“You can come inside and meet Cousin Carlo, if you like. It’s only, what, eleven? I think he’s a night owl, because he didn’t get up this morning until noonish.” I waited until Merrick pulled into the drive for Carlo’s house before making that suggestion.

To be honest, I was a bit discombobulated about our recent carnal activities.

Why? You enjoyed yourself.

Stop eavesdropping.

But more than that, I was feeling somewhat deflated. Not by the experience itself—

Good. I made sure you enjoyed yourself.

Stop it!

But because of what he’d said afterward. That he could share something so wonderful, so ... primal ... and then tell me that we had no future together when clearly we did, well, that said a lot about the sort of man he was.

I’ve been telling you that all along. I’m sorry that you are disappointed, but I believe in honesty wherever possible.

“There’s honesty, and then there’s brutal frankness when there should, according to movies, be pillow talk.” I pointed at the gate. “You don’t have to buzz. It’s open.”

“There were no pillows involved, so I don’t see the lack of pillow talk as worth commenting on.”

“That’s not what I meant, and I know you know that, because I can feel you thinking at me. No, don’t bother objecting,” I said, holding up my hand to stop his protest as he pulled up at the front of the house. “It’s clear you don’t want anything from me but blood and nooky, so we won’t discuss it further. C’mon, doggy.”

“One moment.” He put a hand on me to stop me from leaving the car. “It’s not safe for you to go in. Not until I’ve ascertained the true identity of your cousin.”

“If he wanted to hurt me, he could have done so well before this,” I pointed out. “And don’t think I don’t know that you’re making this statement to distract me from the fact that you treated me pretty rotten after our car interlude, because I know you are. Doggy, heel!”

The dog obediently trotted after me when I stomped my way up the white stone steps to the front doors of the villa.

“I have no intention of distracting you from anything, although I will point out that I did ask you if you were sure you wished to continue before I fed and we had sex,” Merrick said, following. “You agreed to my terms, if you recall.”

“Here’s the thing,” I said, spinning around at the door to face him. Merciful marshmallows, he was gorgeous. The light from the sconces on either side of the double doors lit him with a warm amber glow, burnishing his dark hair, and emphasizing the line of his jaw.

I loved his jaw.

“I may not have had sexual relationships with an actual person before, but even I know that you don’t set terms for what we have together. Whether you like it or not, we have a connection, and you grinding your teeth and insisting we don’t isn’t going to change that fact.”

“Neither is embracing the impossible with open arms. Do not mistake me for one of the characters in Christian’s books,” he said, climbing the steps and standing so close to me, I could feel his breath on my lips. “I am not a romantic figure yearning for a woman to redeem my soul. What soul I might have had has been destroyed long ago because of the work I do. If I focus my attention on you instead of my job, people will die—mortals and immortals alike. Do you want to live with that?”

“No, but—”

“Then you will accept that we have no future together.” He strode past me, and for a moment, I felt like slamming the doors and collapsing into a puddle of tears, but I haven’t survived hell for most of my life just to give in when a pigheaded, annoying man doesn’t know a good thing when it walks up and kisses the dickens out of him.

I object to pigheaded.

If the pig head fits, wear it, I said stormily, and pushed by him to enter the house and call out, “Cousin Carlo? I’m back. I went off with a friend for a little bit, but we’re back now, and I want to introduce you.”

Silence, thick and heavy, was the only answer.

“Cousin Carlo? Giovanni? Hello?”

“We will search,” Merrick said, and went to the nearest door. We looked through every room on the ground floor, including the library where I’d first seen Carlo. The desk was still littered with papers, and both Merrick and I had a quick look at them. They appeared to be financial portfolio statements, as well as some prospectuses for a variety of investment opportunities.

“Bedrooms upstairs?” Merrick asked when we exhausted the possibilities downstairs. It certainly seemed like Carlo and Giovanni were gone, but the lights were all on, the front door was unlocked, and the gate had been left open.

“Yes. Mine is, at least,” I said, leading him up the curving stairs. “What do you think has happened to them?”

“I don’t know. If we find a laptop or a safe, perhaps we can determine what your cousin has been up to.”

