However, in her most honest moments, she acknowledged that romantic entanglement with Richard was pure fantasy. In fact, she suspected she used her attraction to him as a shield. If she was spoken for, even if only in her own mind, then she couldn’t be flustered or seduced by other men—men who might actually get through her prickles and hurt her.
That all seemed rather pathetic now. Outside this room was a world she’d never even imagined, a world most people were entirely unaware of. And she, for once in her life, had a chance to make a real contribution. Admittedly, she’d done the world a disservice by awakening Saloman in the first place, but she could make that right.
She didn’t know why he hadn’t come for her tonight. But she knew it was just a matter of time. For some reason, he was amusing himself with her, toying with her, a little bit like Richard occasionally teased her; yet somehow she knew Saloman would deliver, and instead of romance, it would be death.
Death. And beyond that, the chaos he’d inflict on the world.
Padding across the bedroom, drying in the humid air, she dragged her worn old T-shirt from under the pillow and let it unfold. She frowned at it, then threw it onto the floor. Somehow, the act seemed symbolic.
Naked, she climbed into bed. As she reached for the lamp switch, her gaze caught Mihaela’s detector, sitting dully on the table. She winked at it, stuffed it under her pillow and switched off the light.
Although she’d only accepted the detector to get rid of the hunters, she appreciated it now for adding to her sense of security in this room, her haven, where she’d finally grown up and acknowledged her responsibilities.
She woke in darkness, her heart thudding, her body tingling as if from some sexy dream. Her hand rested on coarser fabric than her sheets, and beneath the fabric was something both hard and supple—like human flesh.
It seemed she was still dreaming. Experimentally, she twitched her fingers and the flesh, whatever it was, moved under her hand in instant response—a slow, sensual ripple, like the reaction of a man to a woman’s caress. It would be a good dream to continue . . . only . . .
Only it didn’t feel like a dream—at least, no more than the whole previous day had done. Leaving her hand where it was, in case the flesh escaped her, she drew in her breath to scream and grabbed the lamp switch with her free hand.
Its energy-saving lightbulb flickered into a dim, easy-on-the-eyes glow.
Saloman sat on her bed, Mihaela’s detector held between his long, elegant fingers.
Oh fuck, I’m dead.
She didn’t even bother to scream. She didn’t think she could in her current state. He looked right at her, not even blinking in the brightening light. Fear rose up and swallowed her.
“Good evening,” he said, as if they’d met at some public soiree. His gaze dropped back to the detector. “What is this?”
Numb, still lying awkwardly, propped up on her elbow with her head against her shoulder, Elizabeth followed his attention. The device lay on his palm, the LED not even flickering. It did seem to be vibrating, but so slightly that it just gave occasional twitches. The display was as dead as it had ever been. Piece of crap. Thank God I didn’t rely on it.
Hysteria rose up from nowhere. No, she’d relied on blind, stupid, ignorant faith, and now the bastard was actually sitting on her bed, playing with the hunters’ secret weapon, which he had extracted from right under her pillow. One was as much use as the other.
“It’s a vampire detector,” she said defiantly, hoping to frighten him off with the potential arrival of the hunters—before she remembered that all that had kept her alive the other night had been her disbelief in him. “Or that’s the nonsense they fed me.”
“It doesn’t work,” he observed.
“That must be because you’re not a vampire.”
He cast her a quick, mocking glance, and her brief hope died. “Well, one of us is upsetting it. Interesting device.” He slipped it into his shirt pocket.
“That’s mine!” she exclaimed.
“No, it isn’t. I’ll return it to the hunters when we meet. I only want to see how it works.”
So do I. The hysteria was back, catching at her breath until she swallowed it down. “How did you get in here? What do you want?”
“I came through the window.”
“It’s locked!”
His eyes glinted. “Give me some credit.”
“Besides, I didn’t invite you in,” she added desperately.
“You’ve been reading Bram Stoker,” he chided.
