“There’ll be nothing they can do.”

“I think there’s always something, if you put choice and a weapon in someone’s hands.” She walked toward him. “Did you come here to wait for me?”

“Yes.”

“Now that I’m here, what do you choose to do?”

He stayed where he was, but she could see the war inside him. Though the air suddenly seemed to lash and swirl with that battle, she stood calmly, her eyes grave and patient.

He took her with both hands, a quick and violent jerk that slammed her body to his. His mouth was ravenous.

“A fine choice,” she managed when she could speak again.

Then his lips were assaulting hers again, stealing both breath and will.

“Do you know what you’ve let loose here?” he demanded. Before she could speak, he turned, gripped her hands to drag her up onto his back.

“Cian, what—”

“You’d better hold on,” he ordered, interrupting her baffled laugh.

He leaped up. Her arms tightened around his neck as she gasped. He’d simply soared up, more than ten feet in the air from a stand, and was scaling the walls.

“What are you doing?” She risked a look down, felt her stomach shudder at the drop. “You could have warned me you’d lost your bloody mind.”

“I lost it when you walked into my room last night.” Now he swung through the window, flicked the drapes shut behind him and plunged them into the dark. “This is the price you pay for it.”

“If you’d wanted to come back inside, there are doors—”

She let out a quick cry of alarm when he swooped her up. It felt as though she was flying through the air, blind in the dark. Her next cry was of stunned excitement as she found herself under him on the bed, and his hands tugged aside clothes to take flesh.

“Wait. Wait. I can’t think. I can’t see.”

“Too late for both.” His mouth silenced her, and his hands drove her to a hard, violent crest.

Her body strained beneath his, and he knew she was reaching, reaching for the burning tip of that crest. Her breath sobbed against his lips as she reached it, and her body went limp.

He gripped her wrists in his hand, pulling her arms over her head. She was one long line of surrender now, and he sheathed himself in her.

She would have cried out again, but she had no voice. No sight, and with her hands captured, no hold. She could do nothing but feel as he plunged himself into her, battering her body with dark, desperate pleasure until she was writhing, then rising, then recklessly matching him beat for violent beat.

This time the hot tip of the crest shattered her.

She lay, scorched skin over melted bones, unable to move even when he left her to light the fire and candles.

“Choice isn’t always an issue,” he said, and she thought she heard liquid being poured into a cup. “Nor is it a weapon.”

She felt the cup bump against her hand, and managed to open her heavy eyes. She made some sound, took the cup, but wasn’t at all sure she could swallow any water.

Then she saw the raw red burn on his hand. She pushed up quickly, nearly sloshing water over the rim. “You’ve burned yourself. Let me see. I—” And she did see, that the mark was the shape of a cross.

“I would have taken it off.” Hurriedly, she pushed the cross and chain under her bodice.

“Small price to pay.” He lifted her wrist, noted the faint bruising. “I have less control with you than I’d like.”

“I like that you have less. Give me your hand. I have a little skill with healing.”

“It’s nothing.”

“Then give me your hand. It’s good practice for me.” She held hers out expectantly. After a moment he sat beside her, laid his hand in hers.

“I like that you have less,” she said again, drawing his eyes to hers. “I like knowing I can be wanted that much, that there’s something in me that pulls something in you enough that something strains, nearly snaps.”

“Dangerous enough when you’re dealing with a human. When a vampire’s control snaps, things die.”

“You’d never hurt me. You love me.”

His face went carefully blank. “Sex rarely has anything to do with—”

“Being inexperienced doesn’t make me stupid, or gullible. Is it better?”

“What?”

She smiled at him. “Your hand. The redness has eased.”

“It’s fine.” He drew it away. In fact there was no longer any burning. “You learn quickly.”

“I do. Learning is a passion for me. I’ll tell you what I’ve learned of you, when it comes to me. You love me.” Her lips were softly curved as she brushed at his hair. “You might have taken me last night—in fact you would have, with less resistance—if it had been just for sex. If it had been only need, only sex, you wouldn’t have taken me with such care, or trusted me enough to sleep awhile with me.”

She held up a finger before he could speak. “There’s more.”

“With you, there tends to be.”

She rose, straightening her clothes. “When Larkin came in, you did nothing to stop him from striking you. You love me, so you were guilty about taking what you saw as my innocence. You love me, so you’ve watched me enough to know one of my favorite places. You waited for me there, then you brought me here because you needed me. I pull at you, Cian, as you pull at me.”

She watched him as she sipped water. “You love me, as I love you.”

“To your peril.”

“And yours,” she said with a nod. “We live in perilous times.”

“Moira, this can never—”

“Don’t tell me never.” Passion vibrated in her voice and turned her eyes to hellsmoke. “I know. I know all about never. Tell me today. Between you and me let it be today. I have to fight for tomorrow, and the day after and into always. But with this, with you, it’s just today. Every today we can have.”

“Don’t cry. I’d rather have the burn than the tears.”

“I won’t.” She shut her eyes for a moment, and willed herself to keep her word. “I want you to tell me what you’ve shown me. I want you to tell me what I see when you look at me.”

“I love you.” He came to her, gently touched her face with his fingertips. “This face, those eyes, all that’s inside them. I love you. In a thousand years I’ve never loved another.”