“You’re assuming he’s been up to anything suspicious,” I pointed out. We started the search of the second floor, and after glancing into my room, Merrick opened the door to a small room at the back of the house. It was clearly a bedroom, but I didn’t see anything exciting in it. “Probably Giovanni’s room,” I said, leaving the room after a quick glance around it. I opened another door, finding a desk in front of a wall with three large monitors.

When I turned around to tell Merrick about my find, I saw him hauling Giovanni’s bed into the middle of the room.

“What on earth are you doing?” I asked, returning to the room.

“Finding this.” Merrick pointed to the floor.

A black panel sat flush in the floor, the door of it open.

“Is that a safe? Wow. I didn’t know people really had them put into floors. And Giovanni slept over it?”

“What better way to ensure it was guarded?” Merrick asked, kneeling and reaching down into the safe. “Looks like they took the contents. Which means your cousin isn’t the innocent you believe.”

I stared down at the empty black safe, and shifted my mental picture of Carlo. “I guess not. I found a sort of office, if you want to have a look there.”

Merrick followed me to the small room and glanced around it. “Ah. I wondered where the security cameras fed to. This is clearly where your cousin monitored the property.”

“Recognize someone?” I asked, pointing to the monitors.

He did a double take at one, then slid a look toward me. “You know what that means, I assume.”

“The fact that a close-up of you standing with me next to your car is frozen on the screen? Yes, I assume that, coupled with my cousin’s obvious hasty departure, is proof that he is the guy you’re looking for.” I sat down in a chair for a moment, trying to process the information that my cousin was clearly not what I thought he was.

“Or if not, he knows who Victor is,” Merrick said grimly, and quickly searched the room.

“This just leaves me feeling ... I don’t know. Disappointed. Kind of scared that I can be so misled. And really, really wondering if all of Papa’s side of the family are off their rockers. Do you think this proves my cousin is Victor? Because I might just scream and burst into tears if it turns out I’m related to a world-class villain.”

Merrick was silent for a few moments. “It’s not definitive proof, no, but it’s not an indicator of a selfless and altruistic nature.” He stood next to me and looked down at where I sniffled back the start of a couple of tears. “You are hurt by this knowledge. I can feel the pain within you. I dislike you feeling this way. It will do no good, and will not help catch Victor. You will stop feeling bad now.”

I hiccuped a little weak laugh. “I wish emotions were that easy to cope with. But I know what you mean, although you said it badly and super bossy. Crying isn’t going to help, and neither is feeling betrayed. Cousin Carlo is what he is, just as Papa was what he was. I’m going to focus my emotions on helping you find Carlo so we can know for certain if he is guilty or not.”

“I do not need your help finding him. It’s not safe for you to do so,” Merrick announced, and, without another word, left the room and headed downstairs.

“I’m seriously getting tired of you making obnoxious statements like that just like you’re the king of the world. Hey, Merrick, wait up. What are you going to do now?” I asked, following him, the dog on my heels.

“Try to pick up his trail before it gets cold.”

I grabbed his arm when he was obviously going to leave. “Hang on. Let me get my things. It won’t take me but a minute, since I didn’t really unpack.”

He looked down at my hand on his arm, his eyes icy blue. “You aren’t coming with me.”

“Don’t be silly. Of course I am.”

He took a deep, outraged breath. “There are times when I wonder if I’m just talking to amuse myself. I’ve told you who I am and what I do. I’ve told you that mortals and immortals fear me, and that you are not my Beloved. Since your cousin is not here, I will arrange to have you picked up shortly and taken to a hotel where you will be safe.”

“I know, I know, you’re Mr. Denial,” I said, waving a hand and turning around to dash back up the stairs. “But you’re ignoring three important things.”

I knew he wouldn’t be able to resist that, and I was right. After a moment of inner struggle, he asked, “What three things?”

I paused at the top of the stairs long enough to throw him a smile and say, “One, you can’t leave me here alone. Two, I am your Beloved whether or not you want to face that fact. And three ...”

“Yes?” he asked when I hesitated.

