Chapter 13 #2
“Feeling proud of yourself, aren’t you?” Amused, he rolls his cuffs up and skillfully shuffles the cards again. Or maybe he doesn’t. I wouldn’t know…because the tanned expanse of exposed forearm suddenly holds every bit of my attention. “As you should, you clever little woman.”
Something knits together in my chest when he calls me clever. He sees me for more than what happened to me in my past, and I think he always has. It just took time for me to realize it.
“But to shake things up a bit, what do you say we play for a little prize? Nothing big. Best of seven hands to make it fair.” He falters for a second. “Unless it’s too much like…”
A small beam of quiet happiness blooms in my chest at his concern. I prop an elbow and rest my chin as I think on it, but the fact that he cares enough to ask surpasses any doubts I may have had. “I know it won’t be anything like that. Not with you. And it’s not poker.”
“Nope, not poker.”
I frown a little. “But I don’t have any money for a prize.”
“Doesn’t have to be money. In fact, money’s off the table,” he says smoothly, leaning in and copying my movement. “If you win, I’ll shuck off my clothes and go run around the house outside buck naked.”
How is that a prize for me?
“In this weather? You’ll freeze without any clothes!” Even as a shrill laugh nervously escapes me, I can’t stop my gaze from wandering over his shoulders and down his chest. He’s already overwhelming enough when he’s only shirtless—or rolls his sleeves up—but if he takes his trousers off, too...
I swallow hard. “What if you win? Just know that I won’t be losing any clothes in return.
” I refuse to do the same. I don’t know if I’m ready for him to see me naked in the light of day yet, and even if I were, there’s no chance in hell I’d run in the cold snow.
A shiver wracks my frame at the very thought.
But there are other things he could ask of me as his wife. Things—
“You don’t want to take off your clothes in front of your husband?
” The sudden raspiness of his voice pulls my gaze to his mouth.
A week’s worth of dark stubble frames his lips as they curve in a slight smile.
They look so soft. How would they feel pressed to mine?
Then those perfectly formed lips speak again.
“All right, your clothes stay on. So tell me what I should get if I win.”
I can’t take my eyes from his mouth. If we’d met under normal circumstances, he would have kissed me on our wedding night. But besides the one kiss to my cheek and hand, forehead and temple kisses are all he’s done. And I wonder…
“A kiss,” I blurt out before promptly slapping my hand over my mouth and slamming my eyes shut. But it’s too late. Christ, I’m so embarrassed.
“Is that so?” Warren tugs at my fingers, but I double down and press even harder. “Don’t get shy on me now, wife. No take backs. Are you gonna give me those sweet lips if I win?”
Blood rushes to my head in a buzz as my stomach tangles in knots.
Let the devil and his angels take me away.
Forcing my fingers down, I guiltily open my eyes, and my lungs momentarily cease at the heated darkness staring back.
My husband’s lips are already full of charming words, but if the raw intensity in his gaze is matched in his kiss as well, how will I resist him?
Once this boundary is crossed, things will never be the same between us.
At the end of seven rounds, I’ll either see my husband naked or he’ll kiss me.
Not very bored now, am I? I should be more careful of what I wish for.
“Only…only one kiss?”
He watches each word leave my mouth before capturing my gaze. “Only one. To begin with.”
Christ. It’s abundantly clear that he’s more than ready to tear down that boundary. I silently plead with the butterflies in my stomach to have mercy on me as I croak out my agreement. “Yes.”
The faint smile directed back at me doesn’t do much to ease my sudden onset of nerves. “All right, then,” he says, voice low and deep. “Let’s play.”
The minute his long fingers deal my cards and set the deck aside, my ability to concentrate dwindles before outright disintegrating into nothingness.
I know what those hands feel like. Warm and always so gentle when they hold my own.
But what if he used those slightly roughened fingertips to trace over my lips?
Or…or elsewhere. A heated chill of desire zings from my stomach and down into my toes.
“Your play, wife.” Warren nods, that slight smile never leaving.
I can do this. Just keep my eyes on my cards and not his hands or any other part of him. And pretend I don’t feel his long leg pressing against mine beneath the table no matter how I rearrange myself.
The first two rounds are mine with nineteen for the first and an actual twenty-one for the second.
But my luck runs out with the third.
And fourth.
And fifth.
By the sixth round, I’m a bit lightheaded and my hands have a small tremor. I narrowly win it, but now we’re even. Or at least we were. Until he catches my eye and moves his knee between mine so my legs can’t close.
