“So do you,” I said, stroking her bottom before I squeezed it.
Her arse drove me crazy. How could I want to brutally bite it and reverently caress it all at once?
“But you smell like sandalwood. I just smell like my shampoo.” She leaned forward and sniffed me, her hand smoothing over my bicep, lingering there. “Even after sweaty sex, you still smell fantastic. It’s witchcraft.”
“Not witchcraft. Merely the power of sandalwood essential oil in cosmetic-grade jojoba.”
Lucy snorted. “Did you just say jojoba?”
“That’s right.”
She lifted a sardonic eyebrow. “You are a cosmetics snob, but I kind of love how you speak sometimes. You’re very…wordy.”
“I am a cosmetics snob. And I speak as I think. I was raised in South Dublin. I’m an everything snob and my vocabulary is a result of the most expensive education money can buy,” I sighed, shrugging, sliding my hand up to her breast. Christ, I loved her body.
“Why are you such a snob?”
“I was raised to be a snob.”
“Were you?”
“Yes. I was allowed to do anything I wanted, so long as I was a snob.”
Lucy studied me, her mouth tugging to the side with a sad smile. “What about being a good person?”
“Frowned upon.”
“That sounds bloody awful.”
I chuckled. “It was. It was awful.”
“Why are you laughing then?”
“Because that’s how snobs deal with uncomfortable subjects. We belittle their importance, laugh at them, and change the subject to weather or sport.”
Lucy murmured, “You make me glad I don’t know my grandparents.”
I thought for a moment, then realized who she meant. “The Fitzpatricks?”
My attention caught on a thick bundle of Lucy’s magnificently colored hair lying across her neck. I shuddered to think how different she might be had she been embraced by that cold family. She might have grown up like me.
They would have ruined you.
The idea of a cold, haughty snobbish Lucy Fitzpatrick was as unnatural to me as it was abhorrent.
“What?” she asked, pulling me from my thoughts.
“What?”
Lucy was giving me a hesitant grin. “You said something like, ‘They would have ruined you.’”
“Oh.” I blinked at her. “Did I say that out loud?”
Her grin blossomed into a gigantic smile. “You’re too cute sometimes. I mean, seriously too cute.”
“I’m not cute. I’m aloof and manly.” I lifted a disdainful eyebrow at the idea of me as cute. Ridiculous.
“You are cute. You can’t change what you are,” she teased, her voice adopting a melodic sing-song quality as she touched my nose with her index finger, her attention snagging on my mouth.
I caught her hand, held it on the bed between us. “You said earlier that I’m a snob.”
“But you’re not a snob with me.”
“That’s because I like you.”
Her eyes widened, refocusing on mine, and she gave me an impish smile. “You like me?”
“You know I do.” I rubbed my thumb over the back of her knuckles, enjoying the exquisite softness of her skin.
Lucy’s gaze sharpened, this time with obvious suspicion. “Is this you trying to flirt? Practicing your new skills?”
“No, lovely Lucy.” I kissed her palm, sighed against her wrist when I detected a delicious hint of her perfume. “This is me being honest.”
We watched each other, residual traces of our earlier smiles fading with each passing second. Her breathing had changed, and something about her eyes was different. They’d grown a darker shade of blue.
“What are you doing, Sean?” Her voice held an edge of anxiety. I didn’t like it.
I brought her hand to my chest, cradled it there as a hostage. I didn’t want her leaving, not yet. Maybe never.
I responded honestly, because with her, honesty was a compulsion. “I don’t know, Lucy.”
Two wrinkles of worry appeared between her eyebrows. I wanted to kiss them away. Instead I held her gaze because the moment was an important one.
“You’re mad,” she whispered. “You’ve known me for a week.”
“I’ve known you much longer than that.”
“Fine, a few weeks. It’s the sex.”
“It’s not the sex. You know it’s not.” My hand reflexively tightened on hers, pressing her palm over my heart.
She shook her head, rejecting my words. “It is. You said yourself. You’ve only been with women when you’re drunk. Sloppy and quick. I’m just the first girl you’ve taken your time with, sober, mindful of what you’re doing.”
“We’re not having sex now,” I said through clenched teeth. Her words stung despite—or perhaps because of—their veracity.
“No. But don’t mistake deeper feelings for a good time in the sack.”