I shrugged. “I don’t want to be left alone. I don’t know anyone in this country, I don’t speak the language, and I’m vulnerable. I need you.”

His sigh was filled with antagonism, but I didn’t let that worry me. I grabbed the few items of  clothing that were laid on a chair, and stuffed them into my suitcase, saying, “If you have to go potty, doggy, do it now before we get in the car. I have a feeling Merrick isn’t going to be happy with the idea of potty breaks.”

The hall was empty when, five minutes later, the dog and I stumbled down the stairs, my two large suitcases bumping after me.

“Well, pumpkin rot!” I swore, going to the front door. Maybe Merrick was sitting in his car waiting impatiently for me.

The drive was just as empty as the hall. A little flutter of yellow caught my eye. A note was stuck onto one of the white stone columns. It is not safe for you to be with me was all it said. A taxi will be here soon.

Hurt pierced me, a hurt tinged with a deeper sense of betrayal than that caused by Cousin Carlo. I stood for a moment, the note in my hand, not believing that Merrick had really left. How could he just drive away from me? What about everything that Christian had written about in his books? None of those Dark Ones had been able to leave the one woman whom they loved above all else.

There is no love, Inner Tempest said sadly. Lots of lust, sure, and some pretty impressive bow-chica-bow time, but no love.

“Well, this is just the limit,” I told the dog, slumping down on the steps, everything about me crestfallen, from my heart right down to my posture. “Cousin Carlo is most likely a bad guy and ran away from me. Merrick abandoned me. Criminy beans, how can he not realize that we’re supposed to be together? Everything says we are. What an annoying vampire. Nowhere in C. J. Dante’s books does he mention how downright annoying they are.”

The dog licked my hand in obvious agreement.

“Now what are we supposed to do?”

A car pulled into the drive and came to a screeching stop in front of me before I could do more than wonder how much of a distance our mental link would work across.

“Get in,” Merrick said, leaning over to open the passenger door. 

I stared at him for a couple of seconds. “You’re annoying. You are stubborn. You don’t know a good thing when you see it. I’m not sure I want to go anywhere with you.”

“And you’re too cheerful, see the good in everything, and believe what you read in those damned books of Christian’s. Get in.”

I sniffed, thought about telling him to take a flying leap, but instead rose with infinite dignity, and let the dog into the backseat. “All right, but I want it understood that you hurt my feelings by leaving me more than my cousin did.”

“I came back for you.” He glanced at his watch. “I’ve only been gone four minutes.”

“Doesn’t matter. You left me, your almost-Beloved, behind. With a dog.”

He looked like he very much wanted to roll his eyes, but instead got out and took my suitcases, tossing them into the trunk of the car. “I’m sure that thought will haunt me for years, but I will strive to overcome it and focus on the job of ridding the world of monsters like Victor.”

“Hrmph,” I said, and slid into the passenger seat.

Silence reigned for about ten minutes as we retraced the route that headed south.

You can’t live without me.

He glanced my way. I can do so quite easily, as a matter of fact.

I read the books, Merrick. I know that once you find your Beloved, you can’t distance yourself.

That’s not true.

C. J. Dante says it is. Is that why you came back? Because you missed me? Or was it because you were hungry?

“Christian has a lot to answer for,” he muttered under his breath, then said louder, “We aren’t Joined, Tempest. Until then, I am not irrevocably bound to you.”

“That’s right, there are more steps. Let’s see ... we must be up to step four or so by now. More than halfway through them,” I said with particular significance that he ignored.

“I doubt if we’ve done more than two steps,” he said, his eyes moving between the rearview mirror and the road in front of us.

“There’s the mind thing—that’s marking, according to the books.” I turned around as best I could with the seat belt on, and patted the dog, taking the opportunity to look out behind us. There were a few cars on the road at this hour, but not a whole lot of traffic. I wondered if Merrick saw something I didn’t. “Then the kissing, which I have to say is pretty spectacular. How many lovers have you had?”

The look he sent my way was one of disbelief. “Why do you want to know?”

“Well, I was technically a virgin before we got together, although I ... you know ... have toys. I mean, I didn’t have them before my father died, but once he was gone, I kind of ran amok in a sex toy shop. If you’re ever in the market for a vibrator, I’m your girl.”