“So have you.”
He smiled at that, not the swiftly vanishing half smile that had so intrigued her on their first encounter, but a proper, devastating smile of genuine amusement. “Of course. I’m not sure my friend Vlad would be impressed by this fresh assault upon his reputation. Though it might entertain him.”
“Vlad the Impaler was your friend?” She didn’t mean to say it. The words just spilled out with her involuntary excitement.
“For a time.”
A tide of questions rose up, together with the realization that Saloman was a historian’s dream. His gleaming eyes acknowledged it, forcing her to close her lips in silence. What a waste. What I could learn from him . . .
He’s not a bloody teacher! He’s a vampire!
“What do you want?” she snapped a second time, registering with vague surprise that her fear was getting lost in academic frustration.
“Your blood, of course.”
Okay, so the fear hadn’t gone. It had merely taken a brief—very brief—backseat. “Go to hell,” she said shakily.
“You don’t mean that,” he mocked.
“Yes, I bloody do.”
“Then don’t hold my thigh so tightly.”
Baffled, she followed his gaze to her right hand, which still rested on his black linen-encased leg, her fingers digging into his flesh. He moved his thigh suggestively, and with a gasp, she snatched her hand away.
“I was touched by your welcome,” he said.
“I was asleep,” she returned with what dignity she could muster.
“You must have pleasant dreams.”
She flicked a glance at him, unsure. It was a mistake, for he caught her gaze and held it with frightening ease. She began to drown in the depths of his black eyes and clenched her fists on the sheet as if to grab hold of the last remnants of sense.
He said, “You’re lonely.” And oddly, it didn’t sound like mockery, which she could have shrugged off. It sounded—surprised.
“I wish,” she said bitterly. “Lately, I can’t move for people in this room.”
“You’re far from home, alone in a strange country. . . . Do you have a husband, Elizabeth?”
Her name on his lips, in his deep, stirring voice, sent an unexpected shiver down her spine.
“No.”
“A lover who pines for you?”
“No! Which is fortunate since you intend to kill me.”
Somewhere she was still amazed by this bizarre conversation. But most of her could glare into his handsome, unfathomable face with anger and, she hoped, hatred.
“That’s a point of view,” he allowed. “A very selfless one.” His hand lifted, and one long, tapered finger touched her shoulder—her naked shoulder.
Oh Jesus Christ, she’d gone to sleep in the nude. What in God’s name had possessed her? And why the hell should I care? I’ll be dead in a minute.
His finger traced a line of fire inward along her clavicle, heating her whole body beyond endurance. I could lie here and be pawed and murdered. Or I could shift my perverse arse and get out of here.
With a gasp of outrage, she slapped his hand aside and lunged for the other side of the bed.
She didn’t make it. She didn’t even come close. As if she’d never removed it, his hand pressed her back into the pillows and she couldn’t budge. She felt as if she’d been winded. His hand over her heart was as unyielding as steel.
She aimed a vicious kick at him, but
her leg tangled in the sheet and her blow lost all its strength. She could swing her fist, but with despair, she knew it would never reach him. He moved too fast, so she contented herself with a glare she was afraid looked more defiant than furious.
But her pathetic escape attempt didn’t appear to anger him. She wondered if he’d even noticed. His hand on her chest relaxed its force. He spread his fingers across her skin, until two of them reached the upper swell of her naked breast. In this new position occasioned by her futile lunge, she was half sitting and terribly afraid that the sheet had slipped beyond all modesty, especially since his gaze appeared to be on his hand, as if admiring the effect of his skin on hers.
Her heart thundered. He would feel that too, thudding into his palm. His hand moved, subtly undulating and his fingers brushed against her skin.
“Silken,” he murmured, “and rosy with warm, sweet blood . . . So—sacrificial.”
“In your dreams,” she gasped.
“Indeed. I thought I was dreaming when you first leaned over me, so beautiful and wondering, with that strong, stirring blood you were so obliging as to drip right on my lips.”
