Deal With the Devil Read online

  “You’re absolutely right about that.” I took another sip of my drink and looked at the silver framed picture on top of the box. It had been thoughtful of him to clean out my desk. “How is Banner doing?”

  “Resting comfortably in the back of an ambulance. He’s under the impression that there was some kind of accident with the elevator doors.” Jacobson frowned. “Unfortunately he might get other ideas if he sees you again. It’s difficult to erase a traumatic incident completely from a human brain without doing permanent damage.”

  I nodded. “That’s okay. He’s never going to see me again. I don’t ever want to go back. I only took the stupid job in the first place…”

  “Because you were going to be promoted to attorney?” Jacobson finished for me when I trailed off.

  I frowned at him. “Don’t start that again. I was just beginning to like you—even if you are a vamp.”

  “I apologize.” He nodded at the picture in the silver frame. “Your husband or lover?”

  “My brother,” I said and added, “I’m single.” Then I mentally kicked myself—why would I tell him a thing like that? As if he’d be interested or I’d be willing to go with him even if he was. A vamp and a were out on a date—what a laugh.

  But Jacobson looked pleased. “I was hoping you were.”

  “You mean you didn’t already know from shaking my hand?” I took another drink.

  “I got brief impressions of the things you were recently thinking when we touched and only because you were thinking about them so hard.” He shrugged. “Sometimes it happens but usually only when the person I am touching has a very forceful personality. Truly, I’m not much of a mind reader, Ms. Velez.”

  I sighed. “Call me Luz.”

  “Luz, then.” He smiled, careful not to show fang. “And I would be honored if you’d call me Jude.”

  I nodded. “Fine, we’re officially on a first-name basis. Now would you mind telling me what you wanted to talk about? What is this proposition?”

  Jacobson—or Jude as I supposed I should think of him now—took a deep breath. He looked at me carefully, as though trying to gauge how I would take what he was going to say. “I want your blood,” he said at last, apparently deciding that the most direct route was the best.

  “What, all of it?” I asked. “Because I’m kind of using it right now.”

  He smiled. “Of course not. What I am saying is that I want to drink from you.” His voice got deeper and his gaze was suddenly very intense. “I want to drink from you more than any other female I’ve ever met.”

  I shivered at the hot look in his eyes. I don’t know much about vamps but I do know that when they take blood it’s not just about getting nourishment. They often combine their dining practices with…other things. Things I had never considered doing with a vampire, that was for sure.

  And I’m not considering them now, either, I told myself firmly. “Why me?” I said, giving him a level look to let him know I wasn’t impressed.

  His gaze never wavered. “As a non-shifter the supernatural power in your blood has never been tapped. It would be like drinking a fine and extraordinarily rare vintage of wine—one I might never get a chance to try again.”

  Well, good—at least he wasn’t trying to come on to me.

  “Also you’re a very, very beautiful woman,” he continued, dashing that idea to smithereens. “The very thought of holding you in my arms, tasting your skin while I bite you…it’s intoxicating.”

  His eyes met mine and he held me trapped in his gaze for a long, long moment. Long enough that I felt my heart pounding crazily against my ribs and the gathering heat and dampness between my thighs. He’s a vampire, I reminded myself sternly. You’re a were. You can’t date a vamp! But no matter what I told myself, the fact was, it had been a very long time since a man—any man—had looked at me like that.

  Finally I tore my gaze away and took another hasty gulp of my melting piña colada. “And why should I let you? Bite me, I mean?”

  “I can make it worth your while to submit to me,” he said and I definitely got the impression he was talking about more than a quick nip on the neck. “There are many things I can offer.”

  “Such as?” I asked, trying not to look at the intense gaze that was still aimed at me like a spotlight.

  “Well, I could help you get rid of that pesky virginity that’s been bothering you.”

  I felt my cheeks heat with a sudden rush of blood. So he had picked that out of my brain along with everything else, the bastard. My deepest, darkest secret. My ultimate shame. Well, except for… I pushed the thought away and looked up at him.

  “So you think I’m so desperate I’ll have sex with a vamp?” I put every ounce of scorn I could muster into the words.

  “I think you are, yes,” he said, mildly. “Your virginity bothers you greatly and you wish to be rid of it by any means necessary.”

  “Not by any means,” I said, but I was just trying to save face and we both knew it. The truth of his words made me wince with shame.

  Since no self-respecting male were will date or mate with a non-shifter, I had been single for years. But just because there were none of my own kind available to me didn’t mean I didn’t want a man. I listened to other women talk about their sex lives and I burned to be touched and taken and held. I wanted it so much that finally I had stooped to dating humans. And one night I let one of them take me home. What I hadn’t counted on was my panicky response to being held down. When he spread my legs and climbed on top of me it was just too much. To awful…

  “I broke his pelvis in three places,” I murmured, lost in the memory of that awful night.

  “You didn’t mean to.” Jude’s deep voice was curiously gentle.

  I looked up at him. “How much do you really know about me? Are you reading my mind right now?”

  He shook his head. “I swear I’m not. I only know what was at the top of your mind when we shook hands. You were thinking about your perceived failures. Your status as a non-shifter, the Bar exam…and buried under all that, so deep you probably didn’t even know you were thinking about it yourself…the other.”

  “All my most embarrassing secrets,” I said dully. “Must be nice to be able to pick things like that out of someone else’s brain. If you ever get tired of being a rich and powerful vampire you can have a whole second career in blackmail.”

  Jude frowned. “Please don’t imagine I would ever try to coerce you into giving yourself to me, Luz. If sex isn’t your payment of choice we can certainly move on.”

  “Move on, then,” I said, making a gesture with my hand. “No offense but I’m not having sex with a vamp, no matter how desperate you think I am.”

  “Very well.” He nodded. “There are other, more prosaic things I can offer you. Money, for instance.”

  I cleared my throat. “This may sound weird but I think that would make me feel even more like a whore than if we had sex.” I couldn’t believe I was still discussing this with him but somehow I couldn’t just get up and go. His intense gaze wouldn’t let me.

  “Consider this,” he said, steepling his long fingers in front of him. “You saved me a considerable sum tonight. If I had signed those papers your foolish colleague was offering me I would have been legally committed to a very expensive and useless project. What if I gave you the amount you saved me tonight in return for the right to drink from you on several occasions?”

  “And how much is that?” I said, taking another sip of my watery piña colada. Wow, it was almost gone. I needed to slow down.

  He named a sum that made me take another drink despite my internal decision to go easy on the alcohol. What he was offering was enough to keep me going for the next two months at least. Rent, groceries, car note—that amount would pay it all. I could stay home and study night and day for the Bar exam which I had been stubborn enough to sign up for again. It was tempting but…

  “That’s still money,” I reminded him. “And a freaking big bunch