She shifted to her back and guided him to her. As she looked up at him, she noticed the tight lines of his body, the restraint he had been showing up until now, and said, "Release yourself." Diego's arms shook as he poised above her, the tip of him at the moist entrance of her womb. Her words reverberated through his skull, awakening the darkness within him, rousing the beast who normally emerged for such diversions.

Shaking his head, he forced back the vampire, wanting his human self to experience the delights of her body and the comfort of the arms she wrapped around him. "Come with me, amor."

She reached to the nightstand, dragged out a small packet and with a speed that surprised him, opened it and eased the condom over him, tenderly stroking even as she positioned him between her legs.

He slipped inside her tightness, overwhelmed not just by the sensation of her warm, willing body accepting his, but by the tenderness of her kiss against his brow and the loving caress of her hand across his face before she sank back down onto the mattress and met his gaze.

He saw it then. The love he had never expected to see again in his eternal life. The promise of so much more than just the physical release their bodies craved. The emotion was so strong it nearly undid him, and so he closed his eyes, focusing on the union of their bodies.

He moved tentatively at first, acclimating himself to feel her beneath him, the tightness around him, slick with the pa.s.sion he had earlier aroused.

She whispered his name, an entreaty to take her further, and he pushed, increasing the strength of his thrusts until their breathing rasped in the quiet night. Her knees came up around him, and her hands held tight to his shoulders.

He needed more. He needed to taste her, and so he bent his head and suckled one breast, dragging a moan from her.

She held his head to her and arched her back, giving him greater access.

He felt it then, the beginning tremors of her climax rising from deep within her body, calling to his to answer. He gave himself over to the sensations of loving her: her skin, smooth and supple as his abdomen grazed hers; the hard tips of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s against his chest.

The smell of her arousal and of the blood surging through her body.

The beast protested then, clawing to be set free, but Diego battled the vampire back as he had earlier, and thrust into her again and again until her body climaxed beneath his and she cried out his name.

Her muscles pulsed around him as he stroked yet again, searching for his own release. When she lifted upward and tongued his nipple, his body jerked with pleasure and it began then, pooling at his center and moving outward.

Heat. Strong, demanding heat. Uncontrollable desire.

He bent his head, the vampire beginning to a.s.sert control as the strength of their pa.s.sion drove back the human, who had not experienced such joy in centuries. As Diego buried his head in the crook between her neck and shoulder, her pulse beat madly against the vamp-sensitized skin of his lips.

The blood called to him and Diego lost it.

The demon erupted even as he savored the release of his body.

He reared away from her, trying to rein in the vampire, which wanted nothing more than to sink his long, lethal fangs into her neck, but it was too late.

She had seen his true face and recoiled, scrambling away from him as he knelt before her on the bed.

He held out his hands in a pleading gesture. "Forgive me." "What are you?" she asked, hands crossed against her chest to hide her nakedness.

"I'm a vampire."

Ramona shook her head in disbelief. "A vampire? An honest-to-goodness blood-sucking vampire?"

No answer was necessary. The proof was there, right before her in the strange blue-green gleam of his eyes and the bright white fangs that reached nearly to the middle of his chin.

Despite that, she shook her head and closed her eyes, as if the image might somehow change. But when she opened them once more, the demon remained, only this time he was fully clothed. In Diego's clothing. His own clothes, she reminded herself, realizing that the creature before her was Diego. Her Diego.

"How did you do that?" she asked, motioning awkwardly.

"Vamp speed."

Vamp speed. So calmly stated, as if he hadn't just upended their entire world with his revelation.

"Ramona," he said, and moved toward her, slowly morphing back to human as he did so.

"Get out," she said, and pointed to the door, alternately confused and guilty about all that had just happened.

"Por favor. Let me explain," he pleaded, something she suspected he wasn't used to doing.

Diego Rivera didn't plead or ask or beg. He took. She had known that much about him from the get-go, and his actions tonight just proved it. But her own conscience p.r.i.c.ked at her, reminding her that he hadn't been the only who hadn't been truthful.

As her fear and outrage ebbed with that realization, she found the strength to make her own confession.

"No, let me explain. I'm dying," she stated simply.

"All humans die," he responded, and dragged a hand through his locks, still in disarray from her hands.