She stared at him, mesmerized. “You saw that? You were awake then?”
“Oh yes. I was always awake in that sense. I could see you. I could hear you talking to yourself—Whoever bled to death from a rose thorn? I could even feel your tender, probing fingers all over my body. I just couldn’t move. Not until you rubbed the blood into my lips—which, by the way, was an experience so sensual that I would almost be ready to die again to repeat it.” His voice lowered to that husky tone she remembered, the one that both paralyzed and aroused. “Your blood and my lips . . . an enticing combination.” She heard her own breath catch and quicken; she didn’t know how to hide it. His hand, sliding lower, must have felt it all.
“Not from where I’m sitting,” she spat. At least she wanted to spit. She was afraid she squeaked. His lips quirked, a smile dawning and dying as he leaned closer, inhaling her. His free hand came up and touched her throat, caressing, right over the old wound he’d created and healed. Unable to bear the sensitivity, she seized his wrist, but no amount of tugging made any difference.
“A meal to be savored,” he murmured. “Served hot or cold. And yet”—his head bent nearer her throat, his voice softening until it was almost inaudible—“and yet I will regret the ending.”
What the hell did he mean by that? That he didn’t want to kill her? Could there be a way out of this? In just an instant, she’d feel again those soft lips on her skin, the prick of his teeth, and the long, ecstatic pull on her blood. Her body flamed, as eager to feel the pleasure as to avoid the resulting death. She felt the weight of his body pressing against her chest. A pool of sexual moisture broke from between her legs and trickled down into the sheet, spreading heat beneath her. She was sure his lips brushed the tiny hairs on her earlobes, on her neck. She jerked again on his wrist, but he only slid his hand around to her nape, holding her more firmly.
Whatever his regrets, they clearly weren’t enough to stop him. She couldn’t fight him physically. Her strength had always been her mind, and she cast around in it to find anything that might halt him or even slow him down.
“Zoltán!” she gasped out. “You’ve got more pressing concerns than this. Zoltán betrayed you! He attacked me!”
The vampire hunters wouldn’t approve. He’d go and kill Zoltán, which was just what they didn’t want. But right now that paled into insignificance beside the necessity of saving her own life.
In any case, it had an effect. Saloman went very still, and for a moment, she wondered if she’d won a breathing space at least. Then his lips closed on her throat, caressing and teasing her skin. She was sure he even flicked the vein with his tongue, tapping it like a nurse before inserting a needle.
She trembled, both yearning and dreading and unable to distinguish one from the other. Saloman relaxed the pressure of his body on hers, and the hand on her chest slipped lower between them and closed over her naked breast. She let out a tiny, inarticulate sound that might have been a sigh or a sob.
Saloman lifted his head. His black eyes burned into hers. “I know,” he said, and dropped his gaze to her mouth, to her breasts. His palm moved, gliding over the aching peak of her nipple.
“Know what?” she demanded with desperation, having lost the thread.
“That Zoltán attacked you. He has no finesse.”
“You were there,” she blurted. “You were the other shadow. . . .” And yet she could have sworn she’d surprised him by her original revelation.
“The other shadow? I’m not sure I like that. It offends my sense of superiority.”
A breath of laughter escaped her, as unbidden as it was appalling. “Are you for real?”
“Oh yes.” His hand released her breast to draw the sheet farther down. “Don’t I feel real?” His fingers touched her lips, parting them with a downward sweep that continued over her chin and throat and down between her breasts to her navel. She moved with the caress, arching under his hand because she couldn’t help it. She felt like a musical instrument, played by his careless, talented fingers.
“I began this meal the night you wakened me,” he whispered. “And I will finish it—all of it.”
She swallowed, trying not to squirm under his devouring gaze. Jesus, no one had ever looked at her like that, with such greedy, urgent passion; but then, no one had ever regarded her as a meal before either.
