Drawn forth by the scent of coffee and bacon, Vicky padded barefoot down the small hall. The wood flooring was cool against the soles of her feet. The white walls were bare, but nail holes revealed where things once hung. Instead of pictures or paintings, spiders now made this hallway their home as they spun their webs in the corners.

She stepped out of the hall and into a room she assumed was the living room, but it could have been a dining room. It was impossible to tell without any furniture to distinguish it, and the walls and flooring were the same throughout the home. The clattering of a pan drew her across the room and around the corner of a wall.

Nathan came into view when she stepped in front of the half wall separating her from the kitchen. She admired his rugged profile and the stubble lining his jaw, as he flipped bacon with a fork before removing the pan from the fire.

Seeming to sense her attention, he glanced at her and smiled. Vicky smiled nervously back, unsure of what to say or do. What did one say to the man she spent the night killing vampires with, before returning to this brick house he’d informed her was once his?

A man who had given her the small air mattress in a bedroom she assumed was once his while he slept on the floor somewhere else. A man who haunted her dreams until she woke aching so much for his touch that she almost searched him out. She’d remained in bed and attempted to take the edge off her need by herself. It hadn’t worked as her body was already quickening in response to his once more.

“I’d offer you some bacon, but I feel like it would be a waste,” he said.

“I’m not a fan of bacon, but I would love coffee.”

An eyebrow rose as he turned to look more thoroughly at her. Standing behind the half wall dividing the kitchen from the dining room, he couldn’t see below her waist. She wore the shirt he’d given her last night to replace her blood and dirt stained clothing. He kept the gray shirt stashed in his room with some of his other clothes.

She’d taken a shower last night, and he assumed she put the shirt on after, but he hadn’t seen her in it, until now, and he couldn’t deny he liked seeing her in it. The sleeves were rolled up to reveal her delicate wrists and thin forearms. Despite her fragile, almost childlike appearance in the too big shirt, he knew she was more lethal than most of the Savages he’d encountered over the years, she’d proven that last night.

Her breasts swayed against the fabric when she stepped closer. The outline of something drew Nathan’s attention to her nipples. Are they pierced?

His mouth watered at the possibility, and his fingers itched to find out. It was yet another thing he should find repulsive about Vicky. Female hunters weren’t allowed to wear any adornments, but on her, the idea of it turned him on more.

She’d left the top two buttons of his shirt undone, revealing a small patch of golden skin. His hand tightened on the pan handle as he pictured slipping the rest of those buttons free and kissing his way over every inch of her body.

He gritted his teeth against his growing arousal and focused on the conversation at hand. “You drink coffee?” he asked.

“I do. I like human things more than the rest of my siblings, so I tried more of them. My sister Abby and I are big fans of cookies. I will never turn down chocolate chip.”

“Good to know,” he said.

Vicky rested her hands on the small wall and leaned forward as he opened a white cabinet. Within, one coffee mug sat on a shelf. He pulled it down and filled it. “I have some sugar, but no milk,” he said to her.

“I’ll take it black,” she said and smiled when he handed her the coffee. The mug warmed her hands when she clasped it and blew on the steaming liquid within. “How often do you come here?”

“At least once a week to check on things, sometimes more.” He lifted a piece of bacon and bit into it.

“And you keep the place stocked with supplies?”

“Enough for me to crash here or clean up after a fight if necessary.”

Vicky sipped her coffee as she studied him. He answered her with casual indifference, but tension emanated from him. She walked around the wall to stand in the kitchen.

“I never thanked you for your help last night,” she said and set the mug down on the half wall.

“There’s no need,” he replied.

“Yes, there is. You risked your life. Thank you.”

Resting her hands on the wall behind her, she lifted herself up and settled onto it. She didn’t miss Nathan’s glance at her thigh when the motion caused the shirt to rise. Tugging the shirt down again, she sat on the back of it. She hadn’t bothered to put on jeans as the shirt hung to her knees and the idea of wearing her ruined jeans again repulsed her.

Now, she wished she had.

She went to slide back off the wall, but Nathan walked over to stand next to her, freezing her in place.

“Anytime, Victoria,” he murmured, his eyes darkening as his gaze fell to the open buttons. The way her name rolled off his tongue caused her nipples to pucker as she pictured the wicked things he could do to her with that tongue.

Vicky’s breath lodged in her throat when his cypress smell increased. Unwillingly, her gaze fell to the growing bulge in the front of his jeans.

Run! But before she could bolt, he retreated from her. Relief and disappointment thundered through her as she bowed her head.

“So, are you ready to tell me exactly what Duke did to you?” he asked as he returned to the pan of cooking bacon.

Vicky grimaced. Drawing her knees up, she was careful to keep herself covered to her ankles by the shirt. She hugged her legs against her chest and surreptitiously slid the top buttons of the shirt into place.

“You heard part of it; he sold me to vampires,” she said.

Nathan’s hand clenched on the handle of the pan until it bent a little within his grasp. He couldn’t look at her. He was afraid if he did, he would strip the shirt off and take her, or batter this kitchen until nothing remained of it.

“I see,” he said through his teeth. “And what’s the rest of it?”

She didn’t want to relive it all again, but he had saved her life, and she owed him something for that. “Did you ever hear about a vampire named Drake Wilston?”

“I can’t say I have.” He chanced a glance at her. “Did he have something to do with Duke?”

“He was once one of Ronan’s men, but he gave in and turned Savage. Then, one day he decided it would be fun to capture purebreds and allow other vampires to feed off them, for a price, of course.”

“Of course,” Nathan murmured, and the pan handle bent entirely over.

“While we were dating, Duke sold me to some of Drake’s cohorts, and I became an imprisoned delicatessen for a bunch of lowlife assholes.”

No wonder she’d despised the vampire, Nathan realized and briefly wished Duke was still alive so he could do what Vicky hadn’t and torture the miserable bastard until he was nothing more than a blubbering mess.

Lifting her arm, Vicky gazed at the scar on her inner right wrist. She’d received it during her time in captivity, but whereas the rest of the countless bites she’d endured had healed and faded away, this scar remained. Multiple bites on her wrist, from different vamps, had formed what resembled an ancient sun symbol on her flesh.

“What do you have there?” Nathan walked over to stand before her again. He frowned at the mark on her inner wrist.

“A scar.”

“I didn’t think it was possible for vampires to have scars, until Killean.”

Vicky started to lower her wrist, but he clasped it and lifted it toward him to inspect it. She almost tore her hand away from him. After what she’d done while chained to that wall, Vicky hated the kind touch of another, but she couldn’t resist him. She concentrated on breathing normally as little currents of pleasure rippled across her flesh from his caress.

“If the action is repeated often enough, a scar or tattoo will remain on a vampire. In some cases with vamps, if they’re scarred before they reach maturity, it doesn’t completely heal. I’m not sure how Killean received his scar, but it was probably one of those two things. I also don’t know why this remains on me when all the other bites I endured while in captivity faded. I wasn’t bitten on this wrist any more often than other places on my body, but the mark persists.”

Color crept into her cheeks, and her lashes lowered to shadow her eyes. Nathan didn’t think it was possible for Victoria to blush; this was more shame creeping over her as she dropped her legs and tugged at the ends of his shirt with her free hand.

“Victoria—”

“I wasn’t raped.”

She pulled on her arm, and he reluctantly released her.

“But they violated me in countless other ways, fed from me in places….” Her hand fell to her thigh as she tugged at his shirt again; although, it was already as low as it could go. “Well, you get the idea.”