He laughed as he went, knowing that although Adam was wont to champion mortals, the vainglorious prince of the D’Jai would hate being human, would despise being trapped in the body of one of those limited little, fragile creatures whose average life span was so horrifically brief.

He was about to find it far briefer than average.

3

Adam was so caught off guard that it didn’t occur to him to do a series of short jumps and follow the woman, until it was too late.

By the time he’d tensed to sift, the dilapidated vehicle had sped off, and he had no idea where it had gone. He popped about in various directions for a time, but was unable to pick it up again.

Shaking his head, he returned to the bench and sat down, cursing himself in half a dozen languages.

Finally, someone had seen him.

And what had he done? Let her get away. Undermined by his disgusting human anatomy.

It had just been made excruciatingly clear to him that the human male brain and the human male cock couldn’t both sustain sufficient amounts of blood to function at the same time. It was one or the other, and the human male apparently didn’t get to choose which one.

As a Tuatha Dé, he would have been in complete control of his lust. Desirous yet coolheaded, perhaps even a touch bored (it wasn’t as if he could do something he hadn’t done before; given a few thousand years, a Tuatha Dé got around to trying everything).

But as a human male, lust was far more intense, and his body was apparently slave to it. A simple hard-on could turn him into a bloody Neanderthal.

How had mankind survived this long? For that matter, how had they ever managed to crawl out of their primordial swamps to begin with?

Blowing out an exasperated breath, he rose from the bench and began pacing a stunted space of cobbled courtyard.

There he’d been, lying on his back, staring up at the stars, wondering where in the hell Circenn might have hied himself off to for so long, when suddenly he’d suffered a prickly sensation, as if he were the focus of an intense gaze.

He’d glanced over, half-expecting to see a few of his brethren laughing at him. In fact, he’d hoped to see his brethren. Laughing or not. In the past ninety-seven days he’d searched high and low for one of his race, but hadn’t caught so much as a glimpse of a Tuatha Dé. He’d finally concluded that the queen must have forbidden them to spy upon him, for he could find no other explanation for their absence. He knew full well there were those of his race that would savor the sight of his suffering.

He’d seen—not his brethren—but a woman. A human woman, illumed by that which his kind didn’t possess, lit from within by the soft golden glow of her immortal soul.

A young, lushly sensual woman at that, with the look of the Irish about her. Long silvery-blond hair twisted up in a clip, loose, shorter strands spiking about a delicate heart-shaped face. Huge eyes uptilted at the outer corners, a pointed chin, a full, lush mouth. A flash of fire in her catlike green-gold gaze, proof of that passionate Gaelic temper that always turned him on. Full round breasts, shapely legs, luscious ass.

He’d gone instantly, painfully, hard as a rock.

And for a few critical moments, his brain hadn’t functioned at all. All the rest of him had. Stupendously well, in fact. Just not his brain.

Cursed by the féth fiada, he’d been celibate for three long, hellish months now. And his own hand didn’t count.

Lying there, imagining all the things he would do to her if only he could, he’d completely failed to process that she was not only standing there looking in his general direction, but his first instinct had been right: He was the focus of an intense gaze. She was looking directly at him.

Seeing him.

By the time he’d managed to find his feet, to even remember that he had feet, she’d been in her car.

She’d escaped him.

But not for long, he thought, eyes narrowing. He would find her.

She’d seen him. He had no idea how or why she’d been able to, but frankly he didn’t much care. She had, and now she was going to be his ticket back to Paradise.

And, he thought, lips curving in a wicked, erotic grin, he was willing to bet she’d be able to feel him too. Logic dictated that if she was immune to one aspect of the féth fiada, she would be immune to them all.

For the first time since the queen had made him human, he threw back his head and laughed. The rich, dark sound rolled—despite the human mouth shaping it—not entirely human, echoing in the empty street.

He turned and eyed the building behind him speculatively. He knew a great deal about humans from having walked among them for so many millennia, and he’d learned even more about them in the past few months. They were creatures of habit; like plodding little Highland sheep, they dutifully trod the same hoof-beaten paths, returning to the same pastures day after day.