“Where does it start?” he asked, his breath ruffling my hair.

I ordered myself to stop thinking of him as a desirable (if annoying as hell) male, and to focus on the curse. “I’m not sure. The start isn’t as important as the end. I have to unravel it, you see. Ah. There it is.”

“Where?”

I placed a finger on his right side, below his last rib. “That’s where it curls over onto itself, completing the pattern. If I trace it back to the origin point, then I will have a good idea of how it’s made, and how I can best unmake it.”

“Interesting. I’ve never been cursed before. Damned, yes. Accused of many crimes, absolutely. Suffered untold torments, of course. But never cursed.”

I tried to follow the ethereal black pattern as it danced in and out of my view, but it was impossible without some way of marking where I was. “I’m sorry, I’m going to have to touch you.” I gave him a long, cool look. “It is purely in the interests of identifying the curse, and not because you hold an intense sexual attraction that no woman can refuse, as I see you are about to suggest.”

“You see incorrectly,” he said simply, watching with interest as I placed my fingertip back on the end of the curse. “I was going to suggest that you get naked so that we both could enjoy ourselves.”

I pinched the skin on his side. “Not going to happen, dragon boy.”

“Dragon man.”

“Just remember I’m a professional, and don’t get any bright ideas. And stop doing that thing with your eyebrows. It’s not affecting me in the least.”

“What thing with my eyebrows?”

“Arching them in a way that makes me want to—never mind. Just stop it. Oh, where’s the talisman you said you got out?”

He reached for his jacket and extracted a small onyx box, handing it to me.

“No, I can’t touch it. Its power has to flow through the curse. Just set it on your stomach, so one corner is touching the curse.”

He glanced down at himself, looked thoughtful for a moment, then laid back, his hands pillowing the back of his head, and the box covering his belly button. “You may proceed.”

“I am not at all moved by you lying here in front of me,” I said primly, and started at the end of the curse again. It swirled up and across his chest, forming an elaborate pattern of swoops and double-back loops, all of which I trailed with my finger. My fingertip grew warmer as I did so, but I assumed it was friction until the curse, tired of weaving back and forth on Constantine’s chest, swung up to his collarbone, then curlicued along his neck.

I was deep in the curse, on the left side of his neck, my nose almost brushing his hair when my finger suddenly burst into flames.

I stared at it in horror for a moment before I realized that the fire wasn’t burning my skin. It was warm, yes, but warm in a way that I’d never felt before, a heat that left me yearning for more. “Oh! I appear to be on fire. But it doesn’t seem to be burning me.”

One of his eyebrows rose. “It is dragon fire.”

“It can’t be. Dragon fire hurts when it touches you. Or rather, it hurts mortal beings like me.”

“Mine doesn’t.”

My gaze met his, and instantly I felt as if I were about to fall into an amber pool. He took my hand and tipped my finger into his mouth, swirling his tongue around it in a way that should have been disgusting and gross, but in truth was the complete opposite.

“Stop it,” I said, reluctantly pulling my finger from his mouth.

“I was merely showing you it was indeed dragon fire, and not of a mundane origin.”

“Mundane as in mortal?” I shook my head. “I knew that much. I’ve never had my finger suddenly burst into normal everyday flames.” Covertly, I rubbed my finger on my pants. It wasn’t that I wanted to get rid of the sensation of it being in his mouth, but I felt like I had to regain control of the situation. “Regardless, I don’t know how that happened, but I apologize. I was almost to the end of the curse, too.”

He crossed one ankle over the other and watched me from half-closed eyes. “You will start over, then?”

I moved restlessly, irritated at myself for being so easily distracted from what was important. “I think since I was so close to the end, I’ll just take a chance that the pattern doesn’t do anything odd right before it gets to the starting point.” I hesitated a moment, frowning at the small black box. “I really would like to have longer to examine the curse. I wouldn’t want anything to… happen.”

“Happen?” Guillaume must have entered the club proper just in time to hear the last word. He hurried over toward us, saying, “What sort of things do you expect to happen? You said nothing would happen to the club, nothing at all. You reassured me!” He stopped when he rounded the bar and caught sight of the bare-chested Constantine lounging on the floor, his eyes widening in shock. “Merciful Zeus! You are engaging in sexual shenanigans right there on the floor? You are, you cannot deny it, it’s right there in front of me. The Venediger will be furious, furious, I tell you!”

“Oh, calm down, you big ole drama llama,” I snapped, irritated both by the fact that he assumed Constantine and I were getting it on and that there was a part of my mind that wouldn’t be opposed to that idea at all.

“Ha!” Constantine said.

I pinched his side again. “I said that merely to be ironic. As for you…” I sent a frown over to where Guillaume lurked. “Your precious club is safe. I meant what I said—no harm will come to it from Charming a curse. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for Constantine.”

Constantine, whose feet were bopping in time to a B-52s song that came from Gary’s cage, suddenly stopped humming along and propped himself up on one elbow. “What cannot be said about me?”

“That’s why I want a longer time to study the curse, really study it, so that I have all of its nuances down pat. If I get something wrong, or even slightly out of order, it could spell the end.” I waited a minute before adding, “The end for both of us.”

“Oh, well, if that’s all…” Guillaume didn’t finish his sentence, shuffling off to the back room again, evidently reassured that the club would be fine.

Constantine prodded my arm. “I heard Charmers were not affected by the curses they charm.”