His fingers ran a tingling path down my jawline as his hand dropped from me. “It’s going to be okay. You want to go home?”

To a soggy church with no kitchen or electricity? Or Ivy’s parents’ place where the tension was so tight that it almost sang? Even better, a hotel room where I’d dodge my mom’s pointed questions while the news inescapably blared? “No,” I said, reaching up to feel his new lack of stubble under my fingertips, and I froze when he took my hand, kissing my fingertips.

“Damn it, Rachel,” he said, the pain in his voice startling me. “When I saw you on the floor, I thought I’d lost you again.”

He was holding my hand close to his chest, and I felt a pang of guilt for his fear. “I’m hard to get rid of.”

“Yes and no.”

The silence stretched and neither of us moved. It had gone quiet downstairs, and the world felt empty. “Do you think the undead who find their souls tonight will suncide?”

Trent nodded, a shadow in the dim room. “If the curse holds and they aren’t pulled back,” he said, then gave my hand, still in his, a slight squeeze. “At least Cormel can’t blame you.”

“He’ll find a way,” I grumped, and Trent seemed to pull himself together as if turning a page in his weekly calendar.

“There is a meeting tomorrow with a few key people. If you’re not busy, I think your presence would be helpful.”

Apart, no one listened to us, but together they might. “Let me guess,” I said, bringing a knee up onto the couch and turning sideways so I could arrange his still-damp hair. “Whoever is in charge of the I.S. during this mess, the head of the FIB. Ms. Sarong and/or Mr. Ray.” I hesitated, smiling. “Mark, maybe.”

Trent laughed, the sound of it seeming to ease some of the ugly uncertainty away. “I’d really like you to be there, not necessarily as a demon representative, but as, ah . . .” He winced.

“As someone who might be able to fix this mess?” I said, and he exhaled in relief.

“Something like that.”

His hand was on my foot, and I couldn’t help a soft moan when his thumb ran right up the side of the arch and pushed on the nerve that ran to my back. “You know, I’m starting to see some benefits from dating a man who has weekly massages,” I said, and he began to squeeze my foot in earnest.

“Actually, I’d like Dali there as well,” Trent said, but I was hardly listening. “I wonder if he’d come if I asked? Etude, if he could stay awake. The elves are behaving badly, and I’m wondering if there’s enough worry to gain letters of intent from them that would outline their concern and their policy against further elf-to-vampire aggression.”

He let go of my foot and motioned for me to turn around. “Your shoulders look like rocks,” he said. “All the way down to your feet. Five minutes, and that bath of yours will be a hundred times better.”

I gathered my hair and turned as he swung one leg up onto the couch, tossing the back cushion to the floor to make more room as he settled me before him. “Sort of like a species intervention?” I said, then stifled a moan when his hands, strong from reining in impossible horses, began working my shoulders. “That’s old school.”

“What works never goes out of style.”

His voice was preoccupied, and my head dropped forward. Trent’s leg was beside me, bare where his robe fell away. “I’ll see if I can work it into my schedule,” I said, imagining there were better ways to use a couch. Unable to resist, I leaned back, ruining my shoulder rub but not caring when I tilted my head into him and found a freshly shaven patch of his neck. His arms shifted to go around my middle, and I smiled when my lips found him.

Trent’s hands never stopped moving, becoming gentler as he touched my stomach and made a tingling path higher.

I turned my kiss into a soft, awkward bite. Oh, this isn’t going to work at all.

Shifting, I turned to face him, settling almost into his lap with my legs wrapped around him. Arms about his neck, I found his ear and nibbled on it as my one foot kicked off another back cushion. More room. Much better.

Trent’s hands held my waist, his thumb moving, pressing as he began to work his way inward to pull my shirt from my pants. My heart thudded as he slipped behind it, fingers both rough and smooth making a scintillating path up to find the curve of my breast.

His breath against my neck was delicious, and I made tiny hop kisses from his ear to his lips. Trent’s touch became aggressive, and breathless, I pulled him to me, very aware that his robe wasn’t covering much between us. His mouth against mine sent tingles over me, our passions rising, building upon each other.

