Page 93 of Devil in Her Details

Blazes!

Gooseflesh erupted all over her body the moment their eyes met.

Thank God.

He crossed the room without breaking the stride of his entrance. Didn’t acknowledge Knight behind the bar or spare a glance for the brothers at his back. His gaze dropped to her hands, and she flinched, thinking about all his tins of ointment. Before Lilly could formulate an explanation, she was off the chair.

Lilly gasped, circling her arms around his neck.

He turned without a word and carried her off.

“Dagger,” she hissed in his ear. “What are you doing?”

A grunt was his only response.

Was he a beast?

Calliope’s voice floated back to her as Dagger marched them away. “I’m perfectly fine, Maxen. Really.”

Lilly echoed the sentiment! The low murmur of voices faded, and she decided that arguing while being carried up a staircase was logistically awkward enough that she would save it for the top. Not that she imagined any arguing with this man would ever be satisfactory. She had the sinking feeling he’d always let her win.

Always, heh?

Oh, stop, she chastised inner Lilly.

The panther shouldered open a door and set her down carefully on a bed, releasing her to shrug out of his coat. She glanced around the chamber. Nothing grand, but tidy. Dagger tidy.

“So this your bedroom . . .”

He arranged his coat over the chair before turning back to her. “Yes.”

Her gaze lifted to him, but his gaze was on her hands.

“It’s nothing,” Lilly said, any argument she might have launched into about treating her like a sack of potatoes dying at that stare. “Just a few scrapes.”

He crouched in front of her and took one of her bandaged hands in his and began unwrapping Calliope’s handiwork. “What happened?”

Lilly sighed, not bothering to stop the man. “I fell and scraped my hands, that’s all. It looks worse than it is.”

“Where did you fall?” he asked softly.

She scrunched her nose. “In front of your humble abode.”

He set the bandage aside and examined the abrasions, tracing a finger along the edge of one graze. It was the lightest possible touch, barely a breath of contact, but she shivered at the touch.

“See,” she said. “I told you.”

“Doesn’t matter how small, any mark on you is one mark too many.”

Oh Lord. Her heart.

He meticulously reapplied the bandages before moving to the hem of her skirts.

“Dagger Fury! What are you doing?” she exclaimed, trying to stop him. Any one of his brothers could enter!

“Your knees.”

“My knees are perfectly—”