Chapter 8
Should’ve brought Merida. Should’ve brought Merida.
Bull needed a chaperone here. For his own sanity, because he couldn’t trust himself.
The cards flashed from one of his hands to the other as he frowned out of the window of the speeding train. He wasn’t particularly interested in the passing landscape, but it was better than watching Rosie.
Rosie’s lips in particular.
That kiss yesterday…
Christ, had it just been yesterday? Only yesterday his world had changed so suddenly?
Because that kiss…
He’d walked into that masquerade ball knowing exactly what was going on: he was a talented detective who’d been somehow persuaded into including a lass in his investigation.
A lass he had been doing his best not to spend any time with.
But all it had taken was that one kiss, and he realized he was wrong. About everything.
For one thing, it was clear this investigation was just as much Rosie’s as it was his. And for another…she was no longer a little girl. No, Lady Rose Hayle had grown into an incredibly desirable woman while his back had been turned.
He remembered Hogmanay, only weeks ago, when he’d done his best to avoid her. This is nae news to ye. Ye saw how desirable she was then, and ye didnae like it.
Now he’d tasted her?
Well, he’d liked it even less.
She was delicious. In every sense.
“You know, I remember the year you taught Beavis to cheat.”
Her words dragged him from his contemplation and he scowled across the carriage at her. “What?”
Rosie sat primly, a book on her lap, swaying slightly with the motion of the train.
When he’d picked her up today—and had practically begged Merida to come with them, as a chaperone—his traveling companion had been dressed as a pampered duke’s daughter, in a periwinkle wool traveling gown of the highest quality and a hat to match.
Cannae fault her sense of costuming, at least.
He could fault Merida for claiming she had an engagement she couldn’t possibly miss, and therefore couldn’t chaperone them. “You are practically cousins,” she’d announced, eyes sparkling. “No one will think anything of it.”
Except Bull was having decidedly uncousinly thoughts about Rosie…
Whose lips now twitched as she closed her book. “It was about four years ago. My brother could not understand why he kept losing to Lochlan and Keenan—”
The memory popped into Bull’s head. “And I explained that they were Thorne’s sons, so they were cheating.”
She smiled. “And he insisted you teach him how to cheat.”
“He was…no’ verra good at it.”
“I know!” Her chuckle was deep, throaty. Arousing, dammit. “But he definitely enjoyed himself more after your lesson. He loses less often.”
The cards flashed again, one hand to the next, fanning in the air as he tossed them. Bull’s scowled eased in speculation. “Do ye play cards?”
“Oh yes.” Primly, she moved her book to the bench beside her. “A lady is expected to be able to play in polite company, after all.”
Bull hid his wince. Whist or Piquet didn’t sound that appealing, but anything to pass the time…
To his surprise, Rosie reached across the car and snatched the cards from his hand. She shuffled competently, then shifted sideways so she could deal two cards face-down to the bench, and two cards face up. She turned to him with a brow raised in challenge.
Bull was unable to hide how impressed he was. “Vignt-un?” It wasn’t a game he expected her to know. “Dinnae tell me ye’re playing that in polite company.”
Her green eyes were sparkling with mischief. “I might be a lady, but I am also Demon Hayle’s daughter.”
“Dinnae remind me,” he groaned, moving to sit beside her and scoop up his cards. “He’s going to kill me.”
“Oh, grow some bollocks, ye toad-spotted cuntwomble.” As if she just hadn’t insulted the fook out of him with that chirpy little tone, Rosie studied her cards. “Ready?”
And despite telling himself he was going to do his best to avoid her during their journey, Bull found himself grinning. “Hit me.”
She lifted the deck of cards, nodded once, then hauled off and punched him in the shoulder with the hand she’d been about to use to deal.
The punch didn’t hurt, but it did surprise a laugh out of him. “Not that kind of hit!”
“Oh?” The minx blinked innocently. “Oh, you wanted another card?”
Chuckling, Bull slid his cards into his sleeve, reached over, and caught her hand.
“Next time ye punch a man, Rosie…” He curled her fingers down, then teased the knuckle of her middle finger up so it stood a half-inch above the rest. “Do it with this knuckle. It’s sharp enough to dig into his flesh with all the force of yer blow behind it. ”
She’d inexplicably stopped breathing. When he glanced at her face, it was to see her gaze locked on his. Suddenly the air in the carriage seemed too warm, too charged. His fingers tightened around hers for a moment before he forced himself to release her.
