"So, were his new feathers like before?" She told herself to stop staring into those eyes, that no matter what he said, such contact had to make it easier for him to invade her mind. But she couldn't look away, not even when those flames turned into what looked like tiny whirling blades. "Were they?" she repeated, her voice rough with sudden hunger.
"No," he responded, reaching out to trace the shell of her ear. "They grew back even more beautiful. Blue edged with silver."
Elena laughed at the scowl in his voice. "That's the color scheme of my bedroom."
Naked heat sizzled between them. Powerful. Vibrant. His eyes still locked with hers, Raphael trailed his finger down her jaw to her neck. "Are you sure you don't want to invite me in?"
He was so utterly beautiful.
But male, very male.
Just one taste.
It was the darkness in her, the small core conceived on a blood-soaked kitchen floor the day she lost her childhood.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
"Come here, little hunter. Taste."
"No." She jerked away, palms damp with a thin sheen of fear. "I just came to return the rose and ask you if you had any more information about Uram's whereabouts."
Raphael lowered his hand, his face contemplative when she would've expected fury at being denied. "I'm good at vanquishing nightmares."
She stiffened. "And creating them. You left that vampire out in Times Square for hours." Stop, Elena, her mind ordered. For God's sake, stop! You have to make him give you an oath of safety-but her mouth wouldn't listen. "You tortured him!"
"Yes." Not even a tinge of remorse.
She waited. "That's it? That's all you have to say?"
"Did you expect guilt?" His expression stilled, became cold as frost. "I'm not human, Elena. Those I rule are not human. Your laws don't apply."
She clenched her hands painfully hard. "The laws of common decency, of conscience?"
"Call it what you will but remember this"-he leaned in, speaking in an icy whisper that cut across her skin with whip-lash cruelty-"if I fall, if I fail, the vampires go completely free, and New York drowns in the blood of innocents."
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
She reeled under the impact of those brutal images. One a memory. One a possible future. "Vampires aren't all evil. Only a small percentage of them ever lose control, same as the human population."
His hand cupped her cheek. "But they're not human, are they?"
She remained silent.
His hand was hot, his voice glacial. "Answer me, Elena." The arrogance he displayed was breathtaking, but what made it worse was that he had every right to it. The power of him . . . it was beyond staggering.
"No," she admitted. "Bloodlust-ridden vampires kill with a viciousness that's unique-and they never stop. The death toll has the potential to reach thousands."
"So you see, iron control is necessary." He came even closer, until the fronts of their bodies touched and his hand slid down to her waist. She could no longer see his face without tilting back her head. It seemed like too much effort at that moment. All she wanted was to melt. Melt and take him with her, so he could do erotic, luscious things to her aching body.
"Enough of vampires," he said, his lips on the shell of her ear.