Chapter 9: Skin

"Not tonight," Corbin said at last. "I'll tell you before Saturday. I swear it."

"Then tell me something else that's true."

He was quiet for so long that I thought he wouldn't answer.

"I want you," he said. "I've wanted you since the hallway. I'm trying very hard not to take that from a woman who has had everything taken."

"Is this pity?"

"No."

"Say it again."

"It isn't pity." His voice cracked on the last word. "Larissa, it has never been pity."

I stood up on the stone step so that I was above him.

"Then don't take it," I said. "I'm asking."

"Rule two."

"Rule two is dead. It died when you put your shoulder through my wall."

He laughed, once, low and rough, and then he stopped laughing.

I took his face in both my hands and kissed him.

He went still against my mouth for one second.

Then his arms came around me and he kissed me back hard.

His mouth was hot and he tasted of smoke.

He kissed me slowly, and then not slowly, with his hand wound in my braid.

When I bit his lower lip he groaned into my mouth.

"The coats," I said against him. "There's a rack."

He picked me up.

He did it easily, with his hands under my thighs, and carried me down the last steps.

He laid me on a heap of wool coats and moving blankets in the corner.

The cellar was dark and smelled of cedar and dust.

I couldn't see him, but I could hear his breathing, and I could feel every inch of him when he settled over me.

I pulled the flannel shirt off my shoulders.

"Tell me what you want," he said.

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