Insatiable lust is the sign that you’ve graduated to two-legged food? Phoebe’s dark eyes narrowed as she considered Françoise’s words, which usually carried hidden meaning.

“Vampires are nothing but desire, you see.” Françoise returned to the tray and poured some coffee. “Can you not scratch what itches yourself? Your mate cannot always be around, after all.”

But Phoebe wanted Marcus’s deft fingers, his soft mouth sucking at her flesh, the nip of his teeth when he wanted her attention, the way he teased her until she was insane with longing and only then gave her the heart-shattering climax she craved. And what Marcus whispered as he brought her to that precipice, over and over, until she was mad and begging—Phoebe wanted those intimate, dark, seductive words most of all.

“No,” Phoebe said shortly. She eyed the top of the wardrobe.

“If you call him, it will make everything worse.” Françoise sighed.

“Call him?” Phoebe tried to look innocent.

“Yes. With one of the telephones in the bag on top of the armoire.” Françoise’s expression held disdain, understanding, and a touch of humor. She clapped her hands briskly. “Milady Freyja is dining out tonight, so I suggest you be quick about it.”

“I don’t think I’m in the mood.” Phoebe had no intention of whispering sweet nothings to Marcus (which always turned into very sweet somethings) on someone else’s timetable.

“Give it a few minutes,” Françoise said as she departed. “You’ll be in the mood again in no time.”

Françoise was right. Her footsteps had barely faded before the throbbing between Phoebe’s legs returned. Before she was consciously aware of formulating a plan, Phoebe had gone to the armoire, leaped for the phone (a surprisingly easy feat, she discovered), and dialed Marcus’s number.

“Phoebe?”

The effect of Marcus’s voice on Phoebe’s raw nerves was electrifying. She pressed her legs tightly together.

“You didn’t tell me everything.” Phoebe’s voice was breathy and rough.

“Just a minute.” There was a conversation, muffled and indistinct, and then footsteps. Then Marcus’s voice came clearly through the speaker once more. “I take it your vampire hormones have kicked in.”

“You should have warned me,” Phoebe said, irritation mounting along with her desire.

“I told you, quite explicitly, about the pleasures and problems associated with a vampire’s sexual awakening,” Marcus said, lowering his voice.

Phoebe racked her brains for the details of this conversation. Dimly, she recalled a few particulars. “You told me it was dangerous—not that I was going to feel an insatiable need to . . . you know . . .”

“Tell me.”

“I can’t.” Pillow talk was not her department.

“Sure you can. What is it you want, Phoebe?” Marcus was teasing—but only in part. Most of him was deadly serious.

“I need . . . want . . . to . . .” Phoebe’s words drifted into silence, replaced by startlingly clear images of just what she would do to Marcus if he were to walk through the door. One encounter took place in the shower, where Marcus slipped inside her while the water flowed over their bodies. Another involved pinning him to the wall, dropping to her knees, and taking him in her mouth. And then there was the stunning image of Marcus taking her from behind, fully clothed, while she was splayed, facedown, across the end of his dining room table, which had been set for a romantic meal complete with flowers and a Georgian silver candlestick.

“I want you in every way imaginable,” Phoebe whispered, her cheeks red with honesty. There was nothing tender in her first wave of vampire fantasies—just pure, raw hunger.

“And then what?” Marcus’s voice turned to gravel.

“Then I want to make love, slowly, for hours, in a bed with white sheets, and curtains that blow in the breeze from the open windows.” Phoebe’s imagination was now captured by an altogether different image of their coupling, one driven not so much by lust as by longing. “Then I want to swim together, and make love in the ocean. And again, in a garden, under the stars with no moon.”

“Summer or winter?” Marcus asked.

She was pleased by his request for further details. It showed he was paying attention.

“Winter,” Phoebe said promptly. “The snow melting underneath us as we move.”

“I’ve never made love in the snow,” Marcus said, thoughtful.

“Have you made love in the ocean?” Phoebe’s erotic dreams were carried away in an undertow of jealousy.

“Yes. It’s fun. You’ll like it,” Marcus said.

“I hate your previous lovers—all of them. And I hate you,” Phoebe hissed.

“No, you don’t,” Marcus said. “Not really.”

“Tell me their names,” she demanded.

“Why? They’re all dead,” Marcus said.

“Not Veronique!” Phoebe retorted.

“You already know Veronique’s name, and her phone number, and her address,” Marcus said mildly.

“I hate that you’re more experienced than I am,” Phoebe said. “You keep talking about our equality, but in this . . .”

“I sure as hell hope you aren’t intending to level the playing field.” Marcus’s voice held a sharp edge.

Phoebe was slightly mollified. She was not the only one in the relationship who experienced a pang of jealousy when other lovers, real or imagined, came up in conversation.

“I feel like a teenager,” Phoebe confessed.

“I remember that phase well,” Marcus replied. “I was hard for a solid week in November of 1781. And I was on a ship full of men, all of whom were jerking off at night when they thought the rest of us were asleep.”

“It sounds dreadful,” Phoebe said with mock sympathy. “But being with your aunt and Miriam is no picnic, I assure you. Tell me what it will be like when we’re together.”

“I’ve already told you,” Marcus replied with a laugh.

“Tell me again,” Phoebe said.

“It will be like a very long honeymoon,” Marcus said. “Once you’re sure it’s me you want, we’ll be allowed to go off together.”

“Where will we go?” Phoebe asked.

“Wherever you want.” Marcus’s response was swift.

“India. No, an island. Somewhere we won’t be disturbed,” Phoebe said. “Somewhere there are no people to bother us.”

“We could be in downtown Beijing, surrounded by millions, and we wouldn’t care.” Marcus sounded very sure. “It’s one of the reasons Ysabeau wanted us to wait a full ninety days.”

“Because it’s easy for newborns to get lost in their mates.” Phoebe recalled the conversation that had taken place in Ysabeau’s apartments at Sept-Tours, on stiff-backed chairs. Marcus’s grandmother had recounted horrifying tales of young lovers who had starved to death in their houses, so intent on the pleasures of the flesh that they forgot to feed. There were tales of jealous rages, too, in which one mate killed the other over a sidelong look at another creature passing by the window, or the mention of a former lover. In such fraught emotional situations between newly mated vampires, even the simple word “no” could bring about death and destruction.

“So they tell me,” Marcus replied. It was a reminder that he might have been in love before, but that was very different from what would happen between him and Phoebe, once they were together again.

Just like that, her mood shifted.

“I wish it were August,” Phoebe said wistfully, her heart kicking up a notch in excitement.

“It will go by quickly,” Marcus promised, “far more so than your first two weeks. There will be so much to do, you won’t have a chance to think about me.”

“Do?” Phoebe frowned. “Françoise says I will have to feed from a human. She hasn’t mentioned anything else.”

“You’re growing up as a vampire,” Marcus said. “You’ll feed from a human, go hunting, meet other members of your new family, choose your names, even spend some time outside of the nest.”