Page 140 of Highland Spy

He nodded in consent. “Aye. Consider yerself flattered.”

Distracted though he might have been, he played with the determination of a man about to lose everything.

And to him, he was.

Ariana brought a part of him alive he’d long since thought dead. She saw in him a goodness he never allowed himself to dare hope he possessed. He thought he was long since past meaning anything, having anything—but she’d seen through his fractured exterior and found the man beneath.

He’d be damned if he let her slip through his fingers.

And if he could convince her to open up about being angry at him, if he could just have a chance to get her to show any kind of emotion, perhaps he might be able to convince her to stay. He wouldn’t give up until she was gone, damn it.

Aye, she’d been teasing and playful at their card game, but it was a facade he saw through. There was other emotion underneath, the kind that made her hard and apathetic.

He needed her to rage at him, to tell him what she’d locked up so deeply.

And if he failed at the endeavor, he’d at least get one last kiss.

Win after careful win, Connor found himself having to concentrate more with each article of clothing she removed.

The loss of her overskirts revealed the shadow of her slender, shapely legs beneath her sark when the firelight hit her just right. The loss of her corset and how it revealed the tips of her hardened nipples pointed against the thin white fabric.

Each piece revealed more and stirred deep memories of the night he’d finally had her.

Thus far he’d still only lost his léine.

Ariana took the stack of cards in her hand in preparation to shuffle them once more. But Connor couldn’t let her go further. It was one thing to reduce a lass to her sark, and though he longed for the hem to slip upward and reveal her body one tantalizing inch at a time to him, it was quite another to reduce a lass to nudity.

“I think we’ve gone far enough,” he said.

Ariana quirked a brow. “But you haven’t fully won.”

Connor lifted a plaid from where it laid over her bags and wrapped it around her shoulders. She pinched the fabric over her breasts and gave him a questioning look. “No’ that the idea of ye naked isna a tempting one, because it verra much is, ye know what I want.”

Ariana’s playful gaze faded to something altogether more serious. “I do.” She nodded.

“Then tell me.” He tried to speak softly, as if doing so could offer further encouragement to her. “Tell me why ye want to leave.”

Her jaw set with defiance.

“We had a deal,” he reminded her.

All pretense of flirtation slipped away into an iced-over countenance. The Ariana he was beginning to grow used to.

And that wasn’t what he wanted.

“Ye have to tell me.” He was goading, and it was entirely intentional. “Ye promised ye would and I did beat ye.”

Irritation sparked in her eyes and the cold look flamed into one of anger.

Victory flickered to life inside him.

This.

This was what he wanted.

Whether it came in the form of rage or sadness, he wanted something more than her acquiescent indifference, a break from her maddening apathy.

And judging from the flush creeping over her cheeks, he was finally about to get it.