Shock jolted through me when his teeth fastened on my lip. My eyes flashed open to find him looking at me, and my pulse hammered even harder at the heated desire in them.

“You’re wearing too much,” he whispered, and I groaned when his hands eased to my back, motions firm with intent as he reached the top of my pants. His lips found my neck, and I took a long, slow breath as his fingers worked to undo them. My knees were to either side of him, and the sudden give of the button was electrifying—the sound of the zipper bringing me back from the rising ecstasy.

I met his eyes to see his desire mirroring my own. I wanted everything, I wanted this. The silence was profound. I thought about Ray safe in her bed, then Jon and Quen at the stables. My hands were behind his neck, my fingers playing in the damp ends of his hair. “Is it worth it?” I said. “Everything you gave up?”

He couldn’t take my pants off with my knees to either side of him like that. There was only one foot on the floor, and it was his. I smiled, knowing he was stymied. “You tell me.”

I leaned to find his ear. I felt him tremble, his hands on me hesitate and move against me even more strongly as I nibbled on his ear. “I’ll let you know tomorrow,” I whispered.

“Mmmm.” His grip on me shifted, finding my center of gravity. “I work best under pressure.”

“Me too.” I barely breathed the words, my hand trailing down his chest to wiggle the last tie closing his robe open. I tensed, knowing he was going to have to do something drastic if he wanted my pants off. His balance shifted, and I countered it, wanting to prolong this. He saw my wicked grin, and he smiled, changing his attack.

He went for my shirt, and I shivered as he pulled it and my chemise over my head in one smooth motion. They fell to the floor beside the couch in a soft hush. The cooler air gave me goose bumps, but they vanished in a wash of heat, driven away as his eyes traveled over me an instant ahead of his hands.

His robe was open, and I eased closer to him, my hands tracing an ever-circling path inward to find him. Trent’s breath quickened as I dipped to his inner thighs, and then I gasped when he unexpectedly found my breast and gently bit me. “You wicked elf . . . ,” I whispered, reaching for him, then almost lost it when he pulled a trace of energy from me.

My eyes widened at the scintillating feeling icing through me. We’d played with the lines before, and my pulse quickened. It was going to be like that, then.

I felt our auras begin to shift to find a middle ground, and I almost lost it when he suddenly dropped the line and everything he collected washed back into me, balancing in a wave of sparkles along my spine. “Ooh,” I groaned, and in that instant of bemused sensation, he shifted his weight, pushing me back into the couch and pinning me there.

His robe fell open around us, and I blinked up at him, reaching to play with the hair behind his ears, letting little spills of energy trace a path where my lips had been.

“Hold still for just a bloody second,” he said, and I shivered as he pulled my pants off, dropping them inside out next to my shirt. I arched my back, reaching for him as he returned, his hands tracing my lines from my foot to my hip, and rising higher until he found my mouth with his lips.

We kissed, breath coming fast as waves of energy swung back and forth between us. My hand ran over his tightening muscles, delighting me in how he tensed as I moved from his neck to his arms to his back and down to his bu**ocks, where I traced little circles.

His hands clenched in my hair as he nuzzled my neck, finding the old scar hidden under my new skin and nibbling it to life.

I could feel him pressing against me, and unable to deny myself and him any longer, I reached to find him. His breath quickened, and we began to move with each other, tiny sparks of energy shifting between us. His head dipped and he found my breast again as I eased my touch inward, muting the energy in my hands until it was a soft, gentle hum.

He gasped as I found his smooth skin. I slid my touch upward, tightening my grip, enjoying his smoothness and wanting him inside me.

“Not yet,” he panted, and he shifted out of my easy reach.

I wiggled, and he pinned my arms next to my head.

A jolt of desire shook me, and I lunged for his mouth, his neck, anything as his weight settled on me, pinning me where I was. I found his lips, and he met my fervent need with his own, adding to my desire until I moaned.

I pulled one hand free, traveling down his back and circling in to find him again. His weight lifted, and I guided him in, exhaling as he entered, arching up to find him, letting him fill me.

