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He smiled wider. She did not. A horrible thought seized her. He was trying to talk her out of whatever this might be. Talk himself out of it. The night in the caves was a result of unusual circumstances, to say the least. The moment in the attic was in order to distract whoever was coming up the stairs to discover them.

It wasn’t about her. Of course it wasn’t.

She was an absolute idiot.

“There it is again,” he said softly. “The posture.”

“You should go if you don’t want this,” she said evenly. “I won’t try to convince you.” She wanted to, but she wouldn’t. Just once she wanted someone to pick her. She wanted Bram to pick her. “It’s quite all right, really,” she said. “We’re adults, and we’ve been in many oddly intimate circumstances.”

She made to scoot back, trying to preserve any shred of dignity. She was suddenly too exposed, and it had nothing to do with her lack of clothes.

His hand tightened on her thigh. “Clara, look at me.”

She did not want to. She did not want to hear his reasons, however sound they might be. She was not enough. And that was enough.

“Clara.” A quiet command, but a command all the same. She glanced at him. “You think I don’t want you?”

She tilted her chin, refused to answer. He searched her face and then stood abruptly. She would not cry. It was ridiculous to cry. This was exactly what she’d expected.

Until Bram pulled his shirt off and began to undo the buttons of his breeches.

Chapter Twenty-One

Captain Bram Thorn was looming over her, stripping off his clothing.

All of his clothing.

He was even more striking than she had imagined, and she had a very good imagination. She was famous for it, actually. Infamous, even.

He was so powerful. He exuded the kind of gentle strength that never made her feel nervous, only protected. Thick thighs, a wide chest, all covered in hair and lined with scars. Tattooed as well, with a swallow on each pectoral.

And all focused entirely on her. Small, pale, forgettable Clara Prescott.

“Move over,” he said. “You’ll wish you never suggested it when it rains down into the rooms below us and they toss us into the streets in our towels.” He stepped into the tub and maneuvered himself behind her, stretching out his legs on either side of her. “Mind your toes.”

She giggled. She actually giggled. Then she clapped her hands over her mouth. The Nightingale wouldn’t giggle. There was nothing sultry about giggling. But somehow, he always managed to make her to do it.

Bram only touched her wrists, lowering her arms. “I want to hear all of the sounds you make,” he said against her ear. He pulled her back against his chest, sloshing the warm water around them, dripping over the edge, as predicted. The hardness of his cock rose against her spine. “Do you still think I don’t want you?” he murmured.

She shook her head.

“Good girl.”

She licked her lips, melting against him. He laid one arm on the lip of the tub, and the other disappeared into the water. He brushed against her quim, softly teasing her, even as he bit down on her earlobe. The contrast made her jolt, shooting sensation from her nipples to her bud. “Do you think I don’t dream about the caves, about you coming on my fingers? Hot and clenching and moaning?”

Just as she was moaning now, because he was parting her lips, stroking up and down, a light circle around her bud, the scrape of his teeth against her throat. She clutched at his thighs, trying to twist around to touch him, finally.

“You come for me first,” he said. “Just like this.”

“Bram.”

“Just for me, pirate. And then I’ll take every part of you into my mouth.”

She arched back, maddened with the pressure building so swiftly. “What if I want you in my mouth?”

He chuckled softly. “Oh, now you’ve done it, pirate.”

He delved into her softness, plunging his fingers deep until she gasped helplessly. He used his other hand to stroke and circle her bud, straining and swelling for him. Circle and stroke, circle and stroke—until the pleasure of it peaked, sudden and sharp. She jerked, and the water rippled around her breasts.