"Neither am I." He dipped his head and kissed her. He savored her taste until he remembered that they had an audience.
Opening his eyes, he saw Fury staring at them inquisitively.
He hated that wolf. Reluctantly, Vane pulled back. "Why don't you close the store for an hour and take a real lunch with me?"
Bride hesitated, then nodded. Lunch with him would be wonderful. "I think I will. I have some leftover spaghetti in the fridge. We could walk to a store a block away and get some wine to go with it."
He looked rather uncomfortable with her suggestion as he scanned the yard outside. Was he looking for his brother?
"That would be nice," he said, but his body language belied the nonchalant tone.
For the first time in her life, Bride had a truly radical idea. She checked her watch. It was almost two-thirty and no one had come into her store for the last half an hour. Friday afternoons were traditionally slow for her "Tell you what," she said before she chickened out. "Why don't I close up early?"
His gaze heated with interest. "Can you do that?"
She nodded. "Give me a few minutes to do paperwork?"
"Take your time. I'm all yours."
The look in his eyes told her exactly what he meant by that.
Bride bit her lip at his invitation. How often did a woman hear that out of the mouth of a man who looked like this one?
Bride returned to her shop and quickly counted down her register. She did her paperwork while Vane browsed through her shelves.
It was hard to focus on sorting receipts while he was there, distracting her. He had his back to her as he looked through her drawers of rings. He had the nicest rump that had ever graced a man's backside. Worse, she could see his face reflected in the mirror.
And he could be hers Swallowing, she forced herself to fill out the bank deposit slip. He came up behind her as she was putting everything in the large zippered envelope.
Bracing his arms on each side of her, he bent down and took a deep breath in her hair as if he were savoring her.
"Have you any idea what you do to me, Bride?"
"No," she answered honestly.
Vane stood there, his heart pounding wildly. His body hard and aching. His presence here was madness. He had covered his scent before he appeared here, but Stefan and the others were damned good at what they did.
It wouldn't be long before they found him.
Of course, so long as Bride bore his mark, she bore his scent, and even if he left her, they were just as likely to pick up that and appear to her as they were to find him.
More so in fact, since Bride didn't know to hide herself.
He was desperate for a taste of her and he knew she wouldn't deny him. But he couldn't take her again. Not unless she understood the full impact of that decision.
And the inherent dangers.
He shouldn't be here, in human form. But unlike Fury, his stronger incarnation was that of human. It was how he could protect her best.
It also made him even more vulnerable to her.
Leaning over, he brushed the exposed skin of her neck with his lips. "I wish you were mine," he breathed, inhaling the warm scent of her skin.
Bride couldn't breathe as she heard the deep, growling tone of his voice. She felt like this was some kind of strange dream. How could this be real?
She leaned back against Vane's chest so that she could look up at him.
The look on his face seared her.