His finger circled her belly button, dipping in and out.
She gasped, “What do you mean, all of it?” Was there a choice? Could she convince him to leave her alive?
The almost smile dawned and died on his lips.
“Sex,” he said unexpectedly. She blinked, and his gaze moved up to her face, mocking, yet scalding in its intensity. “That’s what you call it these days, isn’t it? When you’re being polite.” He laid his whole hand flat on her stomach, then swept outward and downward to her thigh. “Let me say it in my own more familiar terms. Tonight, I will pleasure you. I will take every delight your sweet flesh can give me. And just before sunrise, I will finish the meal.”
Could she negotiate for one without the other? Burning up with his words, she wanted all of it. She remembered the staggering bliss of his killing mouth on her throat, was only too aware of her helpless reaction to his touch right now.
He could make me orgasm just by looking at me. . . . Oh shit, what is the matter with me?
“Well, that’s novel,” she managed, with what mockery she could summon, forcing herself to be still under his idly caressing hands. “Dalliance and dinner instead of the other way round.”
His lips quirked. “I offered them both together, as I recall. I believe I can still manage that. Afterward.”
She squirmed, and he smiled, pleased and predatory.
Fighting herself at least as much as him, she tried for further delay. “Why didn’t you just do it, then? What’s the point of all the cat and mouse?”
“Fun,” he replied, as though surprised. “And the fact that I barely had the strength to stand, let alone fuck.”
Her face flamed all over again, and his hand on her nape massaged the muscles there, sending shivers all the way down her spine. They felt more like bolts of lust.
He said, “I’m better now,” and drew her forward by the nape until her naked body rested against him. There was no time to struggle, if she could have forced herself to it, before his mouth closed on hers in the most sensual kiss she’d ever known. His lips dominated, tasting, then sucking, while his tongue thrust in deliberate simulation of sex. She felt his teeth, those terrible fangs, and without really meaning to, just unable to resist, she touched one with her tongue.
A sound like a groan escaped him. She was swept closer into his body, her breasts crushed against his hard, powerful chest while the hand not caressing her nape splayed flat against her naked back and began to play among her vertebrae, spreading wild, devastating lu
st straight between her legs.
He opened her mouth wider with his, deepening the kiss. She felt dizzy, as if she were falling, and realized he was pressing her back into the pillows, moving the rest of his body onto the bed with her.
This is it. He’s really going to do it; have sex with me. Everything in her leapt toward that goal, that yearning that had become a need, a necessity. In just an instant, she’d feel the weight of his hard, muscular body. As he removed his clothes, she’d feel his naked skin on hers, his hardness pressing between her thighs. This amazing, beautiful being wanted to have sex with her.
And then he would kill her.
Her mouth opened wide under his. She didn’t know if it was a sob of fury or a cry of desire. But at least it spurred her to jerk against him in a futile attempt to dislodge him—futile because she realized her hands were clinging to his long black hair and his shoulder, holding him to her at the same time as she was pushing him off.
And the bastard laughed inside her head. Relax and enjoy it, he said. She pulled his hair hard, just as she dragged her mouth free.
And something crashed and pounded on the bedroom door.
Chapter Seven
“Elizabeth!”
It was Konrad’s voice, shouting through the door as he hammered on it. In fact there must have been at least two pairs of fists, judging by the racket. There would be complaints. She’d be asked to leave.
“Elizabeth, let us in. The detector won’t work.”
“Really?” said Saloman. And unforgivably, Elizabeth wanted to laugh. It wasn’t funny. Saloman could bite her, drain her blood so fast she wouldn’t even be aware of it, as he’d done with the vampire who’d attacked her the night before, and escape through the window before the vampire hunters could break their way in. Cornered as he was, and by those who could hurt him as she could not, she was sure it crossed his mind. Her blood was important to him, to bring him back to full strength, and he’d already said that the game, whatever it had been, would end before sunrise.
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