"I... love you."

"Oh please! Don't say that if you don't mean it."

"I never say what I don't mean."

"Then you said that to calm me down. In five minutes you'll have me fending you off."

"You're probably right there. I love you."

"Don't believe you. Sorry!"

"My life was fine until you jumped onto the tail end of my private thoughts that night," I said over my shoulder. "But I don't... hate you." I realized, as the thought froze in my brain, there was a thin line between love and hate.

"I guess it's too early to tell me how you feel. I'm not very good at the relationships thing," she said.

I stopped pacing, shook my head as looked up at the dilapidated ceiling. I didn't dare say anything further with how I felt. He was still sorting it out. "That night was the end of my privacy," I said.

"You can't stand to have anyone know the real you. Too bad, Daedalus. I'm getting to know all of you."

"Why aren't you running away?"

She smiled wryly. "We're stranded in this cabin during the worst blizzard ever."

A tortured whisper broke through my lips. "You should be running like a bat out of h.e.l.l." Then louder, I said, "Why aren't you?"

"I guess the same reason why you can't. We're hopelessly entangled."

"Hopelessly entangled...That sounds right." He watched her play with her lip. "I take risks every night, and now I have this job..."

"What job?"

"I'm Head of Security for the King and Queen of Vampires." I made an unintelligible sound after watching her frown. "That was too much information, wasn't it?"

"Your brother and his wife?"

"We're all around you."

"And you're..."

I sighed wanting to end this bit of the conversation. "The Head of Security and the Prince of Vampires or Enforcer. Whatever is easiest to say."

"You risk your life every night."

"I do, and that makes us too different."

"Are you talking your way out of this?"

"Knowing me will put you in danger. Look at what happened to my daughter."

"I had a taste of that in the subway station and Tilly House, remember," Ilida reminded him. "And I survived."

"It will get worse before this is over."

"I'm not entirely defenseless, Daedalus."

"You hate using your powers, and you haven't told me why."

Chapter Twenty-eight

"You want a confessional?" "Why not? We have no place else to go."

You haven't told me about the scars."

Ilida peered around her anxiously. The cabin creaked and whined with every gust of wind. The ceiling groaned as if it carried a huge weight on its shoulders. It'll be a miracle if the roof doesn't collapse.

It would be a double miracle if she could convince him they can be together, but that was a wasted wish. He didn't want any part of her except what was between her legs. He was a playboy through and through, or was he?

"How about it?"

"Five years ago I was an intern and had my first patient, an elderly man having a heart attack. I a.s.sisted the doctor in trying to resuscitate him. We worked on him for half and hour. His wife was outside, frantically pacing around wondering if the argument they had earlier was worth it. I blocked out her thoughts wanting to concentrate on her husband. Ilida took a deep breath then let out. Tears stung her eyes.

"And then what?"

"I thought I had control of my telepathy. I did. Then while I was working on him his spirit, his thoughts, reached out to me begging me to save him. He wanted to tell his wife he loved her. I tried to ignore him. He insisted, then in a flash of blinding white light he died. I felt him slip away. You know there really is a silver cord attached to our spirits."

She flinched. His finger tenderly wiped a tear away. "I'm sorry."

"From then on, I just wanted to be normal. I stopped my lessons with my aunt."

"You are normal. It's what makes you, you."

"You have no problems being a vampire? You ever wanted to be anything else?"

He shrugged. "This is all I've ever known."

"Vampires are born vampires?"

"Mostly. Some have been changed. We call them acolytes."

"Was your brother's wife born a vampire?"

"He changed her, then she became his queen a year ago. After that incident you went back to school."

She nodded thoughtfully. "My father wigged out about it. He wanted his kids to be doctors like him."

"Your brother is a doctor?"

"An emergency plastic surgeon here in Long Island."

"You have quite a family."

He'd said that as if he felt inadequate. Was he kidding? His life seemed more vibrant and fun than hers. "My family is just as dysfunctional as everyone else's: my mother running off to Paris, my brother the chauvinistic pig and ambitious surgeon."

"I can't imagine leaving you."

She laughed bitterly, then wagged her finger at him. "But you will." She hugged herself trying to warm her limbs.

"I won-?"

"Let's talk about you."

"You want to hear about my dysfunctional family? Could take a while."

"My train is late. Let's hear it."

"I..."

As he answered, the ceiling groaned. Ilida flinched then jumped at the wood sprinkling on her shoulder. The next thing she knew she was dropped on the couch. Daedalus lay on top of her shielding her. With a loud splintering whoosh sound, wood and snow fell to the floor.

"My G.o.d!"

A five-foot mound of chunky snow lay where the table used to be. Rounded cubes of snow melted into the weathered hardwood floors. Daedalus's welcomed weight pressed her into the couch. Something else pressed into her, too.

"Are you okay?"

Her gaze fell to his generous lips. "I'm fine."

They both stared at the mess on the floor.

"It could be worse," Daedalus said.

His deep, gravely voice made her toes curl. "You don't call the ceiling falling down on us bad?"

"It's a good sized hole but not the whole ceiling."

"So how do we keep warm now?"

"Come on, Illy. You can figure it out."

She figured it out, all right. The answer was right between his legs. The way he looked at her, as if he wanted to devour her, was the answer she needed. The Hymeneal they were in...he could break her heart. He didn't want forever. He just wanted right now. She was being sucked in deeper by the hour. G.o.d help her, she wanted him, too. "I've been reduced to a rabbit in heat."

"I know it's the blood talking, but we have to keep warm."

"Can't we just lie together really close?"

"Fine. Let's try it. If it doesn't work then we'll..."

"Make love."

Her body reacted to his heat-straining for closer contact. Her lips thinned into a grim line. She fit him too well, as if some cosmic force bound them together, and there was the Hymeneal-vampiric marriage, he said.

She could find less desirable males to be married to. "What do we do about the Hymeneal?"

"Go with it. To rebel against the Hymeneal is to injure me and yourself."

"You're shivering." He reached down and felt the soles of her feet then her toes. They were freezing to the point of numbness.

"I'm okay."

"No, you're not."

"We can't."

"We're wasting time." Slowly Daedalus lowered his head. Her eyelids fluttered then closed as his lips pressed against hers. She was cold as diamonds; he was hot as newly formed coal.

"Let me eat, and I'll warm up again, then you can feed," she said between his kisses.

"That's not what I meant. Let me help you."

She was delirious with heat. His need relentless. She was drowning in him. "The more we do it the more..."

"The connection between us deepens. We'll figure it out later."

Moaning loud, she kissed him back. Then she pulled away from him. "No, I can't do this. The more we do this the more I feel for you. There has to be another way for us to keep warm."

I need you, angel. You need me. The unspoken words vibrated between them in the air they breathed.

Feel me.

He moved behind her, lifted her leg, and swiftly entered.

She knew he would break her heart. She was waiting for the moment to come. She wanted him inside taking her, whenever. She was a slave to his erection, to him.

She threw her head back, clutched the dirty couch. The seam binding ripped off in her hands.

"We're in each other's blood and mind. I belong in your body."

She clenched her eyes closed. "Can it be broken? Are you sure we can't stop this?"

"It has already begun and nothing will separate us." He looked down, his hair brushing against her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, then stared back at her. "Look at us. Are you afraid of enjoying it?" he asked.