A great sigh shuddered out of her. “I’m such a weakling to be weeping about it, but I canna help it.”
“What’s so bad that it canna be fixed?” he asked.
“My department knows what I’m doing. They want me to come back or they’ll send guardians after me. If I go back, I’ll lose any chance at the book and I’ll be a Failte forever. And they’ll fire me, so I’ll go mad all the sooner without work to distract me. But if they send guardians after me before we find the book, it’ll be that much harder.”
“When will they send them?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Then we’ll get the book tonight.”
“We have to. Because it’s more than just me. If I fail and the university fails to retrieve the book, we’re looking at divine war before the end of the month.”
“You’ll get it back. I canna imagine another Mythean being more capable of the job. If you quit now, the university’s best chance of getting the book back goes with you. Then we’re all fucked.”
She straightened and breathed deeply, her confidence and determination strapped back around her like a suit of armor. “You’re right, damn it.”
He grinned. He liked her toughness and determination.
We’ll get this book,” he said. But as he said it, dread settled in his stomach. The book was his ticket out. He had to have it to barter, or he had nothing and he’d be back in hell. But if he threatened to destroy it to force her to remove his collar, the university would fire her.
With the shaking nerves of her freak-out behind her, it suddenly hit Fiona that she was sitting pressed against the hard length of Ian’s side.
The attraction she’d been suppressing welled, heat and warmth and grinding need rushing through her in a torrent. The stress of everything that lay in front of them broke down her resistance so that the river of want surged through her.
“Fiona?” Ian’s voice scratched so sweetly over her nerves and made her sex throb. His voice was so rough and hard that she c
ouldn’t help but think he’d sensed the change in her.
“Aye?” Her voice was scratchy, too, she realized.
“Maybe you ought to get up.”
She turned her head to look at him, but couldn’t quite get the range of motion required. Instead, she caught sight of the bulge between his thighs, thick and long and so prominent that it was obscene.
She wanted it. She shouldn’t. It was a terrible idea, a distraction from her work. But gods, she wanted it. Wanted him. Wanted something to make her forget everything that was at stake, if only for a moment. They had hours before they could break into the museum.
“It must have been a really long time since you’ve been with a woman.”
Why had she said that? To egg him on? To explain to herself why he was hard for a boring Acquirer like herself?
“It’s fine.” His voice had turned to gravel and his breath feathered against her ear, making her shudder.
“Really?”
“I’m no’ a fucking animal, even if I feel like one right now. But I’m at the edge here, Fiona, with the things I want to do with you. So I’m going to need you to get up or to tell me what you want.” The arm that wrapped around her shoulders trembled, his self-control an iron thing bent to breaking. “Do you want this, Fiona?”
This was so crazy. It was happening so fast. But it’d been so long since she’d been with a man. And she wanted this man. He was handsome and charming and dangerous and a thief. Forbidden.
“Fiona?”
“Aye.” It was so quiet she was almost afraid he didn’t hear her.
But his big hands gripped her shoulders and spun her quickly, pressing her back into the seat, so that he could rise up hot and hard over her, caging her in.
His head dipped low and close, his eyes hot on hers. He smelled of clean soap and aroused male and it made her want to taste him. To run her tongue over the smooth skin that stretched across the hard muscles she knew covered all of him.
“You’re sure?” Ian asked, his voice gravel.