SHE COULDN'T BREATHE.

That was the first thought that struck her. Ava froze, trying to drag her hand to her face. There was something there. Over her mouth. And her skin felt warm and wet, as though some sort of liquid surrounded her. Metal under her touch. The brass filtration device over her mouth and nose, with a tube leading back to an oxygen canister.

She felt the beginning of that old panic. She knew this place. Knew where she was, how she'd been trapped.

Naked limbs. Naked all over. Her only decoration was the enormous scar up the center of her chest, where Hague had cut her heart out and replaced it with his own clockwork version.

Ava screamed, bubbles slipping from the breathing mask over her face, rippling over her delicate cheeks and shooting toward the top of the small tank she floated in.

Hague's healing tank, he'd told her.

She pressed her hands against the glass, her vision blurry through the water. Ava pounded her fists against it, but it would not break. She'd tried, a thousand times before, ever since she’d woken up here in Hague's dark laboratory. She was trapped in here, trapped forever, unable to ever escape—

"Ava! Ava!" Hands caught her shoulders.

She fought him, trying to push Hague away, but then he said the one word that stayed her fury. "Damn it, kitten. You're going to give me a black eye."

Kitten?

Only one man ever called her that. Ava caught Kincaid's wrists and gasped. Cool metal met her left hand, the bare spars fused into flesh with exquisite workmanship. Suddenly she could see again. Recognize where she was. Kincaid knelt on the edge of her bed, his palms cupped around her shoulders. He loomed over her, but there was a lantern in the corner and its golden light backlit him, revealing just how quickly he'd rushed in here. She caught a vague glimpse of naked skin, but the darkness threatened to suck her under again.

"Here." Warm arms enveloped her even as she sucked in a sharp breath. "I've got you. You're safe. You're with me. I've got you."

Ava burrowed her face against Kincaid's throat. The first sob took her by surprise, a spasm ripping through her chest as she tried to suppress it. She might be safe, but she'd never be entirely free of Hague and the shadow he cast over her life.

Kincaid held her for a long time as she struggled to fight back the tearless sobs. His human hand stroked her hair, catching in tangles of it, and then gradually easing them free. It was that which brought her back to the present. The patient, slow way in which he finger combed her hair. Not a single question, or a demand she fight her way through her panic-fueled nightmares, but just letting her find her way back when she was ready.

He'd done the same to her in the Garden of Eden when she'd suffered her hysteria attack—whatever else this man might be, he was patient when he needed to be. And surprisingly gentle. She'd have never expected it of him, with his brutish body, the sparse steel of his mech hand, and the fierce expression he so frequently wore.

Ava turned her head, pressing her lips to his throat and breathing in the scent of him. She couldn't stop herself from darting her tongue against his skin and tasting the salt there. The kick of his pulse against her tongue made the shadows rise again. But this time they were different shadows. The craving ignited inside her as the predator within her raised its head, scenting blood. She could hear his pulse in her ears, feel it flickering against her lips, just daring her.... So near she could almost taste it—

"That's enough," Ava said, pushing him away with a gasp.

Kincaid reared back onto his knees on the bed. He wore trousers, at least, but the sight of his light-touched skin drew her gaze, and made her uncomfortably aware of how quiet the night was.

How they were possibly the only two people in the house right now.

"What are you doing in here?" she whispered, sitting up and dragging the sheets under her chin.

Kincaid arched one of those dark brows. "Rescuing you from an assassin. Someone screamed the house half down. Thought you were being murdered. Turns out you were fighting off your sheets instead."

Of course. She felt like the worst sort of fool. If the ground opened up to swallow her whole right now, she would pray to any god. "Did anyone else hear?"

"Apart from Herbert, I'm the only one here, princess. Our resident inventor, Jack, had mysterious business in the city. Viscount business, I suspect. And the baroness was up to no good. Looked like she was heading out to a ball. If she doesn't come home with at least a dozen hearts in her pocket, I'll be disappointed."

A joke, for the baroness was cold and reserved, except for when Isabella looked at Malloryn.

Apart from Herbert, the butler née assassin, Ava realized she was all alone in the house with a half naked man who was a physically fine specimen of male anatomy indeed.