Exhaling, he pushed against me, and my eyes opened. He looked wonderful over me in the dim light. A rising feeling of sparkles widened my eyes, and I gasped as he slowly pulled energy from me, almost like a slow cl**ax. I could hardly breathe, letting him draw it forth until I couldn’t stand it anymore and I pulled it back, making him start as our energies mingled.

I felt him there in my chi, his masculine taste on my lips, my skin, the line now being slowly pulled back into him again.

I let him take it, his warm masculinity slipping away, leaving me wanting, needing. “Oh God,” I moaned, balancing, on edge as I pulled it back to me with the sharpness of a cracked whip.

His grip shifted, and I gasped when he took back, his lips drawing on my breast, his need filling me. Sensation slipped from me in a scintillating wave, tripping over every neuron where we touched. I felt my desire building, and with a ping of emotion, I tipped our energies over the edge in one quick wash.

“Oh God, Rachel,” Trent gasped.

The unexpected jolt shook me. I reached for him, straining, and with a glorious release, my body shook.

Trent’s hands on me clenched, and he groaned, cl**axing right as I did.

I couldn’t breathe. We hung in a joined sensation of ecstasy as our energy, shared and mixed, pooled and settled, perfectly balanced between us.

My heart pounded. Slowly I opened my eyes, seeing him above me in the dim light. He was smiling.

“Hi,” he whispered, propping himself up on an elbow so he could shift the hair from my eyes.

I could still feel him inside me, still feel little jolts of sensation when either of us moved. Smiling, I reached up and tucked a stray strand of hair behind his ear. How could I be this lucky? “Hi,” I breathed, my hand moving to feel the slick sheen of sweat on his shoulder. “I’ve ruined your shower.”

“I can take another.”

He didn’t move, knowing better, and I winced. “Sorry about that.”

He knew I wasn’t talking about the shower, and he leaned down to kiss me, our lips parting with a sound so familiar, so right, that it made me ache. “Have I ever complained?”

“No, but—”

“Shut up, Rachel,” he said, then kissed me some more. I couldn’t very well talk with his lips moving against mine like that, and I gave up, giving in to the moment until I had to breathe again.

“We probably should have found a better place than this,” I said, and he gave me several more kisses to shut me up.

“It’s my house.”

He was down to short sentences, which meant he was relaxed and feeling good. I smiled up at him, playing with the hair at the nape of his neck. Why in hell had it taken me so long to realize I loved him? “Okay, but you share it with two other men and two toddlers.”

Trent’s eyebrows rose, and he glanced over the top of the couch to the stairway. “You live with a vampire and a family of pixies.”

Content, I sighed. “And yet we keep finding ourselves in this position.” I watched his eyes lose their focus as my inner muscles released. Exhaling in relief, he shifted to lie beside me. There was just enough room on the couch, and I felt happy when he tried to cover us both with the free fold of his robe.

“I’ll have to remember that one,” he said, arm draped over me. “Get you to think about pixies and vampires to get you to let go of me.”

Embarrassed, I ran my fingers over him, following the line of his muscles. “I’m worried. They don’t have three miles of forest and a gatehouse between them and the crazy people.”

I sat up and he sighed, shifting to sit beside me. “I know,” he said shortly as he stood, gathering up my clothes before he pulled me up into his arms. “I’ll get you back into Cincy before the sun comes up. Promise.”

I gave up, the feeling of being loved pushing all else away as he carried me through his rooms to the warm bath he had drawn for me. And as he used his foot to open and close the doors, I found myself looking over his simple yet complex world, wondering how I fit in. Maybe I should give up on the thinking and just do it.

That had always served me well in the past.

Chapter 23

I couldn’t see the sun apart from the glow on Cincy’s towers, the blood red slowly shifting to a more familiar gold as it crept down the sides of the buildings as the sun rose. Mark’s was busy, the music muted and the conversations tense with fear. It would’ve been impossible for Trent and me to have found a seat when we’d arrived a mere five minutes ago, but Ivy had been here for hours, rightly worried that the streets would be closed off when the suncides began. We clustered at her table to watch the news on her charging laptop.