“I will keep that in mind,” he said without the slightest twitching of his lips, but I felt his amusement, and relaxed a little. I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life with a man who didn’t have a sense of humor.

“So it will be nice to know that one of us can bring lots of experience to the sexual table.” I patted him on his thigh. “We can both contribute. I’ll be the source of info as to which vibe carries the biggest bang for the buck, and you can demonstrate lots of positions and interesting sexual additions like blindfolds.”

“Into bondage, are you?” Now he did look amused, although the expression faded almost immediately.

“No.” I looked out of the window, noting absently the streetlights of cross streets blurring past us.

“You surprise me.”

I said nothing, still watching the lights.

Have I said something to offend you?

Why would you think that?

Because I can feel your distress. Is it because I am not interested in your sexual toy reviews?

“Goodness, no. I’ll give you those whether or not you want them, because I think you’re closed to new experiences until you see how fabulous they are. You know, how you are with me.”

“Then why are you upset?”

I picked through my words carefully. “One of the promises I made to myself when I was younger was that I wasn’t going to be a victim. I wasn’t going to dwell on what happened in the past. I was going to put it all behind me, and move forward.”

“And that has something to do with sex?”

“No. It has something to do with being tied up as punishment.” I kept my eyes on the lights, refusing to let the darkness that those memories brought with them fill me. I’d worked too hard to expunge the dark from my soul to let it back now. “Bondage isn’t a fun thing for me. It’s something to endure.”

“I see.” Anger burst through the car, a sort of red haze of anger that seeped into every pore. A spurt of adrenaline accompanied my brain’s being filled with images of vengeance against nameless men.

Wait ... nameless men? Is this you getting so furious again? I told you when you got mad about the beatings that it was in the past. I’ve made my peace with it. I just don’t happen to like being hit or tied up.

Merrick snarled into my head something quite rude.

Clearly, the situation needed to be lightened a bit. I did what I could to downplay the events of the past. “Buzzing bumblebees, Merrick! Why are you so angry because my father was part of a whackadoodle cult, and the Elders clearly had issues with women? It couldn’t be in part because you know deep down I’m your Beloved, could it?”

“I dislike anyone being abused,” he said self-righteously. “It’s one of the things I have fought so long against, in case you missed that point of my repeated discussions of just what it is I do, and why I do not need or want a Beloved.”

“Well, lucky you, you got one anyway,” I said, and decided to put a little icing on the cake. I leaned over and gave him a loud kiss on the cheek.

The look of outrage he seared me with in response gave me immense satisfaction.

It wasn’t long after that we found a twenty-four-hour vet hospital. The tech there kindly scanned the white dog’s entire body for a microchip, but came up blank.

“The man says they can’t take the dog unless you are abandoning him, and then there will be a charge,” Merrick told me, translating for the tech. He reached for his wallet, and started pulling out cash.

“There’s no need for that,” I said loudly, glaring at him, and taking the thin emergency leash the vet hospital offered. “Kelso is coming with me.”

“Kelso?”

“I just named him, now that I know he’s not chipped. Here, give him my number, and tell them to call me if the dog’s owner comes looking for him.” I walked out without another word to Merrick.

You can’t keep a dog, he told me when I marched out to the car.

Why not?

Stranger in a strange place, remember?

Now I’m a stranger with a dog.

The next five hours aren’t worth recording, since they mostly consisted of me sleeping, with one break while Merrick got gas in the car, and I took the dog for a potty break before taking my own.

“Where are we going?” I asked at that point, rubbing my face as I blinked at the bright neon lights of the gas station. Merrick shoved a bottle of water and a bag of chips at me before squatting down and pouring some water in a bowl for Kelso.

“To a small town you have most likely never heard of.”

“Really? What’s there?” Absently, I opened the chips and started munching on them, smiling to myself when Merrick offered Kelso a sandwich, which he happily wolfed down.

“My villa.” Merrick returned to the car and waited for the dog and me to get settled before returning to the road.

“Why are we going to your house? And wait, aren’t you Irish? Why do you live in Italy?”

