can be a gracious and giving creature, Maxine Parker, should I find the inspiration.”
“And do I inspire you?”
“Oh…very much.”
His insinuation sent her face rushing in heat. Something shifted in the room again, and she looked up to find him gone. Missing. His chair had not been pulled away. The mystery did not last for long as a hand settled on her shoulder.
Gasping, her hand flew to one of her hair pins. She brandished it like a weapon.
He laughed quietly, a sound that was both sinister and dangerously alluring. He leaned down over her, and she felt his lips graze against her ear. His hand slid into her hair, combing through it, before gathering the strands in his fingers and holding it in his grasp. “You would think to stab me?”
“I have little other recourse.”
“Draw my blood, and I will have to spend yours in return.” He let out a low hum, and a sound like an animalistic purr joined it briefly. His lips ghosted over her cheek, and he tilted her head, baring her throat to him. “Go on, then. Please defend yourself.”
“Don’t—”
“I wish to taste you, my beautiful little empath. I wish to feel you on my tongue. I find the wine a poor alternative.” His other hand ran slowly down her arm before it reached her wrist and took the pin from her hand. She was shaking too much to fight him. She did not resist as he placed the adorned metal stick back on the tablecloth.
When he kissed her throat, she gasped. She writhed in his grasp, and she could not deny that his touch set her on fire. It sent a heat coiling deep inside her that threatened to consume her. And there was nothing she could do to resist it. He was inevitable. He was a force of nature. He wanted her, and she suddenly realized she did not wish to tell him no.
She wanted him.
What he could do to her.
The feel of his soul sent hers begging for more. For a different kind of union.
But she was terrified of it all the same. “N…Not here, please.”
“Ah, I see. You are shy. You do not want witnesses as you feel my kiss for the first time.” He chuckled and placed his lips against the skin of her neck where it joined her shoulder. She jolted beneath him. “They will not remember a single moment of this.”
She scrambled for excuses. She struggled to find any reason he should stop. “I—I—”
“Although I find I must agree. This place lacks a certain…mystique. Your first experience with my true kiss should be a memorable event.” He straightened and released her hair. “I will grant your request. This will not happen here. But it will happen tonight, Miss Parker.”
She was trembling as she watched him disappear from her view. Like a dark shadow slipping over the room, he reappeared in his chair as if nothing had happened.
It would happen tonight.
She knew there would be no convincing him otherwise. Her hand traced her throat at the spot where he had kissed her, as if she would find something. “Where will it happen instead?”
“Somewhere more suitable.” The statement was so vague that she shot him a pointed glare. He laughed at her expression. “I find I prefer your ire to your fear. Fascinating. This is not a normal occasion for me. Tell me, Miss Parker. Do I frighten you?”
“Yes.”
“Yet you find the conviction to argue with me. To debate the nature of loyalty. You vie to sell yourself to me in trade. You ask for concessions from me. You want me. I can see it in your eyes. But you also want to kill me to save your city. I find it a heady and intoxicating mix. You belong to me, and somehow I find myself uneager to ruin you.”
“I do not belong to you.”
“Another lie you speak unwittingly.” His lips pulled back in an expression that was both a sneer and something animalistic, showing his pointed teeth. “You come to me not simply to avoid violence but because you desire to know me. You said it yourself.”
Now it was her turn to be angry. “You do not own me.”
“Ah, but I do.”
She glared at him. “There is nothing you can say or do to convince me that I—”
Glass shattered beside her outward onto the street. The window in its frame exploding was the first thing she grasped had happened. The feeling of a thousand wings battering at her, at tiny claws