Kincaid resettled himself on the edge of the bed, shirtless, and with the buttons on his trousers half undone. Ava blushed. Hair trailed from his navel down into his pants, and a generous dusting of it shadowed his chest. He was nothing like Paul, her ex-fiancé. Side-by-side he'd dwarf poor Paul, and he felt... threatening in a way Paul never had.

Because you want him. Because there's danger inside this man, and you're not quite certain how to handle him.

"I'm sorry. For dragging you out of bed."

"Don't be sorry." He scratched at the faint scar on his chin. "Happen often?"

"Sometimes," she said noncommittally.

"Something bad happened to you once."

She didn't deny it.

"It's written all over you, luv." Those wicked eyes narrowed, but more in consideration than anything else. "You don't have to tell me."

Ava drew her knees to her chest. Suddenly Hague was back, trailing ghostly fingertips down her spine. She pressed the heels of her palms to her closed eyes. "I don't really want to talk about it. But yes, something bad happened to me once. Something that gives me nightmares, something I can never escape."

A soft sigh escaped him. When she lowered her hands, she found Kincaid sprawling across her bed, looking utterly relaxed, his fingertips brushing against her calf through the sheets.

"We all have fears," he finally said.

"Even you?" The mighty behemoth?

He cradled his mech hand behind his head, his abdominal muscles flexing. "Jaysus. I've had more than my fair share."

"But you're...."

"I'm...?"

"So powerful," she blurted, gesturing to his body. "And cocky. And rash. I cannot imagine anything could ever frighten you." The past swam up between them, when she'd tended to his broken nose, and Kincaid had snapped at her to get it healed so he could rejoin the hunt in time. "You wanted to hunt a vampire, when the very thought made my blood curdle."

Shadows darkened his eyes. "Vampires don't really scare me. It would be a quick death. A fairly clean one—"

"You've got to be jesting me," she broke in. "I cannot possibly imagine death by vampire to be quick, or particularly merciful."

"It is compared to the fate of others." His voice roughened. "Over in an instant of fierce terror and pain, rather than the long drawn-out spiral downward of something degenerative where you stare your death in the face every day, wondering when the time will come where your body fails you. Wondering how many days you can spend trapped within your body before you go mad."

"Well, I couldn't think of anything worse than a vampire."

"Really? Not a single thing? Not even whatever causes your nightmares?"

Ava opened her mouth to reply, but an image of Hague sprang to mind, strapping her to his examination table and shining the harsh light in her eyes as she screamed and tried to escape—to no avail. A chill ran down her spine. Kincaid was right. Death by vampire might be considered a blessing in some circumstances.

Or was it...?

She'd lived after all. She'd survived the unsurvivable as Hague infected her with the craving virus and then cut her heart out of her chest while she swayed in and out of ether dreams. It was a horrible nightmare—six months of torture and misery and hopelessness—until Perry and Garrett had appeared, bringing light and hope back into her world. Bringing freedom. Maybe Ava would never escape the past, but she was here and now, and there was a whole life stretching out in front of her, filled with all the things she'd never done.

Perhaps the idea wasn't to forget the nightmares, but to accept them. She'd spent years trying to pretend she'd put all the pieces of herself back together. To hide her screams at night, to make sure nobody knew how much it sometimes scared her to leave the house and walk the streets. To pretend she was confident and had her wits about her at all times, when but one sharp noise might send her crashing down like a cracked porcelain vase given a shove.

"You're right. There can be worse things than vampires. And you, sir," she pointed out, before he could interrupt, "have initiated a rather macabre turn of conversation."

Kincaid scraped his hand over his face, sighing as he rolled onto his side. "Maybe it's macabre, but maybe... it's easy to talk to you about the fears a man has." One blue eye locked on her as he drew his hand away. "You're very easy to talk to, Ava."

She blushed. Nobody said that about her, especially not men. Usually they were searching about them for some means of escaping her. "When I'm not babbling about autopsies or the craving virus, do you mean?"

"What's wrong with hearing you speak of dismembering cadavers? I think all those others who disdain you simply have weak stomachs." His smile faded. "I didn't realize how long it's been since... I could actually talk to someone."

He didn't look happy about this realization.