He gave a mock sigh. Do you always ask so many questions?

Only when I want answers.

I was born in Ireland, but moved to Italy a few centuries ago.

Oh. Why?

Because I liked it!

Sheesh, I just asked. Silence filled the car for about five minutes. Why are we going to your house?

It’s the only place where I can ensure your safety.

“My safety?” I shook my head, feeling like my brain wasn’t functioning so well after the nap I’d just taken. “Why on earth do you keep imagining that Cousin Carlo wants to hurt me? He knew who I was before you kidnapped me.”

“He didn’t know your connection to me,” he pointed out.

I rubbed my face again. I had a serious wrinkle from where my face had been pressed against the door. “That’s right. He did have that picture of us together frozen on the monitor. I don’t see that he’d want to hurt me, though. Not because I let myself be kidnapped.”

“If he is Victor, then he would not hesitate to destroy you in order to get to me.” There was something more to his sentence, but he must have been hiding his thoughts from me, because all I got was an echoing sensation in my head.

I went back to sleep not long after that conversation. By the time we reached Merrick’s villa, the sun was coming up, my back was cramping from being in the car for six hours, and I had to pee again.

“What are we doing here?” I asked when Merrick woke me up. We were stopped in a small square parking area, lined on either side by gray stone walls. Ahead of us was a silver metal doorway apparently cut into a vertical rock face.

“This is my home.” He got out of the car, and went to the trunk to get my luggage.

I got out slowly. “You live in a cave?”

“No, I live in a house eighty meters up. That’s an elevator.”

“Eighty meters ... that’s like two hundred and fifty feet. Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who had an elevator set into a cliff just to get to their house. Come on, Kelso. I bet you’re going to be happy to have a yard to run around in. Wait, you do have a yard? A fenced one?”

“There’s no fence, but there is no way in or out of the gardens from the outside.” Merrick cast a sour glance at the dog when we followed him into a small elevator. “Please confine him to the lowest garden. I don’t need him soiling the other areas.”

“Just how many gardens are there?” I asked, more impressed than I wanted to admit.

“Four. What is your birth date?”

“August eleventh. Why?”

He punched something into the panel on the elevator wall. “I’ve just set the code to zero eight one one. You will have to enter that to use the elevator.”

“Nifty,” I said.

The doors opened and I gasped at the sight that met my eyes. Floodlights shone up on the long front of a house painted the color of goldenrod, dotted with white shutters and French doors down the length, and bisected with a long narrow balcony that that was heavily covered in some sort of green vines. In front of the house, a lush green lawn spread out toward the sea, visible even though the sun was just starting to lighten the sky. “Criminy noodles! This is some sort of gorgeous. I bet the view is breathtaking in daylight.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Merrick said drily, and unlocked a door. I released Kelso, who happily trotted off, his nose to the ground, the white plume of his tail waving gently in the darkness.

“Why not—oh! Vampire. Sunlight.” I eyed him as we entered the villa. “So that’s true? You burn up into little black blobs of nothing if you go out in the sun?”

“No, but it’s not particularly enjoyable to be in sunlight.”

“What happens to you?”

He set down my suitcases, and pulled out his phone. “We blister.”

“Is that all?” I glanced around the room, pleasantly surprised. I don’t know what I expected Merrick’s home to look like—something out of a German expressionist’s nightmare, all white and black and angles everywhere—but this room was Mediterranean cozy with pale acid-washed-jeans blue walls, darker blue sofa, love seat, and chairs, and, overhead, thick wooden beams that had been stained a honey oak color.

“It can be deadly if we are confined for a length of time in full sunlight, so, yes, that’s all.” He nodded toward a staircase. “You can use the room at the top of the stairs just on the left.”

“This place is breathtaking,” I said, noting a dining room beyond the living area. The house was clearly built to utilize the view, with lots of windows and French doors opening onto the lawn and the sight of the sea beyond. “How many rooms does it have?”

“Six.” He finished with whatever text message he was sending, and took both cases upstairs. I followed after him, counting three bookcases in the living room alone. I couldn’t wait to see what sort of reading taste he had. “There is a bathroom attached to your room.”

