They just stayed there for a moment, and our eyes met in the almost dark. Pritkin’s held the same fierce, focused intensity they did when he was bending over me in the training salle, a sword resting hot against my neck. Only there was something more there tonight, something fierce and hot and possessive. I was shocked to feel myself start to tremble.

The feeling intensified as those big hands slowly spread against my skin. For a dizzying moment of clarity, I could feel everything: the fingers smoothing over the line of stitching running up each side of the shorts, the faint scratch of the tag against my skin, the sweat-damp material sticking to the small of my back. And then those hands began smoothing, oh, so slowly, back down my body. And they took the shorts with them.

I heard myself make a sound, nothing I recognized. And then time seemed to slow again, going soft and liquid. To the point that I could feel every inch of the thin, silky material as it skimmed over my belly button, glided past my hips, drifted across my pelvic bones and then stroked down my thighs.

Somewhere along the line, a spiraling, falling feeling took over my head, banishing any kind of rational thought. I didn’t fight it. It was something I needed badly—something that let me forget what we were and where we were, and all the reasons why this was a very, very bad idea.

The silky cloth brushed over my feet as he pulled it completely away from my body. He never said a word. But as I lay there, bare except for a brief thong, I slowly realized that he was shaking. The tremors were almost imperceptible, as controlled as everything else about him. But I felt them.

I tried to tell him it was all right, that I trusted him, that this wouldn’t change anything. But then warm hands found my skin again and slid up my legs. And all I could manage was a low sound, deep in my throat, as he slowly pressed my thighs apart.

He bent his head, not hurrying, but with an intensity on his face that made my brain start to short-circuit. Warm breath ghosted over me as he tracked up my body, pausing here and there for long seconds, as if breathing me in. But never stopping, never touching. His lips were millimeters from my flushed skin, so close that every breath raised goose bumps. And that’s where they stayed, until I thought I would scream.

I wanted to touch him; I needed to move. But I couldn’t seem to do anything but writhe in helpless counterpoint to that merciless nonassault. Within seconds, I was biting my tongue to hold back something perilously close to a whimper. Then those hands slid up my sides and that mouth finally made contact, closing on the tender flesh just above the bow on my thong.

I gasped at the warm, wet sensation, so different from the feel of hands. And suddenly it was much easier to lie still, my whole body going heavy and languid. I sank back, surrendering to the weight that settled between my legs, the cool feel of his hair and the shockingly intimate caress of lips and tongue on sensitive skin. Satisfying a monthsold craving, I laced my fingers deep into the soft mane, feeling his head move under my hands.

The tender mouth went on to feast on my thighs, drawing another sound of startled pleasure from deep within me, a sound that turned to a groan when the hot tongue found the crease where thigh met hip. It made me want to touch him again, to flow against him like water, to slide along that muscled warmth and return pleasure for pleasure—

“Stop,” he said mildly, nipping lightly at my hipbone. And my body reacted with a sweet, surprised rush.

He slowly tracked across my skin until I melted, becoming a malleable creature of pure response as the warm, wet onslaught moved over my hips, my stomach and then lower. His tongue ran around the top of the thong, tracing the lace, catching on the small satin bow. I couldn’t see what he was doing; his head was in the way. But I felt it when a warm mouth closed over that small scrap of material, brushing my skin as he started tracking back down my body. And pulled it off with his teeth.

I stared at him blankly for a moment. All my fantasies, and still I’d never guessed, never known that this man simmered all the time below those grumpy looks, that stubbornset jaw and stiff-necked control. Or maybe some part of me had known, and known the risk....

And then I couldn’t watch him anymore. I lay back against the seat, panting, as I was stripped bare to the warm night’s breeze. Rosier was gone, or at least I couldn’t see him. I couldn’t see Caleb, either, because of the seat back, but wasn’t sure if the opposite was true. At the moment, I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything but the golden head now working its way back up my body.

He was drawing light patterns with his lips, his tongue, runes and symbols I was too far gone to read but that burned through my skin. The sensation was so intense, so overwhelming, that it felt like my body couldn’t contain it. He stopped at a point where, had I been wearing panties, he would have been below them, feasting on skin I’d just waxed a few days ago. But he wasn’t low enough, not even close, and that all-consuming need was building again.

I sank my hands into his hair, trying to direct that head to where I so needed it to be. But he ignored me, continuing to nuzzle softly against my flesh with that same deceptive gentleness. Until a stab of longing tore through me, so strong that I thought the emptiness might kill me if it went on much longer.