"What's wrong?" she whispered. "You sound like that's a horrible thing." Every person needed a friend—someone who could hear their inner thoughts without flinching.

"It's not." He toyed with her blankets again, looking so much younger in this moment. "It just makes me miss my brother. He was the only other person I could speak to like this."

Oh. "He's...?"

"Dead," Kincaid muttered. "His heart gave out on him three years ago, a month before I finally escaped the enclaves. There's irony for you. I never got to see him again. I spent ten years in that hell, and his heart couldn't bloody wait one more damned month."

Ava slid her hand over his, a pulse of sympathy sliding through her, but Kincaid shook it off. "Sorry, luv," he said, shooting her an insincere smile as he sat up. "There's things a man can speak of, but I draw the line at being pitied."

"I wasn't pitying you."

"No?"

"No. I was seeking to... to offer comfort."

This time, the look he gave her was hot and slow. Kincaid finally sighed. "It would be almost too easy."

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing." Kincaid rolled onto his knees. "Don't ever change," he murmured in her ear, before pressing a gentle kiss to her cheek. The heat of his breath ghosted across her jaw, and a shiver ran through her.

His face lingered there, and Ava turned wide eyes toward him, holding her breath. It would be terribly easy to remove the distance between them, but she was suddenly shy again.

He backed away, as if he knew precisely what was going through her mind. Ava cleared her throat, feeling awash in an unknown wave of heat. Good lord. He'd barely even brushed his lips against her cheek. Yes, but he's practically naked. And suddenly her mind was taking her down dark avenues she'd never truly explored. "I won't change. I don't think I'd even know how."

"It's part of your charm."

"Charm," she scoffed. "Now I know you're jesting—"

Kincaid captured her jaw, forcing her to meet his suddenly steely gaze. "There can be charm in honesty, Ava. Charm in a woman who is so blatantly unaware of her own enticements. Charm in an innocently curious gaze."

And she was blushing again, for he'd noticed where she was looking. "I'm a scientist. I cannot help feeling curious."

"So I've noticed. But if you were truly scientific, then you'd be more interested in putting a theory into practice."

Those eyes twinkled with mischief. Daring her.

Ava looked down. To the thumb just brushing against the pulse at the inside of her wrist. She swallowed.

"You know what I'm talking about, Ava."

"I thought you refused to have anything to do with virgins." Somehow she managed to meet his gaze, though her cheeks burned. "You told me that once. So how can I consider your proposition to be a serious one?"

"There's a part of me that is reevaluating that rule. Every damned time I look at you, lately. My rules are simple: don't play with virgins. Don't break hearts. Make the rules clear from the start. But—"

"But?" she dared, the sensation in her chest expanding, leaving her slightly dizzy.

"Ava," he warned. "Don't start a game you won't finish. I will play along. To a certain point. But I don't like being trifled with."

Ava couldn't help thinking about her earlier realization that although she'd survived and put her life back together, there were quite a few things she hadn't experienced.

A proper kiss, for example.

Her gaze slid to Kincaid's mouth. Paul—her ex-fiancé's—kisses had been dutiful, and she'd seen Perry and Garrett steal enough kisses in the Nighthawks guild to know when she was missing out. Those types of kisses did not seem anything like the chaste caress Paul pressed upon her once upon a time.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Kincaid breathed.

She crossed her arms over her nightgown. It was strange how safe she felt with him in her room, at night, when she wore little more than thin cotton. Kincaid gave the devil a run for his money when it came to mischief, but he obeyed a peculiar set of rules he'd set himself.

Maybe I could use him to test out some of my theories? a little voice whispered. Maybe we could both give each other pleasure? He wanted her, after all, and she was very curious about what, exactly, he would do to her.

Suddenly she felt like she had an answer to his proposition.

Nobody would get hurt. She knew what she was entering into. An experiment. A purely physical one. Exactly what Perry had recommended she do.

She couldn't deny she was attracted to Kincaid in a physical way, but she also quite liked him. The craving virus roused the primal side of one's nature, but she couldn't entirely blame this... this lust upon it. She wanted those strong hands on her bare skin. She wanted to touch Kincaid, to lick him, to taste those devilish lips, in a way she'd never felt before.

None of this made any sense at all, except for the demanding pulse of the ache between her thighs.

