Page 45 of Under Her Protection

"Mm."

Vivienne kissed her again. She bit Leo's lower lip not gently. She felt Leo's free hand, the one she had not pinned, come down the line of her own ribs and curl around the small of her back, and she felt the pads of Leo's fingers press through the cream silk, and her own breath pulled in without her consent, and she did not let the breath show on her face.

Leo saw it anyway.

"There you are," Leo said, very quietly.

"Do not."

"Madame."

"Do not."

She let go of Leo's wrist, because the hold was not serving her anymore, and she slid both hands between them and went for the buttons of the black shirt under the black jacket. She did not undo them. She pulled. The top three went. One of them hit the carpet. She did not care. Leo's hand, the one Vivienne had just freed, closed around both of Vivienne's at the back of her head and brought them forward to the wall above Leo's shoulder and held them there for two seconds, just long enough to make the point, and then released them, because Leo, it turned out, was not interested tonight in holding a point down longer than the point needed. Vivienne registered this and filed it. She had spent her whole life in rooms with men who made a point and then held it down for an extra ten minutes because they enjoyed the holding. Leo did not enjoy the holding. Leo enjoyed the finding.

Vivienne's hands came back to Leo's shirt. She got the rest of the buttons exposing strong ab muscles and small breasts in a sports bra. Leo's hands were on her cream silk and Vivienne offered her arms to allow Leo to peel it off each shoulder and she was in a lace bra against the front of Leo's jacket. Leo's mouth came down onto the collarbone she had just bared and left a mark there that Vivienne would notice in the mirror tomorrow and which Vivienne would choose, after a moment of consideration, not to cover with a blouse.

Vivienne's hands were on Leo's waistband. Leo's hands were on Vivienne's hip.

Leo's eyes went down her body once.

Not in any hurry.

Vivienne watched Leo's face while Leo did it. Leo's jaw did the thing. Vivienne's breath pulled in again, and this time she let it.

"Jacket," Vivienne said.

"Yes."

Leo shrugged out of the jacket. She shrugged out of the shoulder rig under it, which she set on the small side table to her left with the careful instinct of a woman who did not put weapons on the floor. The black shirt was already open where Vivienne had pulled. Leo's chest under it was what Vivienne had expected from the two weeks of watching her carry herself: lean, contained, marked in one place by an old pale scar at the collarbone that Vivienne did not ask about and would not ask about tonight.

She put her hand on the scar.

Leo did not flinch.

"Sofa," Leo said.

"No."

"Madame—"

"No."

"Where?”

"Here."

Leo looked at her.

"The floor," Vivienne said, and it was not a question, and it was not a request, and her voice had the low clipped certainty it had in negotiations, which Leo, she registered, had learned to read by now.

Leo's mouth moved in the almost-smile. "The floor."

"The floor."

"Yes, Madame."

"Do not."