to startle back against her chair.
He wrapped a hand around Lilah’s wrist and pulled her to her feet. One quick twist spun her around and pinned her between him and the table. He flattened her hands on the surface, then skimmed his palms up her arms.
Heat flared under his touch and something brushed against his mind. He wanted to grab a handful of her hair and tilt her head to the side. Expose her neck. Inhale her sweet scent and mark her as his own.
Focus. Seth squeezed his eyes closed. He opened them again when his hands reached her shoulders. He didn’t have time to figure out what the hell was going on in his head with a task at hand.
“I’ll ask you again,” he said thickly. “What did you put in my drink?”
Lilah tried to rear back, but his hands on her shoulders kept her locked in place. “Let me go,” she hissed.
“Your choice,” he growled. “Dangerous games, Lilah. I can’t guard you if you try to poison me when my back is turned.”
“I don’t know you,” she shot back. “I can’t trust you.”
From her shoulders, he ran his hands down her back. That sensation pulsed against his mind, stronger than ever. He could almost feel fur sliding under his skin.
At her hips, he spanned around her front and slid his palms down her thighs. So close, he couldn’t smell anything but her citrus and lavender scent. His mouth watered and blood rushed straight to his cock. It was a relief when he stepped away from her body to crouch at her side. No worry of her knowing how fucked his response was to her nearness when he didn’t press against her.
Lilah’s breath turned ragged as he dragged his hands down one leg. “Stop,” she whimpered.
Sweet fuck. Seth bit back a groan as the thin thread of her arousal hit his nose. Spit and hiss at him, try to poison him, she, too, felt that odd connection between them.
It was almost like the reaction between mates.
Seth nearly fell on his ass. Impossible. At least for him. He didn’t have an animal half. He didn’t have fangs to claim her. Those instincts didn’t exist in him.
She was just a job. Not a mate. He didn’t have a mate because he wasn’t a full shifter. He really needed to cut ties with everything supernatural once Lilah wasn’t in danger. He’d clearly cracked.
“You can stop this.” Fuck. Was that his voice? Low and hoarse? Seth swallowed hard and cupped her other ankle. He swept up her leg. “Tell me what you put in my drink.”
She trembled when he reached her stomach. He stood again and felt his way to the curve of her breasts. Just a job, he reminded himself. Just a pat-down. Nothing could happen between them.
The rustle of plastic drove that point home.
Seth spun Lilah around to face him. He stared down his nose at her as he dipped fingers under the collar of her blouse. Instead of silky skin, he found the crinkly edge of a plastic bag stuffed inside her bra.
She sagged against the edge of the table, looking halfway admonished as he rolled the pills flat inside the bag.
“Sleeping pills?” Her tongue darted out to wet her lips. Still keyed up and wrapped in her scent, he struggled to imagine anything but her mouth wrapped around him. Not the time. Not the place. She wasn’t even the person for him. “What was your plan when you laid me out?”
Not likely. He doubted she ground up enough to knock him out for long.
Lilah’s silence burned through the lust riding him. Frustration filled the void. He’d had terrible clients. Mean ones. Stupid ones. Never had he dealt with one intent on rushing for the edge of the cliff and jumping.
He had to keep her safe. If she wouldn’t listen, he’d truss her up and lock her deep in a cave where no one could get to her.
He had to keep her.
Seth growled. At himself. At the dangerous thoughts that swirled in his head. At the woman taking shuddering breaths inches from him. He stuffed the bag into his pocket and snapped a hand around her wrist. Lilah dragged at him and tried to pry his fingers away from her skin, but he wasn’t budging. “If you want to act like a child, you can be sent to bed like one.”
He shoved her through a bedroom door and let her stumble to a stop.
Seth turned to leave and froze at