They both sucked in a breath as he sat back, and he could swear he could feel his skin tingling where it had touched hers. In his trousers his cock was throbbing, reminding him that he’d been painfully aroused since that kiss last night.
An unrelenting need that could only be sated by—
“Right,” Rosie said in a small voice, rolling her shoulders and scooping up the cards. “I—I will remember that for next time.”
“Good. Aye.” Bull cleared his throat. “Now, where were we?” Och aye, the card game. “Hit—nay, I mean, I would like another card, please.”
Her lips twitched into a smirk as she plopped another card down on the bench.
“Stay,” he said, and she nodded.
“Dealer takes one. Dealer takes two—shitenuggets,” she muttered as she turned a queen, putting her over twenty-one.
Bull flipped over his nineteen, not surprised he’d won. “Again?”
They played a few more rounds and he felt himself relaxing.
Aye, he was sitting beside Rosie, but she was way on the other side of the carriage, with the bench between them they were using as a playing surface.
They were reminiscing, swapping stories about their families and the people they both knew and loved, but as the minutes turned to an hour, the questions turned more personal.
By unspoken arrangement, the winner of each hand began to ask questions.
Bull found himself telling her of some of his cases: how it felt to bring a murderer to justice, and what the Princess Louise was like in private, and how to spot a counterfeit coin.
She thought his stories fascinating and kept trying to downplay her own experiences.
Truthfully, he had little understanding of the art theory she explained, although he enjoyed her stories of visiting the great museums of Europe and even chuckled at her accounts of interacting with eccentric artists.
Even if he didn’t understand the academic ramifications of post-modernism, Bull didn’t care. He was more than content to sit there and watch Rosie’s excitement as she lectured on them. Her eyes lit with enthusiasm, her hands waved as she tried to capture a motif, and her breaths came faster.
He could watch her, listen to her, for hours if she gave him the opportunity.
That realization slammed into Bull, causing him to blink and shake his head as she was telling a story about finding proof of a particular theory in the basement of a gallery in Paris.
Christ, he didn’t just like kissing Rosie; he liked her.
He liked the way she threw herself into her passions whole-heartedly.
He liked that she was smart and quick-witted, he liked that she understood his work and could slip into a role as quickly as he could.
He liked her teasing and intelligence and God help him, he liked the way she tasted. The way she felt.
The next hand she won again, and this time, Rosie beamed hopefully. “Instead of a question, I have a request.” When he twitched his brow, inviting her to continue, she straightened her shoulders, as if preparing herself. “I want you to teach me—”
Dinnae think about kissing, dinnae think about—
“—how to cheat.”
Yet again, she surprised him. “At cards?”
“Well, I know how to stack a deck, obviously.”
“Obviously,” he repeated dryly, wondering how many other duke’s daughters—besides Marcia—had that skill. “So, palming a card?”
Rosie nodded to his sleeve. “Do not think I missed that little trick.”
With an affronted gasp, Bull lifted his hands, palm out. “I would never cheat ye, milady!” He twisted his hands so the backs faced her, closed his fingers…and when he turned them back, palms out, he flicked the ace of clubs between two fingers. “Much.”
“See?” Chuckling, she snatched the card from him and slid it back into the deck. “I doubt you can help it.”
Unrepentantly, Bull shrugged. “Habit. But I dinnae think yer hands are wide enough to palm a card.” He took the deck from her as he eyed her gown. “And yer sleeves definitely arenae.”
“Then teach me some sleight of hand.” She leaned forward eagerly. “One summer after you refused yet again to show us, Merida and I taught ourselves how to pick pockets—I am better than she is, because she keeps laughing.”
Bull sat back against the swaying train carriage’s wall, brows raised.
Finally, he said, “Ye ken, Rosie, I’m no’ even a little surprised by that, and that surprises me.
Of course ye saw a skill ye wanted to learn and ye taught yerself.
” Chuckling, he pushed himself to his feet, reaching for his bag overhead.
“Ye’re no’ wearing any jewelry, so I’ll see what I have we can teach ye to palm… ”
He'd reached his hand inside his briefcase, his fingers closing around a small object, when Rosie announced, “I have some coins, would that work?”
Bull paused, his brain trying to process what he was holding. Oh, it was Lady Mistree’s ivory box! The one with the ring inside, the one she’d said he should give to the woman he planned on marrying.
As if anyone would have him.