And then it’s the seventh hand.
The tie-splitter.
A cold thrill builds against the dread as he deals. Is the sweet call of the win what pushes gamblers to risk it all? Reverend Overstreet may have had the right of it in preaching against it.
An eight of hearts and a king of spades land in front of me. Eighteen. I stare at them until the numbers blur.
“Worried?” he asks lightly.
“Not at all,” I lie, shifting uncomfortably and accidentally squeezing his knee with both of mine.
Damn that knowing smile of his. If this pressure wasn’t against me in this last round, I would be able to think straight.
But no, throw in the possibility of a naked Warren and a kiss and now my thoughts are all messed up. Now I don’t even know if I want to win.
He has a nine, but there’s no telling what’s under it.
I need to quit stalling, though. Whatever happens will happen. “Stand.”
He flips his hidden card. “Five.”
So, fourteen to my eighteen. My gaze bounces between my cards, his, and the deck. What to do? Win or lose? This would be a wonderful time for Emmaline to wake up, but she hasn’t stirred once.
“Stand.” I want to win. Mostly because I was the ultimate winner at checkers, too. Not because I want to see him naked.
Definitely not that.
Warren’s hand hovers above the deck. “You all right, wife? You’re looking a bit peaked over there.”
“I’m fine.” Another lie proven as such by my fingers stuttering a rhythm against the table. “Just…just draw the card.”
“Not wanting to back out, are you?” Damn his ever-watchful eyes that lock onto my jittery fingers. “We can put the game aside and save it for another day. Maybe tomorrow if it snows again.”
“No.” I don’t mean to snap, but I don’t want to stop. “Let’s finish this.”
Ever so slowly, he peels the card away, curving his fingers around the back. When he grins, my heart triples in beat. “What is it? Let me see.” Now’s not the time to tease.
Arching one eyebrow, he drops the two of clubs onto the table.
“A two.” I close my eyes and sigh with a mixture of relief and tension. Sixteen to my eighteen. “Stand.” I’m not risking going over. The butterflies beat in fury inside my stomach as he claims the next card, but I can’t bear to look anymore.
Seconds tick by, then he murmurs, “Well, damn.”
My eyelids pop open. “What?” I demand, heart pounding again. “What’d you draw?”
“Six of spades. Puts me at twenty-two.” Looking all too proud for a man who just lost, Warren tosses down the card and casually unbuttons his shirt as he stands. “You win, wife.”
Good Lord.
“I won,” I repeat faintly, swallowing through a throat so dry I’d almost think I’d not had a drink of water for days.
I don’t know whether I’m feeling relief or disappointment.
Instead of our first kiss, I’m going to see my husband naked.
Oh, Christ…am I ready for this? My back goes ramrod straight as his hands move to his trousers.
He unfastens the buttons with slow intention but holds the waistband taut before it reveals anything.
“You sure you’re all right?” Concern pulls his dark eyebrows together at whatever expression is on my face, but it’s the barely hidden air of anticipation emanating from him that has my fingers clenching the sides of my chair.
He wants to show me just as much as I want to see.
“Fine.” I mangle the word so badly that I have to clear my throat and repeat it. “I’m fine.” His hand tightens reflexively before releasing the material, and as his pants drop, my eyes widen. “Sweet Mary, mother of Christ.”
The biggest cock I’ve ever seen hangs heavily between his legs, and it’s not even hard.
I wait for disgust or fear to set in as he stands there and allows me to look my fill, but it never does.
His length twitches beneath my attention, so I jerk my head aside and take in the rest of my husband’s form.
Over his strong neck and shoulders. Across the very light dusting of hair on his chest to the stacked lines of muscles that taper into a narrow waist. Then down to his muscular thighs and back to a shaft that’s just a bit thicker than it was moments before.
And it was already thick.
Now his proud swagger makes sense—the man’s carrying a cock and set of balls big enough to rival a stallion’s.
“Something on your mind, wife? Seems like you’ve lost your words.”
I blink rapidly and force myself to look elsewhere as he rounds the table.
The last thing I want is a face full of cock, and the last thing he needs is for me to stroke his pride.
Stop thinking about stroking. I wave in the general vicinity of the window and ignore his smirking provocation.
“You’re not really going out there, are you?
As deep as the snow is, you’re sure to catch cold. ”