?”

She jerked a nod and entered her chamber, her heart pounding so hard she half thought it might be audible outside her body. She fitted the key in the lock. Why were her hands trembling? Not fear, although it was a little bit the same.

“You sitting down, a mhuirnín? Back to the door?” Some thumps from the other side suggested he’d just done that himself.

“I . . .” She sat on the floor, then scooted up just enough that her back touched the wood. “Yes. I am now.”

“Shirt on or off?” he asked through the door. “What should I do?”

She’d be picturing him without the shirt anyway. He might as well have it off in truth, although it was chilly enough perhaps that was unkind.

“I hear you thinking through the door,” he prompted.

“Off,” she said. “I think. But it’s chilly.”

“I won’t be chilly long. So off, a stór? Is that what you want me to do?”

“Yes.”

“Then it’s coming off. I want you to close your eyes. No, better: Blow out the candle so it’s nice and dark. I want you in the dark with yourself.”

“I must get up to do it.” She’d left the candle on her washbasin.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Heart beating hard, almost dizzy, she extinguished the candle. “It’s out.”

“It’s not entirely dark in here. I’ve put out the lamp, but there’s a bit of a glow yet from the fire. Enough that I can see myself. I’m going to tell you what I’m doing right now. But you have to do the same. We take turns? Aye?”

“That seems fair,” she said cautiously. She wasn’t sure she was brazen enough, and Quinn seemed utterly at ease with his sexuality in a way she was not. But of course he was. Earthy, frank, and honest to his core in his own way.

“I have the buttons undone on my trousers. Your turn.”

“I . . .” She slid the night rail up till the fabric pooled across her lap, cold winter air kissing her bare legs. Then higher. “It’s at my waist. My gown.”

“Right now my hand is just resting on my leg, peaceful, but I’m looking at my cock and thinking about touching it. You want to hear about that part or not? Me looking at myself.”

If she was going to do this, she wouldn’t do it by half measures. “Yes.” It was almost a dream anyway, in the dark. “Yes, I want to hear about you looking at yourself.”

“So I curve a wee bit to the left when I’m standing at attention. Which I am right now, all the way, because talking about this is arousing the hell out of me. Makes me want to do something about it. Take myself in hand and stroke myself a bit.”

She spread a hand on her thigh just above her knee. Slid it up a few inches and stopped. This was madness.

“Are you touching yourself yet?”

“No. I— This is ridiculous.”