I did whimper then, a ragged, involuntary moan that didn’t even sound like me. It would have been embarrassing if I’d been capable of caring about such things. But I wasn’t and I didn’t, not about that, not about anything but the almost unbearable intensity of need. I gasped out his name on a sob.

And finally, finally, he dropped that last inch. Warm lips closed over me, a wet tongue circled me. And a fierce, spiraling ache of need shot down every nerve I possessed. There. Oh, there, yes, there.

A faint shudder ran through him and his breath caught audibly. “Yes,” he hissed, so soft it might have been my own imagination. But the hands on my hips tightened convulsively, and that tongue became demanding, forcing me open, learning me intimately, discovering what I needed.

And then I couldn’t think anymore. It was sensory overload, hearing the sounds he made deep in his throat, smelling that peculiar mix of sweat and gunpowder and magic that may as well have been his signature cologne, feeling the assault of that mouth, all wet, silken heat and fiery passion, nothing safe, nothing sane—

And then he gently bit down.

And oh, dear God.

Pleasure racked me, a deep, primal shudder of response followed swiftly by a surge of pure, molten lust. The rush of heat started in my belly and swept outward in an unexpected, uncontrollable wave, the raw force of it wrenching a cry from my throat. Merciless, he sucked me deeper and did it again. And my body simply couldn’t take any more.

Ecstatic release flashed like chain lightning through my lungs and thighs and every place in between, right down to my toes. It rippled into Pritkin, tightening his hands, causing his fingers to dig into my flesh. And the sound he made, deep and vulnerable and desperate, made my body shudder harder, as if trying to come again even in the middle of mind-shattering release.

“God—” I heard myself choke, and didn’t know if it was a plea for mercy or a prayer of thanks.

When it was finally over, I clung to the heavily muscled body, the skin fever hot with the thrum of magic pulsing just under the surface, gasping. A hand crushed my head to his chest, fingers tangling in my hair. I didn’t even try to move; didn’t think I could. I just stayed there, listening to his heartbeat pound strong and sure, if a little erratically, under my ear.

And then the car touched down, bumping asphalt, somewhere outside Vegas.

Chapter Twenty-seven

The shape I was in didn’t really hit me until I stumbled out of the car. And face-planted onto something hard. I didn’t know if it was the afterburn of adrenaline or being a snack for a half-incubus war mage, but I was completely wiped. To the point that the concrete under my cheek actually felt pretty damn inviting. I was all for sleeping wherever the hell I was, but somebody picked me up. I didn’t have the strength left to protest.

Those same hands gently wrapped me in a blanket. It had to be three, maybe four a.m., but Vegas in August is stifling even at that time of the morning, and the blanket was scratchy and hot. I decided not to care, because it was easier.

We started across a cracked parking lot toward a brightly lit aluminum building with a couple of trucks and, incongruously, a limo parked outside. I squinted at it blearily. If that was war mage HQ, color me disappointed. It looked like it ought to be warehousing shoes. But I guessed it was more interesting inside, because a couple of leather-coat-clad guards were roaming around, giving us the hairy eyeball.

I didn’t care about them, either.

I did care a few minutes later when I was put down on something puke green that smelled like cigarettes and old shoes, but decided I could live with it. I went to sleep. And then woke right back up at the furious, whispered conversation going on over my head.

“They called ahead; told them to expect you. What the fuck am I—”

“Tell them whatever you like. I am more concerned with getting a healer in here.”

“You’d best be concerned with your job!”

“I could care less about—”

“Then how about your neck? Because that was assault, and assault on the Pythia carries a mandatory death sentence, as you damn well—”

Which was when I sat up. “No doctors,” I croaked.

“Cassie!” We were in a small office, with Pritkin crouched beside what could best be described as an antisofa. Besides the unfortunate color and the more unfortunate smell, it was also hard and lumpy and stained, and had sad little tufts of stuffing dribbling out of one of the cushions. Kind of the Platonic ideal turned on its head.

Two sets of startled eyes looked at me, so I guess I’d said that last part out loud. “What? I read.”

“Are you all right?” Caleb asked, crouching down beside Pritkin. Which gave me nowhere to put my legs. I thought about drawing them up, but then I’d probably go back to sleep again, and that was a bad idea for some reason that currently escaped me. I sat there and blinked at them, and waited for it to come.