Lord of the Abyss & Desert Warrior by Nalini Singh

rusty and unused—and though her stomach was clenched tight beneath the water in an attempt to quiet the butterflies—she began to rub the soap down the bare skin of her arm, unable to see a washcloth. “Of course, since you took such pleasure in tormenting me, I shall torment you, too.”
    There was a luminous spark in his eyes and then he was beside the bath again, his arms—solid, muscled,strong beneath the liquid caress of the armor—on the rim. “You were fighting with me, Liliana.”
    An odd thing to say, but not so odd when you considered that no one dared argue with him, this dark lord. “A little,” she said. “But not seriously. It was almost a game.”
    He considered that, his expression thoughtful once more. “The children in the village play games.”
    Placing the soap on the rim beside his arm, she raised her hands to her hair. “What did you do when you were a child?”
    “I don’t remember being a child.”
    Fingers caught in the rat’s nest on top of her head, she tugged and pulled as she tried to work out what the confluence of his mother’s and her father’s spells must have done to him for him to have forgotten his childhood so completely. Either the impact had wiped his memories—or perhaps he hadn’t had a childhood. It was possible that he’d been held in a kind of limbo until he was old enough to care for himself.
    “You’ll pull it all out.”
    “What?”
    “Your hair.”
    “Oh.” She dropped her tired arms. “I’ll cut it off after I get out of the bath. That’s the only way to untangle it.”
    He made a low sound deep in his throat that had her thighs clenching. “I’ll untangle it for you.”

CHAPTER EIGHT
    H IS STORYTELLER LAUGHED .
    The Guardian of the Abyss had heard feminine laughter before. Sometimes, Jissa laughed. And he’d heard the women in the village laugh, too, when they didn’t know he was near. But Liliana’s laugh was different, full of something that made his own mouth want to curve, his chest muscles expand. He didn’t give in. But he wanted to.
    “Very well,” the sorceress said to him, for he knew she was a sorceress. “But how will you work this magic?”
    He ran his eyes over the slopes of her shoulders, so silky with water. “Turn your back and wait for me,” he ordered, wondering what the water would taste like licked from her skin.
    When she raised an eyebrow, then obeyed, he got to his feet. “Start thinking of your tale.” Leaving her, he went quickly down to the kitchen using the secret passageways of the Black Castle that opened only for its lord, and found the cupboard where Jissa kept her “pretty-making things” as Bard called them when Bard could be brought upon to speak.
    The Guardian wasn’t interested in pretty-making, but he’d been curious about the light in Bard’s eyes when he’d spoken of such things, so he’d explored. Everything in the cupboard had smelled very nice, and later, he’d caught one of the scents in Jissa’s hair. There. Closinghis hand around the bottle, he promised himself he would bring Jissa a bar of the special soap she liked when he next went flying over the village.
    All the shopkeepers knew to leave a black box with some of their wares out for him in the night. No one dared steal from that which was the lord’s, and the shopkeepers made sure of it—for he paid them very well. He wondered if Liliana would like to see his room of jewels and treasures as he retraced his steps to the bathroom. Part of him had expected her to be gone, but she was waiting patiently, her back against the rim.
    “Liliana,” he said from the doorway.
    A soft smile over her shoulder that made his body tighten in painful ways, and yet it was a pain he craved. “I heard your footsteps,” she said. “What have you got?”
    “Nothing for you to see.” If she knew of it, she might decide to do the task herself. “Turn your head to the wall.”
    Only the slightest of hesitations before she did as he