Falling Through Glass by Barbara Sheridan Page B

once.
    How in the hell did her father and Uncle Jake slip these things on and get the long ends tied like it was a piece of cake? This was ridiculous. When she grasped the front ties the back fell, and vice versa. What she wouldn’t give for a nice pair of jeans about now!
    “Let me,” Kae grumbled, coming up behind her.
    Emmi sucked in her breath when his large, rough hands swept across hers as he took hold of the ties from the front section. He fastened them around her waist, then reached down and took hold of the hakama back. He slid it up and tucked the kimono inside, brushing against her rear as he did so.
    “Hey!”
    “Sorry,” Kae said quickly, although he stepped closer still as he began to wrap the long back ties of the hakama around her waist and fit them into a precise square bow at the front.
    Emmi tried not to notice the way he allowed his arms to linger around her waist after he finished tying the hakama. She thanked him in a whisper and wondered if she was imagining the attraction between them.
    Nope, not imaging a thing, she thought when he drew her back against him.
    He kissed her neck. His lips were a warm and inviting prelude to the way he slid his tongue up the side of her neck and nibbled on her ear.
    Had that odd whimper just come from her? Did it even matter?
    Kaemon coaxed her around and drew her nearer, into a slow kiss. Emmi wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed closer. Giving in to his expertise, she let the play of his lips and tongue unleash a flood of sensation that she’d never fully experienced.
    She’d been on dates. She’d been kissed, but not like this. Never like this.
    Daylight flooded the bathhouse, and Kaemon and Emmi jumped apart. The scary man from last night—Saitou—stood in the doorway, struggling to conceal his amusement. He cleared his throat.
    “Hijikata-san wants to see you both in his quarters.”
    “Thank you, Saitou-san,” Kaemon said, bowing.
    Emmi did likewise and took a long deep breath in an effort to slow the thudding of her heart. When she straightened, Kaemon was staring at her. His deep, dark eyes burned with an intensity that both frightened and attracted her.
    Without a word, he tore a thin strip from the towel-like cloth and tucked the end into the waist of his hakama. Using his fingers as a comb as he had the night before, he smoothed through her damp hair and drew it up into a high ponytail similar to his own. He wrapped the cloth strip around her hair to secure it in place.
    “Now you’ll appear to be my servant.”
    “Hey!”
    “Would you rather look like my courtesan?”
    A servant or a hooker? That was a no-brainer. Emmi shook her head and followed him outside, slipping into the sandals left for her, also courtesy of Yamanami-san. At least people were generally smaller in this time, and she wasn’t stuck trying to wear huge men’s shoes that would fit someone like her father or Jake.
    Emmi kept looking toward the ground. She tried to ignore the pointed glances and suppressed snickers of the men milling around the compound. Emmi’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment when Captain Harada approached and clapped Kaemon on the back, leaning in to whisper something about the bathhouse.
    For all their fame in the history books as dedicated warriors, the Shinsengumi bunch wasn’t that far removed from the jocks back home who liked to tell tall tales in the gym locker room.
    “Shouldn’t your unit be on patrol, Captain Harada?” Hijikata Toshizou called loudly from the porch of the building across the way.
    “Understood, Hijikata-san!”
    Emmi glanced at the vice-commander and followed Kaemon toward him slowly, not anxious to be in the ever-irritated man’s presence.

Chapter Eight
     
     
     
    When they stepped inside the vice-commander’s quarters, Emmi bowed far lower than Kaemon. After all, when confronted with angry men who brandished sharp, dangerous objects, it seemed wise to push aside one’s modern pride and