Page 64 of The Spy’s Song

“Nothing is wrong with you, Lou.” He kept his voice quiet. “You had a saber in your hand a few minutes ago. Someone meant to hurt you, and your body did what you asked of it. Now there is no blade, no enemy, nowhere for all that fire to go.”

He unscrewed the brandy. “Soldiers have been solving the problem badly for centuries. Some drink until they can no longer remember what frightened them. Others find a camp follower.”

Rodrick held the bottle out to her. He would drink with her until they were both pleasantly insensible, and pretend that sharing oblivion with Louise Bonnechoix could possibly be enough.

She took the flask without a word. Her fingers still trembled around it. Louise turned it once between her palms and set it carefully on the table.

“D’Arc might get drunk,” she said. Then she looked at him. “But I don’t care for spirits.”

Rodrick’s pulse kicked.

Louise stepped closer.

“I want you.”

She said it the way she said everything—straight out, no armor, no calculation behind the eyes.

He had been seduced by professionals. Women who knew exactly which angle of candlelight flattered them, who understood the precise weight of a hand on a forearm, who deployed vulnerability like a blade.

But Louise's face was open in a way that had no business existing in a bivouac tent, on a woman who had ridden at thirty armed men three hours ago. Beneath this outrageous vulnerability lived a weapon he had no defense against.

"Louise—" Her name came out as a groan, too much in it.

Rodrick closed the distance before his mind could catch up. He caught the back of her neck, pulled her in, pressed her body flush against his—faster than her breath could hitch. Her gasp broke against his mouth, and then her hands were in his hair, yanking him down.

Their teeth knocked together, the kiss clumsy and brutal, more hunger than rhythm. She opened her mouth and bit his lip. He tasted blood and fire and the aftershock of violence still coursing through her limbs.

She surged up on her toes, shoved her hips into his, clawed at his shoulders. They tore at each other's uniforms like enemies still locked in combat. Her hands shoved beneath his coat, tugged it down his arms as if she meant to peel the restraint from his skin. He yanked her trousers over her hips and down her legs, leaving her bare, flushed, breathing hard.

Rodrick bent and dragged his tongue along her sternum, tasting salt and soot. He scraped his stubble along the soft underside of her breasts, drew one nipple into his mouth and bit, just enough to make her jolt.

She rolled her hips against his cock, her fingers tangled in his hair like reins she refused to let go.

He stood in one motion, lifting her with both hands beneath her thighs. She wrapped ballerina legs around him, arms locking at his shoulders.

Rodrick wanted to press her against something solid. To drive into her so hard the world forgot its own shape. He scanned for a beam, any corner of the tent that could hold them.

But no wall was strong enough for what he meant to do with her. One thrust would rip the whole canvas down.

"Goddamn it," he growled into her ear.

She bit his shoulder.

Rodrick grunted and staggered toward the cot, his legs trembling. Somehow he ended on his knees before her, pressing kisses along her belly, tasting the heat and salt of her skin. He wrapped his arms around her hips and rested his cheek against the soft plane of her stomach.

"I thought you knelt for no one," she murmured, brushing his hair.

She wasn't no one. She was his wild, blood-streaked Corsican princess, all blade and flame, and he'd rather kneel to her than to any crown.

He pulled her closer until their faces aligned, until their breaths met in the narrow space between them.

"I don't bend my knee, but I'll do something better for you."

Rodrick stretched out on the cot, his arms folded behind his head.

"What are you doing?" she asked, brow furrowed, chest still heaving.

"Come ride me, Louise."