"What if I do intend to finish it?" She was tired of living within the rules—tired of being polite, and letting her own desires go unanswered. Perry's suggestion had only exacerbated the sense of frustration.

And the more she thought about it, the more Kincaid seemed to be the perfect answer to her problems.

Even if her words wiped the smile off his face.

"Are you sure you know what you're asking for?" he asked, pushing away from the bed and pacing across the room, the bulky form of the mechanical brace that girdled his hips and thighs bulging beneath his trousers. She wished she knew why he wore it.

Ava sat up on her knees, leaving her a little chilled as her blankets fell away. "Yes, I do. I trust you. And this attraction doesn't seem to be going away, so why not?"

"I know women. You're not the sort to enjoy an affair if your heart is not involved. And I'm not offerin' a future, Ava. I need you to understand that."

"Pfft." She waved the thought away, determined now she'd made up her mind. "You might have a good deal of experience with women, but you forget something. I am not like most women. I'm a scientist, Mr. Kincaid. You said yourself, this makes sense in a logical, rational way. And you present a very intriguing dilemma for me. I have never felt so curious about... about a man's body before. When you are in the same room with me, I am—" She searched for the means to say it. "—overcome with purely physical desires. I cannot stop thinking about it, and it's quite vexing. Usually when I am interested in a man, it is because I find him charming, or he is nice to me, or I admire his manners, or—"

"Or in the case of Byrnes, you found him comfortable to be around." Kincaid crossed his arms over his chest as he faced her.

"Ye-es," she said carefully. "He was easy to be around because he accepted me as I was, without seeking to change me or disapproving of the way I think. You don't know how rare that is." Again, she thought of Paul, the man who hadn't entirely approved of her. She didn't blame him for moving on when he thought she was dead, after Hague kidnapped her, but at the time the loss had hurt her.

It didn't anymore.

Kincaid's eyes narrowed. "Did you ever want to kiss Byrnes?"

"Well," she sputtered. "Of course I did. He was very kind to me, and I cared for him, and—"

"Kind?" The way he drawled the word made her feel like he knew something she did not.

"Byrnes has no concept of charm, but he can be kind. I know you probably can't imagine it, but—"

"I thought there was something between the pair of you, but if there was, then you wouldn't be thinking of him as kind. That's the very last word anyone would ever use to describe that smug bastard."

"Whatever does that mean?" she asked suspiciously.

Kincaid rubbed his mouth. "Ava, do you have any idea what it is like to bed a man?"

"Of course I do. I've seen—"

"Outside of what you've seen in books."

They stared at each other, and she felt like they were having two different conversations. "No," she admitted. "Only what I've read, or what I've seen in diagrams."

"I see."

"I'm not completely sheltered. There were farm animals at my father's country manor. And I saw the shadow show at the Garden of Eden." He looked unconvinced. "I studied anatomy, for heaven's sake. I know how things fit."

Kincaid growled under his breath, scraping his hands over his face as he muttered, "Why me?"

"I can hear you. Enhanced hearing, if you'll recall? And if you want an answer to that, then here it is. I don't love you. You don't love me. There's no risk here for me. But I like you—enough to trust you with my body—and I... I think you like me. Or you would, if I weren't a blue blood, but—"

"I do like you," he admitted gruffly. "Blue blood notwithstanding."

Something warmed with her. "And the truth is, I'm not certain I've been living my life. I needed time to put myself back together after what happened to me, and I think I'm nearly there. But the last few years have been... controlled. Full of routine, and me trying to pretend everything is fine, and dusk to dawn spent in a laboratory, or traipsing through crime scenes, and while that is all well and good and intellectually stimulating it has come to my attention it also makes me feel a little hollow. Or... lacking. Lacking something."

Those sleepy eyes turned dangerous. "You mentioned a taste of passion."

Passion. That was what had been missing. "Yes," she breathed. "I want to experience something that sweeps me out of this ordinary life. I want a taste of everything I'm not supposed to want, and everything I've been suppressing for the last few years. Perry suggested I take a lover, but I think it's more than that. And I don't know precisely what that something is, but there's a hollow inside me, a yearning for... something. And maybe if I start with a lover, then I'll work out what that something is."