I entered the room he indicated. A large bed sat against the wall, facing a bank of windows, which Merrick opened after setting down my suitcases. “Pretty room.”

“I’m sure you are tired after being up all night.” He nodded toward a bed swathed with mosquito netting. It looked like something out of The Arabian Nights.

“Not with all the sleeping I did in the car.” I looked around. “This isn’t your bedroom, is it?”

“No. Mine is down the hall on the right. I’ll have some food brought in for you.” He pulled out his phone again when it made a burbling sound. “And food for the dog. There’s a key to the front door in the top left bureau drawer in the main room downstairs. If you like, I can have a rental car delivered for you to use.”

“Thank you,” I said, warmed by the thoughtfulness of his gestures. “That’s very kind of you, especially considering you didn’t want me to be around.”

“Here is my mobile number.” He pulled out a card and wrote a phone number on the back. “Although I would ask you not to call unless the situation is desperate.”

“Desperate,” I repeated, a suspicion slowly starting to dawn in my brain. “Situation?”

“If you hear from your cousin, tell me immediately.” Merrick glanced around the room, then turned and left.

I stood staring for a few minutes, the suspicion growing until it propelled me out the door and down the stairs. I caught up to him at the elevator. “Wait a minute—you’re leaving me here?”

“Yes.” He stepped into the elevator and punched a button.

“You can’t do that!” I objected.

“You need not fear for your safety. You will be safe here. You may have the run of the house and gardens. There’s a pool on the side. The town is small, with few tourists, but you might find it interesting.”

“You can’t just dump Kelso and me like this!” I stuck my arm out to block the elevator doors.

He made an annoyed noise, and tried to move my hand. “I just told you that you will be safe here.”

“Safety is not my issue with the situation. Where are you going?”

“I have a job to do.” His gaze was level, but I could feel the anger within him. It burned white, different from the red hunger, but no less potent.

“And I want to help you with it! Don’t give me that look—you’re not thinking things through properly.” I clutched the elevator doors tightly. “Who knows Carlo? I do. Who would recognize him if she saw him in a crowd? I would. Who can help you find him? That’s right, me.”

“How?” he asked, his expression wary.

I waved my hands around in an attempt to distract him from the fact that I really hadn’t a clue what I was talking about. “He’s ... he’s family. That will help me find him.”

Merrick gave a disbelieving snort and pried one of my hands from the door.

Desperately, I grabbed at the first thing I could think of. “What about eating? If you’re going to be gone longer than a few hours, you’re going to need to eat, aren’t you? C. J. Dante says that now that we’ve hooked up, you can’t feed elsewhere.”

His eyes narrowed, and I could feel him thinking that through. I braced for him to deny again that we had a physical connection, but instead, he said, “There are other sources of food.”

“Such as?” I asked, a spike of jealousy zinging through me.

“Animals. We can feed from them if we have to.”

“Ew.” I wrinkled my nose. “That sounds unpleasant, and can I point out how insulting it is that you’d rather eat from some cow or horse or whatever you find to guzzle in order to avoid me?”

“It’s not ideal, but if it’s what has to be done, then so be it.” He pried my other hand off the door, but rather than pushing me out of the elevator, he wrapped both hands around me and pulled me up against his chest, his mouth on mine before I could even gasp in joy. Instantly, my body went into pure celebration mode, sending off little fireworks and starting up the brass band of welcome.

You sure do know how to kiss, I moaned into his mind at the same time I pulled his shirt out of his pants, running my hands all over the lovely planes of his back. I’d like to thank each and every one of those women who you’ve had relationships with over all the centuries, because the work they did has paid off.

Normally women are jealous of any past partners, he pointed out, a sense of amusement in the back of his head. Trust you to turn that upside down and want to thank them.

Why shouldn’t I? It’s not like you’re cheating on me to go learn how to kiss. Also, could you please do that thing with your left hand again?

His hand, which had slipped down into the bodice of my dress, was currently engaged in tormenting my right breast, his thumb gently stroking my nipple while his fingertips grazed the underside of my breast.

“You must stay here,” he said, his mouth hot on my jaw and neck. “I’ll know you’re safe if you’re here.”

