She shuffled around, trying to fit into the small cramped hull of the boat, which really was not where she wished to be, not even for a moment. She was squished, her arms tight up against her sides. It smelled. It was mucky. It was wet. Wet, as if a small pond held a secret life down in the basin of the curmudgeon’s curaigh, or whatever Finian had called it.
“Finian.”
“Mmm?” He didn’t look down. His powerful arms kept up a powerful paddling. She could almost feel the river skiffing away not an inch below her body.
“I think there’s fish down here.”
“Aye. This river has many fish.”
“No. I mean this boat. Swimming around me. Little tiny fish.”
His lips twitched.
“If you laugh, I’m getting up,” she warned.
“Hush.” His voice went low, his lips hardly moved. Senna barely had time to feel a tingle of concern before she heard the shouts of men at the shoreline. The rush of panic came flying for her. Englishmen. Soldiers.
They’d been found.
“Heave to, Irishman,” one of the soldiers called.
r /> Finian shoved the paddle deep into the mud of the riverbed, keeping the boat from sailing any farther, which would have sent the soldiers shouting for whatever others were billeted on the people and patrolling the lands. It also kept the curaigh from going any closer to the shore.
“That looks like O’Mallery’s nubbin’ boat,” one of them said.
“That’s so,” agreed Finian easily. “He let me use it.”
“Not bloody likely,” muttered the shorter one. The two stared at each other a moment, then the taller one snapped his fingers.
“O’Mallery don’t let his wife use his pecker,” he growled. “Come over here, boy.”
Senna could almost feel Finian rise up in the boat, like a huge wave uncoiling itself close to shore. She grabbed his boot. His steely gaze snapped down. With her free hand and an open palm, she mimed going softly down. Sit down, calm down.
“For me,” she whispered.
He fired his gaze up again. “There’s only two of them,” he said, not moving his lips.
“Now there’s only two,” she whispered. “You said you enjoy traveling with me. I enjoy traveling with you. Let it go.”
“I’ve let a lot of things go,” he said in a calm voice. That worried her. He was still squinting toward the shoreline, locked, she supposed, in mortal eye combat with one of the English soldiers.
“I’ll make it up to you,” she whispered urgently.
The faintest trace of a smile lifted his lips.
“Boy, git over here.”
It was the whisky that made her do it. She was fairly certain of that. The hot, uninhibiting flush the drink had sent coursing through her limbs simply floated into her brain and melted her wits.
She took a deep breath, gave her tunic a harsh tug so it tore further, exposing an immodest curve of her breasts and the valley between. Then she sat up. Unraveled, really. Or so she hoped.
Finian’s jaw dropped, but not so far as the English boys’ did on the shore.
“Jay-sus!” one of them shouted, jumping back as if she were one of the fey.
She smiled as lustily as she could and draped her arms over Finian’s thighs, her face close to his groin, implying she’d only just lifted her mouth away.
“Hello, lads,” she said in a confident, husky tone. Or did it sound like she was sick? She didn’t quite know how to sound seductive, and hoped this would do. “Are we disturbing ye?”