"Malloryn wouldn't approve. After Byrnes and Ingrid, he specifically demanded no more fraternization occur."

"I thought thumbing your nose at the duke was the highlight of your day? And who are you to speak of rules? You, who clearly likes to break them?" She could see the furrow on his brow still, the disapproving way he held himself, as though she'd suggested he rub mud all over his skin. "And if you won't help me, then I shall find someone who will."

"Like hell you will," he growled. "Christ, woman. Think of the risk."

"That's why I'm asking you. I know you wouldn't hurt me. I... I trust you with my body." And wasn't that a thought, for someone who'd been another man's captive. True, Hague had had no interest in her body sexually, but he'd still controlled every aspect of her. She'd been helpless for a long time, and unable to control even the slightest physical interaction.

But when she thought of giving herself to Kincaid, there was no fear there. Only... interest. A delicious urge to spread her wings and take what she wanted, for once in her life.

Kincaid eyed her with an evil look. "What was that thought?"

"I trust you with my body," she said gently, half in wonder. "I didn't understand why it had to be you, but I think that is the answer. I am both attracted to you, and feel safe with you. You don't know how rare it is to find a man who makes me feel like that."

He looked uncomfortable again. "Has a man ever hurt you, Ava?"

"Not... in the way you mean." She hated talking about it. It seemed wrong, in a way. I survived, and the others didn't, and sometimes that woke her more often than any nightmare she might suffer. What did she have to complain about? A little hysteria every now and then? An inability to leave the house when she was suffering the worst phases of her trauma? It could be worse. She could be buried in St. James's cemetery, like Evangeline, or in Harknell like Suzette. Or she might even be one of the girls that had vanished completely. Only Hague knew where those bodies went, and he was dead and never telling.

But Kincaid needed to know.

Just in case she panicked if he made a sudden move.

"Four years ago," she said quietly, rubbing the sheet between thumb and forefinger to help ground herself, "I was captured by a madman. He was a scientist who created clockwork and mechanical organs, and he needed humans to test his operations on."

"The Steel-Jaw case?"

It had been all through the papers at the time. No wonder he knew it. "I was one of the girls he experimented upon. He wanted to create a clockwork heart that could sustain a patient dying of heart failure. But the problem was he couldn't keep the girls he experimented upon alive throughout the process of removing... removing...."

Removing their hearts.

"Dr. Hague infected me with the craving virus, so I might survive," Ava whispered, unbuttoning her nightgown a little so he could see the top of her scar, and trying to ignore his paling face. "I was his first successful heart transplant patient. But not by choice. Byrnes, Perry, and Garrett... They rescued me from that vile laboratory, and though I have managed to resurrect some semblance of a life, it haunts me every day." She glanced up from beneath her lashes. His eyes were wide with horror. "I was one of only two girls who survived. I saw them die, Kincaid. And... and there was no way to escape. I had no hope left. Nothing but pain, and...." She gasped, her fingers contracting into a fist.

"Hush, kitten. It's all right." Kincaid slid onto the bed, curling a hand around the back of her head as he dragged her against his chest.

Ava released a shuddering breath. She wasn't going to allow Hague to intrude upon this moment. "I know what it's like to be unable to make choices in regards to your own body," she said, absorbing the heat of his body, "but I want to learn what it's like to give myself to a man. I make this decision. It's my body to give to someone else, and I choose you."

There was a long moment while Kincaid thought about this. He kissed the top of her head. "Hell, Ava, I had no idea."

She pressed her finger to his lips. "I don't want to talk about it. I want to talk about the future. About us. About... your proposition."

"Very well. An affair." He kissed her finger. "But if we agree to do this, then we do it on my terms. I want you to be very certain about this, so I don't intend to rush you. We take this one step at a time, and I decide when you're ready for the next step, considering how eager you are, and how much you don't know."

"Agreed."

Kincaid's eyes darkened. "Agreed."

Silence fell in the room, a hush of sensual awareness. The lantern light flickered.

"Aren't you going to kiss me?" Ava breathed.

Kincaid became very still. "What?"

"Sealed with a kiss," Ava said, her heart ticking quietly in her chest as a thrill of nervousness lit through her. "Isn't that the way it's done?"