Slowly, she lowered herself into a crouch. In the mirror he could see her heart-shaped a.s.s and the wet twist of her hair down her back.

She put her hands on his knees and shoved them apart. His heart lurched.

"How's your self control?"

"Perfect."

"You think so?"

"I know so."

"Then you won't come until I tell you to. Swear it."

His mouth went dry. "I swear."

Again, he surprised her. This time she controlled her response much better, but still he could see it. She couldn't believe he'd agreed. He liked keeping her off balance.

She walked away. He swung around and watched her pull a small, black box from a Chinese cabinet. On her return, she walked with a serpentine twist of the hips that fascinated him, even while the black box worried him.

Kneeling in front of him again, she put the box to one side and slipped her hand under his b.a.l.l.s. His limbs locked and his mind emptied out. She may as well have Tasered him. Cupping them high, she breathed on his c.o.c.k. Nothing more. First she opened her mouth wide and puffed a hot, wet breath of air over his shaft. Then she pursed her lips and blew on the damp skin. Her gorgeous, bruised mouth stretching wide, then closing, stretching wide, then closing, waking and teasing his flesh. He watched her, entranced. She reached for the box and pulled a feather from it.

The feather she swiped up and down his shaft, and around the head. The sensation was tickling light, but his c.o.c.k twitched and leapt in response. It ignited his senses, but did nothing to satisfy. He leaned back on his hands and took a big gulp of air.

"What do you think of the feather?"

"I don't think I have to tell you anything."

She laughed. "You tell me plenty."

Tossing the feather aside, she tilted her head and licked him from base to tip, until his c.o.c.k shone with her saliva. Faint tremors began in his thighs and forearms. He forced himself to relax.

"What's this?" She quirked an eyebrow at him over his c.o.c.k. "Pre-come? Already? Please tell me your come won't bind me to you."

"Not blood," he gasped. "Safe." Keep going. G.o.d in heaven please keep going.

With a smile she stretched out her long, pointed tongue and neatly captured the drop. Mikhail closed his eyes.

But he couldn't block the sensations. Her hot, wet mouth dropped over the head and slid down his shaft. Her lips sealed and the suction began. He grabbed the sides of the bench and held tight.

"Why so tense?" she said, pulling off him, playing the understanding wife. "You need to relax. Let go."

"Is that an order?"

She winked and dropped her mouth over his head again. Meanwhile she took up his b.a.l.l.s again, this time squeezing lightly. She flicked at his frenulum, her tongue fast as a snake's. He'd forgotten pleasure altogether, he realized. Forgotten it could be exquisite torture.

Sweat began to trickle down his temples. Again she pulled off him. The skin over his head was red and distended, and so tender he thought it would split.

"Would you like to come now?"

He nodded. The mere suggestion made his t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es tighten.

"Will you beg me for it?"

He shook his head, puffing through his nose.

"Stubborn."

"Won't beg."

"You said you want to please me. Begging would please me."

"No."

"Then you'll lose control. You will break your oath."

He shook his head.

The box came out again. From its depths she pulled a long string of pearls and a small jar. He took a deep breath.

Leaving him to watch, and wonder, and suffer, she took her time untangling the string of pearls. Holding them high, she let them cascade over his c.o.c.k, smooth and cool. Then she pulled them off, leaned over and took him in her mouth again to suck and let her hot saliva cascade down the sides. He grabbed hold of the bench again.

When he was as wet as she wanted him to be, she wrapped his c.o.c.k with the pearls, starting at the base and winding her way up. Cupping her hand around this sheath, she moved her hand up and down. The pearls rolled and slid against his wet skin like a hundred caressing fingers.

"Agh!"

It was an agonized sound, even to his own ears. And it gave him no relief. Still stroking him with the pearls, she bent low and began to kiss his inner thighs, supplementing her kisses with cruel scratches.

He writhed, fighting the desire to pump his hips. o.r.g.a.s.m was a semi bearing down on him, horn blaring. He tried to scoot backward out of her reach.

"Uh, uh."

"Ahhh!" He stamped his feet. He ducked his head and ground his teeth. "Errrr!"

"Say please." She leaned forward to taste his navel.

The wood snapped under his hands. The bench went lopsided.

Frantic, he dug his fingernails into the cut on his arm-the one he'd threatened her with in the pool-opening it wide. The pain pulled him back from the brink.

The scent of his blood distracted her. She lifted her head, her nostrils flaring. Though he suspected he must look insane, she didn't bat an eyelash, just said, "You'd better get down before the bench collapses."

Keeping hold of his c.o.c.k, she guided him to the floor. He stretched out on the cold, hard tile, grateful for its brutality.

Her hand still on him, stroking slowly up and down, she said, "How do you want to come, Mikhail?"

"Inside you." His lips retracted involuntarily, baring his teeth.

Her purr turned to frost. "You'd like that. Thrusting into me over and over until we were both sweaty, until I was screaming for mercy, tight, hot, slippery. Or maybe you're imagining taking me from behind-"

"Shut. Up."

"You're going to come, Faustin. You can't control it. Say please before you break your oath."

"Not going to happen."

She stripped the pearls off his c.o.c.k and sent them sliding across the tile. Wearing a wicked expression, she straddled him backward, giving him a magnificent view of her a.s.s and her gleaming wet s.e.x. But she said, "Don't touch that."

