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“What is this, 'more'?”
His eyes drifted up from her recklessly-placed knight, sitting directly in front of his queen. “You like men, Cassia. You like their attention.”
Her eyes widened.
“You liked what we were doing. You...wanted it.” Without taking his eyes off her, he slid his queen forward and took the knight.
Heat surged through her cheeks. “Wanted what?”
He smiled but said nothing.
She touched her fingertips gently to her chest, the picture of innocence. “I do not know of what you speak.”
He smiled. “You lie very prettily.”
Her jaw fell. She'd never been spoken to the way this man spoke to her. He was bold, uncouth, impolite, improper…and beating her at chess.
Intolerable.
He was not a courtier, a troubadour, a safe or admiring man. He was the rogue, the summer storm. He conjured excitement, and was nothing like the chivalrous knights from the lays the troubadours sang. Those passions were chaste, pure, exalted. She was certain his would be hard-pushed, wild, untamed.
And it made her body hum.
A sad commentary on her noble, well-trained life.
Well. He was not the only one who could be bold and impolite.
Whisky running through her blood, she set her elbow on the table and looked at him through the flickering firelight and the sultry heat of the summer night.
“I have been thinking, Irishman. And I have questions about this whole thing.”
Chapter 11
Máel felt the shifted energy of her as if a fire had suddenly burst into flame.
“Uh oh,” he murmured.
“Yes, you see the dilemma.”
“What kind of questions?” he said carefully. He hadn’t expected questions.
“Why would Sir No One do such a reckless thing? Why walk into a tournament where he clearly does not belong, and confront my father, a man far more powerful than he? What would motivate such boldness? Moreover, why would my father allow such a thing? Why not call the hue and cry at once? Is that not a good question?”
“’Tis a question,” he allowed.
“And then, of course, I answer.”
“Of course you do,” he murmured.
She shifted on the bench. “You say he took something that did not belong to him, but debt collection does not usually involve armed combat at tournaments. So why did this one? Is it because there is something more?” Her words slowed. “More than money, something that goes deeper in the heart, which is quite a feat, to go deeper than coin into my father’s heart. Maybe into yours as well.” She was looking directly into his eyes. “But what is more powerful than money?”
“Chivalry would say ‘love,’” he said.
“Would you?”
“Never.”
“Of course not,” she agreed softly. “Nor would I. Not for my father, and not for you.”
