Rebel: The Blades of the Rose by Zoe Archer Page A

ashes.
    â€œI’ll find my way. Could use guidance, though. A firm hand.” He raised his eyes to hers, and a heated interest glowed there.
    â€œYou don’t need that kind of guidance,” she answered tartly.
    His scarce smile flashed. “A man who believes he’s nothing more to learn about women is a damn fool.”
    Her sudden laughter caught them both off guard, but he chuckled with her.
    â€œThat’s a nice sound,” he said.
    â€œRusty,” she replied, grimacing. How long had it been since she’d laughed with another person?
    He fed twigs to the fire, but she could not help but notice the masculine grace of his hands. A traitorous thought teased her: How might he touch a woman? With a firm hand, no doubt.
    Astrid took her knife and carved the roast rabbit into pieces. Rather than bother with dirtying plates, she shoved a cooked leg into Lesperance’s hand and took one for herself.
    She muttered something in Swedish about her disloyal mind, but, before she could take a bite, he asked, “What language is that?”
    Astrid sighed. “I’m not used to all this conversation.”
    â€œYou intrigue me,” he said simply.
    Her body gave a sudden pulse of answering interest. “I shouldn’t.”
    â€œBut you do.”
    She had been so far withdrawn into herself for all these years, the idea that she could draw any man’s interest—particularly one as devastating as Nathan Lesperance—stunned her. “Why?” she asked, genuinely baffled.
    â€œYou’re not like any woman I’ve met before.” When Astrid gave an indecorous snort, he said, “Don’t scoff. We’re alike, but not the same. Tied together somehow, you and I. I knew it the moment I met you. You felt it, too.”
    She wanted to deny it but couldn’t. She tried to shield herself behind flippancy. “Who knew a shape-changing attorney could be so sensitive? You should write poetry.”
    â€œThrow your barbs,” he said with a shake of his head. “You can’t scare me off. I want to know you from the outside in.”
    Oh, Lord. She could well imagine.
    â€œAnd,” he added, nostrils flared, “there’s a hell of a lot more heat than poetry in what I feel for you. The animal in me feels the same way.”
    She, who had faced enemy gunfire, water demons, sandstorms, and cannibal trolls, trembled at his words. Images flickered through her mind of her and Lesperance, slick and tangled, mouths and hands and flesh. His growls. Her moans. And not only bodies entwined, but minds and hearts as well. Exactly what she wanted. Exactly what she feared.
    She had to change the subject before she gave in to her body’s darkest desires. “If I tell you what language I was speaking, do you promise not to say another word all night?”
    â€œI’ll be quiet for ten minutes.”
    â€œTen! Thirty.”
    â€œFifteen.”
    â€œTwenty.”
    He held out his hand to shake. “Done.”
    Her fingers slid into his grasp, and the sensation of fingers pressed against each other echoed in humid pulses through her body. “How did you talk me into this?” she asked, breathless.
    He smiled, wry but also confident. “I’m a very good negotiator.”
    That, she did not doubt. She wondered how many women he had “negotiated” into bed. A goodly amount, she wagered. Perhaps all his talk of being intrigued by her, their connection, was merely that—talk.
    She wished that was true. Yet knew, somehow, it wasn’t. He was no polished city attorney, beguiling women into his bed with glossy words of seduction. What he wanted, he achieved through strength of will. And he wanted her.
    It took longer to retrieve her hand than it had taken to give it. The drag of skin contacting skin. Her starved body wanted more. She refused to acquiesce. Yet he knew, too, the effect he had on her, blast him.
    She finally