“But I can help you. Oh, grape juice, not the spot behind my ear. That’s ... it’s like kryptonite. My knees go weak when you nibble there.”

He nibbled, his arms strong around me when my legs gave way. He turned so that my back was up against the wall of the elevator, the cold of the metal on my back a stark contrast to the hot man pressing against me.

I won’t be able to do my job if I’m worried about your safety, he said.

I don’t know why you’re so convinced that someone is going to want to harm me, but I appreciate it. I also dispute it. Let me help you, Merrick. Let me help find my dad’s cousin so he can be locked away where he can’t hurt anyone. Let me do something good. Let me into your life.

You are in my life, he said with a growl, and instantly, I was filled with hunger, a need for him, for us to be joined together, for the life to flow between us.

You say that like it’s a problem. Bite me!

His teeth pierced the flesh of my neck, that fraction of a second’s pain fading instantly away to a heat that flowed down my neck and settled deep in my belly.

I squirmed against him, both hands now desperate to touch all of him. His hands left my breasts, and slid down my hips to my thighs, where they found their way under my dress.

“You don’t—we’re not—you can’t—oh, merciful joy of all beings, yes! You won’t hurt your back doing this?”

I writhed against him as his clever, clever fingers managed to divest me of my underwear. His mouth moved around to my shoulder, where he bit a second time, pushing me almost to an orgasm just by the pleasure that he was feeling from the act.

Luckily, he managed to get his fly undone, because I was a mindless ball of erogenous putty in his hands.

Wrap your legs around me, he instructed, lifting me up a few inches.

I’ve never done this standing up, I managed to babble into his mind, locking my feet together around his back. This is so ... so wicked! Can I bite you?

His eyes flashed a pale icy blue at the moment he slid into my body. Bite me where?

I don’t care. I want to do the blood exchange, Merrick. I want to be your Beloved properly. I want all the steps.

He kissed me, his hips working hard against me, the thrusts making the elevator shimmy a little. My tongue twined around his, one hunger diminished while the other raged unchecked. I dug my fingers into his shoulder muscles, my back arching when he increased his pace until I slipped over the edge. My legs tightened around him just as my intimate muscles did the same, which had him groaning with pure pleasure as he gave back the life he’d taken from me.

I held him tight as little aftershocks of pleasure swept over me, my brain having a hard time coming to grips with the sensations that he poured into it, acting like an echo of my own experience.

“That’s amazing that you can do that standing up,” I said in between gasps for air. I was pleased to note that he was breathing just as hard, feeling that if I was going to be totally wiped out by our lovemaking, it was only fair that he was, as well. “I’m not sure that I could hold up another person like that. I feel like my legs are made of gelatin as is.”

He held on to my hips while I unlocked my legs and let them slide down until I was standing again. My inner thighs felt especially quivery.

“It’s not my preferred venue for seduction, but it did the job,” was all he said.

I stood with my hands still on his shoulders, looking deep into those eyes, now a dark sapphire blue. “Let me be your Beloved, Merrick. Let me redeem your soul from wherever it is—C. J. Dante was never very clear about that in his books—and make you whole again. You know as well as I do that what we have isn’t something you can set aside. We were meant to be together. I feel that to the tips of my toes.”

He said nothing, but an interesting array of emotions passed over his face, from male smugness to regret, longing, and finally anger.

“Merrick, don’t do this,” I warned, feeling his intentions if he said nothing. “Don’t close me out. I can help.”

“At the risk of your own life?” He shook his head, and put me out of the elevator. “I might be many things, Tempest, but I am not a man who willingly risks the life of innocents. And you, sweet goddess, are very innocent. The monster Victor would destroy you simply for the pleasure of corrupting your soul.”

“If he wanted to do that, he could have done so earlier,” I protested.

“He didn’t know who you really were,” he answered, and punched a button on the elevator.

“Who am I?” I asked him, confused about what he was saying. “His cousin, you mean? Or your Beloved?”

He didn’t answer, the doors closing with a near-silent whoosh, but I felt the echo of thought in his head.

You are the hope that I cannot have.