She looked over her shoulder, glared at him, then looked back down and continued digging out some noxious-smelling plant as if she didn’t care one fig for what he’d said.
The woman was mad. Insane! Completely and utterly moonstruck. No one disregarded him when he spoke. No one.
So rare was this that Sin had no idea how to deal with it.
After a few seconds, she straightened from the bed. “I need wine. Have you any?”
“Nay,” he lied.
It didn’t work. She spied a flagon on the table by the hearth.
Going to it, she quickly learned it was far from empty and Sin wished he had drank the whole of it the night before.
She gave him a smarting stare, then poured a goblet of it.
Sin narrowed his eyes.
“I wish you would stop scowling at me.” She returned the lid to the flagon. “‘Tis unnerving.”
“The devil is oft?—”
“And stop with the devil nonsense. I told you I know who you are and I’m not afraid of you.”
“Then, you, milady, are a fool.”
“I’m not a fool.” She gave him a meaningful look as she wrapped her long, sensuous fingers around the bowl of the goblet and brought it toward him. “But I do know demons when I see them.”
“Obviously not.”
She pulled leaves from the plant and dropped them into the wine. “Demons feed on children, they don’t stop them from being hurt.”
“And what would you know of demons?”
She met his gaze as an equal. “Quite a bit, actually. Much more than I would like.”
Sin was amazed at her courage. Most women, and men for that matter, trembled in fear at his presence. None, save his brothers, had ever dared to defy him.
She added more herbs and bits to the wine until it formed a thick paste. Then, she took the paste and smeared it over his skin, her touch searing him with heat.
Sin watched her hand gliding gracefully over his skin as chills ran down his spine.
“Do you have a name?” she asked.
“Since you claim to know me so well, you tell me.”
She paused. “Well, I’m rather sure your mother didn’t name you Demon Butcher, Satan’s Spawn, or King’s Executioner.”
Sin suppressed a smile at her cheekiness. Aye, she was a brave lady with the heart of a lion. “My mother gave me no name at all.” He watched her wrap a bandage over his arm.
Those light green eyes flashed as she met his gaze. “You have to be called something.”
She stood so close that her breath fell softly against his skin as she spoke and the warm, floral scent of her filled his head.
He became acutely aware of the fact all he wore was a pair of chausses and she was dressed in naught save a thin servant’s dress. One that would be easy to divest her of.
His mouth watered.
The woman was beguiling, and for some reason he couldn’t fathom, he wanted to hear his name on her lips.
