Page 49 of Twisting Beauty

The blade was taut against the last scrap of fabric and I stood there with nothing left.

The only move left was the one he wasn’t expecting.

I dropped my arms, my nipples tightening to painful points against the cold air, but I pushed my chest out like I didn’t care.

His gaze dropped to my breasts. His pupils widened, his jaw going tight. His hand holding the knife faltered, just once, barely, but I caught it.

“You know what I think?” I lowered my voice and leaned into him, just a fraction. “I think you just want to see me naked.”

His gaze snapped up to mine, the frosty blue rings of his eyes so dilated they were almost black. His jaw twitched as something like anger flashed across his face. But it was gone so quickly I couldn’t tell.

Then his gaze dropped to my lips.

My lips opened in a soft intake of air. Was he going to⁠—?

Lorcan’s head snapped toward the door.

Heavy footsteps sounded down the corridor, getting closer. The sound of it went through me like cold water poured down my spine.

Alistair was returning.

16

LIATH

Fuck. Alistair was returning and I was practically naked in his bedroom playing knifey games with his son.

Lorcan’s eyes snapped to mine.

He swept the cut clothes off the floor and shoved them at me. I clutched them against my chest as he hauled me to the far corner toward floor-to-ceiling drapes. He pushed me behind them and followed. My bare back hit the wall and his chest hit my front, crushing me against it, every inch of my bare skin against the solid heat of him.

The thick drapes settled around us. Neither of us spoke. Neither moved.

For one fractured second, relief flashed hot and stupid through me. He was protecting me. Saving me from his father.

Then reality crashed in. If Alistair walked in here and found me half-naked with Lorcan, the damage would hit him too. He wasn’t saving me. He was covering his own ass.

His heartbeat came through my sternum, faster than it should have been. His body heat soaked through my skin. His scent was everywhere, woodsmoke and whiskey, and the violins in my head had stopped playing a warning and were now playing a low and aching melody.

I was brutally aware of every line of him, every place where his body met mine, the shift of his chest with every breath. Through the thin fabric of my underwear, his thigh pressed against my pussy. The ache that was like an irritating buzz before flared into a full-body roar. It took everything in me not to grind against his thigh.

Shit. I could not stay here pressed up against him like this. I would go crazy.

But I could not move. If I moved, the drapes would move.

Alistair would see.

I peered out past Lorcan’s arm through the narrow gap between the drapes.

Shit. On the bedroom floor was a scrap of black cardigan fabric Lorcan had missed. Too late to fetch it.

The handle turned and the door creaked open.

I went dead still behind the drapes.

Heavy footsteps sounded first, slow and measured on the floor, each one closer than the last, the sound crawling over my skin. I held my breath until my lungs burned, waiting for the drapes to shift, for Alistair’s hand to pull them back, for the whole room to split open around me.

Alistair crossed the bedroom, passing in and out of my narrow sightline. I prayed he wouldn’t stay for long. Prayed he wouldn’t notice the drape around us was protruding out too far. Prayed he wouldn’t notice that strip of fabric on the floor.