“You think you can have him and get rid of me,” Fenris had said. “Once I take you, he’ll be that much weaker.”
If that were possible, the reverse must also be true. She had the chance to circumvent Fenris’s plans here and now. He might return at any moment, but if Quentin was first, Fenris was disarmed. The act of love would be for mutual pleasure, not domination. And Fenris would lose some of his power.
Over her, and over his other self.
“I am as fully committed to seeking your cure as I ever was,” she said slowly. “But we will do it together.”
“Together.” He held out his arms. She moved into them, feeling as though she’d been rescued from the midst of an icy desert. “This method of rational discussion is a strange, dry way to go about lovemaking. It’s a technique I never thought to try.”
“With all your other lovers?”
“Ah, yes.” He rested his forehead in the hollow of her shoulder. “There is so much you don’t know about me, Johanna.”
“No two people can hope to know one another completely.”
“I’m still a drunkard, and I don’t know what I’m capable of when… I lose control. If you give yourself to me, you do more than risk your reputation.”
It was the plainest warning he could give. He wasn’t aware of Fenris, and still he was afraid for her—but he didn’t reckon on the greatest danger she faced.
Losing her heart. Facing life alone when he left her, as surely he must—as Rolf had left her, and her father.
That, too, was her decision: to take the risk, knowing full well that the future was an unknown quantity. She’d already turned her back on a woman’s traditional fate.
She wouldn’t force Quentin to bear the burden of unreasonable expectations. She went into this with her eyes wide open. What happened beyond tonight was in the lap of the gods. And if she got with child…
She would cope with that eventuality if and when it came, as she’d always done.
Words were insufficient to persuade Quentin of her sincerity. The time for hesitation was past.
Deliberately she pressed her weight against him, bearing back down among the pillows. She laced her hands behind his neck, amid the wavy strands of his auburn hair, and kissed him on the mouth.
At last, he believed her.
Chapter 18
Now Quentin was sure that there was more to sleep than nightmares.
Johanna had come to him. She was in his bed, practically begging to be loved. And he hadn’t the strength to deny her, even when he knew he should.
Even when he knew how unworthy he was.
Why now? What had changed? She’d never really answered that question. If he’d thought it was pity that drove her, after seeing him in such a pathetic state, fallen from his high resolves, his memory a blank…
But it wasn’t pity. He sensed that she’d withheld the full truth about what had happened while he was drunk in town, but she wouldn’t come to him if he’d committed any acts of violence. She was far too sane to commit her body to a lunatic.
Not Johanna. If she gave herself, it was with full comprehension, and of her own desire. She was as bold as any lady of the evening—unashamed, yet endearingly innocent at the same time; self-assured, yet betraying just a trace of feminine insecurity. Those very contrasts were what made her unique in all his wide experience.
He had known, from their first conversation, that loving her would be the premier experience of his lifetime. She’d give everything she had, for she knew no other way. And she’d chosen him to be her teacher in the arts of love.
But she was inexperienced, naive for all her intelligence. She needed guidance and a gentle hand.
She needed a lover who would take her so far, and no further.
Oh, it would be so easy to surrender to his own baser instincts and relieve her of the virginity she had so little use for. She was convinced that she’d accepted the potential repercussions of her actions. But he knew better. And he wouldn’t let her destroy her life and career for a night’s pleasure.