Hips high, she lowered her head over his c.o.c.k and drew him inch by slow inch into her mouth. Her fingertips tickled his b.a.l.l.s and she started to move her head up and down. His hips lifted off the floor. He heard grunting and realized it was his own.

The sound of a lid being turned. The little jar from the box. Her warm, greasy finger slid back along his perineum and circled his a.n.u.s.

No one had ever touched him that way. He had no idea it could feel so good. Combined with the slow suction on his c.o.c.k, it was unbearable. He heaved a breath, slapped his palms against the floor, and fought not to give in.

Her finger pushed at him delicately, teasing him until he opened to her and the tip of her finger slid inside. Taking him. Meanwhile her head was bobbing, her suction relentless, her saliva hot and slick. His c.o.c.k leapt in her mouth. Pulsing. Alive.

"f.u.c.k! f.u.c.k! f.u.c.k!" He saw red. Nothing else. But he would not come. He'd implode first. He'd die.

Her fingertip wiggled gently, stroking him deep inside. Tears started to pour from the corners of his eyes. She backed off his c.o.c.k and said quietly, like the Mother of Mercy herself, "Come for me now, Mikhail."

The e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n was so immediate, so intense, he screamed. His hips jerked as jet after jet tore out of his body. Vaguely he knew her mouth was on him. Swallowing. Sucking. Vaguely he knew her finger was still ma.s.saging his prostate, demanding that he give more.

He gave and gave, twitching and moaning, emptying into her mouth. For the first time in his life he let go. He didn't try to control it, or come out of it. He rode it as long as it lasted, until she was finished with him, and he lay there, wet and exhausted, a shipwreck survivor washed up on the beach.

Chapter Seven.

She thought he'd pa.s.sed out. The transition from his screams echoing off the walls to total silence unnerved her. His body, which had been sweat soaked and corded with frustration, was now soft and pliant.

Alya pushed her hair out of her eyes and wiped her mouth. No one had ever fought her so hard before. But she shouldn't have expected anything else from him.

And he hadn't just surrendered, he'd surrendered over and over, allowing layer after layer of resistance-all his training, all his natural defensesto fall away. He'd given himself to the moment and made himself vulnerable. It made her domineering heart go pitter pat.

He could have struck out at her. Or made a joke of it. Or tried to change the rules. But he played her game with more heart than she'd ever seen. None of the princes she knew would have let it go so far. She couldn't read his motivations.

Mikhail Faustin had grown up fascinating.

Leaving him there, she stepped over shotgun sh.e.l.ls, broken gla.s.s, and hunks of plaster, making her way to the kitchen, where she grabbed a bottle of wine and two gla.s.ses. When she returned, he was still sprawled next to the settee he'd demolished.

While she was pouring the wine he stirred. "I figured you would kill me in some spectacular way."

She warmed with pride to hear how raspy his voice was, and how lazy, too.

Nudging him with her toe, she said offered him a gla.s.s of wine.

He scowled at the offering. She took a sip out of her own gla.s.s, wincing as it stung the cuts inside her mouth.

"Purist." She returned to the kitchen to get him a gla.s.s of water, remembering that his parents drank only blood, water and medicinal scotch.

His voice followed her down the hall. "Why would I play human? Why would I pretend to be less than I am?"

But even though Mikhail and his parents were old-fashioned, his brother Gregor ran a nightclub where vamps and humans mixed-and where no doubt many vamps drank unauthorized beverages. Alex Faustin, she heard, took it one step further. He cooked. She wondered if that was a source of tension in the family. Always searching for weakness, aren't you, Alya?

Returning, she handed him the water and he drank it down thirstily, still sitting on the floor. She perched on a chair nearby.

The few swallows of wine she'd had were already going to her head. That meant she was dangerously weak.

"I need to eat. I'm going to call in a couple of feeders for us."

He jerked his head her direction, a disapproving gleam in his eyes. "You shouldn't use feeders. Hunting keeps you sharp."

"It's okay to hunt in New York, but not in LA. You have to drive around to find victims. The traffic is horrible. Then you have to park..." She waved her hand. "It's easier to order out."

"I'll go. I'll find someone and bring them to you."

Alya folded her arms. Knyaz. Not only was he already trying to change the way she ate, he was also reminding her of another small fact. "How could I forget? You're not hungry, are you?"

An unexpected flash of pink grazed his cheekbones. "I ate very well this evening."

"I'm amazed you can meet my eye while you say that."

"I went about it wrong, that I admit. But I can't say I'm sorry I tasted you."

He stood in one fluid motion. She knew his strength now. Intimately. But she let him close with her. Let him press her hand against the leaping pulse at the base of his throat. When he spoke, his deep voice vibrated against her fingers. "Tell me you're not tempted."

Alya swallowed hard, remembering his tongue on her wounds. What would his blood taste like? His sweat and seed were compelling enough. But she couldn't sink into this madness. "The idea sickens me."

He covered her hand with his. "You know how they live on inside us. After."

After exsanguination, he meant. Yes. Her enemies were always with her.

"Imagine that intimacy with a living person. Live communication, soul to soul."

Intimacy. Her favorite thing in the world. She turned away.

"You're afraid you can't bond like that."

"Why would I want to?"

"You're afraid...you're afraid you don't even have a soul anymore."

She whipped back around to glare at him.

"I heard it in your blood."