Page 83 of A Deal with the Devil

Chapter Twenty-One

The ride to the house was short and quiet. Kitty was not sure what to say. Should she make idle chatter? Should she discuss the extraterrestrial band of blue-skinned warriors from a popular chapbook series? Or Malcolm, a ship’s captain turned pirate? None of her usual topics of conversation were appropriate. Which was not to imply they had ever been appropriate to begin with. But this was something different.

Devil sat quietly watching her as though she were worth watching. As though he saw her. And still meant to keep her safe.

He did not know what she was capable of, what she had nearly done to her closest friend. This would all go away when he truly knew her.

“Does it hurt?” he asked softly.

How she had treated Clara? How angry she was with her father? She opened her mouth, snapped it shut. He meant her ankle, of course. “It’s fine.”

“Mm-hmm.”

The carriage pulled up to her house, a single window soft with lamplight. The rain continued to fall, gilding the glass, the puddles on the road. Devil insisted on carrying her to the door, setting her gently down only when no one answered his imperious knock.

“Where’s your butler?” Devil asked when she opened the door and still no one came to greet her.

Kitty laughed. “We haven’t had a butler for years now.”

“Footmen?”

She shook her head, smiling at him like he was being ridiculous.

“Not a one?” He finally sounded shocked, he who was shocked by nothing. He ran an actual, literal den of iniquity, but this had him scandalized. It was endearing. “You’re alone in there?”

“There’s my father and my aunt.” She had the sudden feeling she was going to wake up with half a dozen more Winchesters on her front stair by morning. She was tired, achy. Vulnerable. She could not withstand any more kindness from him. She might shatter. “Good night, Devil.”

He gripped the door handle, keeping her from going inside. He raised a brow expectantly. Patiently.

“Good night, Rhys,” she amended.

“Good girl,” he murmured in her hair. “I’ll be right back. You’ve had a long night, but I haven’t forgotten my promise,” he added roughly.

“What promise is that?”

“To make you come until your legs give out.”

And just like that, she was on fire from the top of her head straight down her spine. Her nipples puckered in response. She grew wet right there standing on her front step.

He really would have to follow through on his promise soon, or she would never get anything done. This kind of attraction was distracting.

“Lock the door, firecracker.”

The floaty-sparkly feeling lasted all of three minutes. And then her aunt charged out of the parlor. “Was that Lord Birmingham?”

“Yes, Aunt Priscilla.”

“Did you not invite him in?”

“He is a busy man.” And Kitty could not think of many things she wanted less than Devil in her house with her father and her aunt buzzing around him like wasps.

“He has yet to ask your father’s permission, you know.”

“As I am laughably beyond my age of majority and have no dowry, Father is not involved in this.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. The least you can do is have him forgive your father’s debt.”

“It doesn’t work that way.” If he even held a debt of her father’s. She had not asked directly. Part of her did not want to know. There were already too many tangled, complicated threads between them. And because she didn’t want to know. Even if that made her a terrible daughter.