She already missed the feel of them sliding through her fingers, but forced herself to make her statement clearer. "I'm terminally ill.

I may not survive the autumn, Diego. I didn't mean for this-"

He was on her, grabbing her arms and shaking so hard her teeth rattled together. "What do you mean?"

"Van Winter called me a dead woman walking, and he was right. It was probably why he chose me for his scheme."

Diego's hands dropped from her arms and his eyes slowly bled out, becoming the strange neon blue-green of the vampire. Fangs inched downward, but he retracted them, clearly fighting for control. When he finally spoke, an odd rumble tinged his voice, like that of a big jungle cat.

"You lied to me. Did you lie about everything else?"

She wanted to alleviate his doubts, wanted him to believe in her, but maybe this was for the best. They had lied to each other about things that were too important. Nothing could ever come of a relationship based on such lies.

He was a vampire and she was...

As good as dead.Chapter 13 N ot even vamp speed was enough to outrun Ramona's last words: "I don't ever want to see you again."

He leaped to the roof of her building and hurried away, trying to escape the look of betrayal on her face. Still, even with her anger and his, all he could think about was how right it had felt to be with her. Until the vampire had emerged. Until she had revealed her own lies.

He knew all about what deceit did to a relationship, how any relationship built on lies couldn't survive. Just look at his own life.

Only this time the pain was greater than that visited on him by his wife's betrayal. Physically healing was much easier than healing the heart.

He regretted that he had hurt Ramona, but he was just as enraged about what she had done to him.

Now he wanted to hurt and be hurt without impunity. He wanted to remind himself of the pain that came from choosing love poorly.

He knew just the place to satisfy that need.

The Blood Bank jumped with the pulse of the underworld as he walked in. Or maybe he was just more sensitized to the undead energy thanks to the raw pain surging through every pore of his body.

Ramona was dying. Her matter-of-fact confession still rang in his ears, and he still felt as if someone had driven a red-hot poker through his gut.

Diego needed to replace that grief with something he could forget come morning, when another day dawned for him and another slipped away for her.

Pushing through the crowd, he stalked to the tables near the back room where the vamps and more determined humans lingered.

He was not disappointed as his gaze settled on the variety of lesser vampires and humans who lurked there, waiting to be chosen, hoping for someone to take them into one of the back rooms and satisfy their baser hungers.

He had barely contained his demon upon his arrival at the club, and the lingering thrum of that inhuman power clung to him, calling to vampire and human alike.

He skipped past the undead, needing satisfaction from a mortal tonight. The demon hungered for the taste of the blood it had been deprived of earlier.

Standing by one table, he noticed two women just ahead of him, dressed in their best impression of vamp attire with lots of black leather, laced tightly to show off their ample a.s.sets. Their arms were draped around each other. Even from there, he could smell their arousal.

When he neared, one woman she smiled, aware that she and her friend had his attention. He insinuated himself between the two of them, kissing one and groaning as the other reached around and unerringly found his erection.

"Come with me," he said, knowing that the owner of the club wouldn't appreciate him finishing this little menage in full view of the club. Not that Foley wouldn't mind viewing the display himself, but even at the Blood Bank there were rules, minimal though they may be.

He grasped the women's hands and they followed him past the vampire guard, who knew better than to ask Diego for the customary fee. There would be time enough on another day to settle the bill.

With a kick at a semiopen door, Diego jerked the women ahead of him, and before he could undo their clothes, they were both on him, stripping him of his. He knew then that he had made his selection well.

Tonight wasn't about pleasure. He wasn't even sure it was about pain, but that would be a good start.

He walked them to the bed and tossed one woman onto it, where he shackled her to the posts and tore off her pants. From the corner of his eye, he noted her friend eagerly surveying the choice of toys on the wall and the leather and metal at her hip. She had brought her own toys to play with.

"Pick well, my love," he said to her, even as he slipped between her friend's legs. He thrust into her repeatedly until the first lash fell against his back.

He froze then, the pain tightening his gut, reminding him of why he was here. Because he was undead physically, and emotionally empty.

"More," he said, wanting the punishment to salve his conscience. With each lash against his back and every thrust into the willing body beneath him he was reminded that love and pain were irrevocably entwined. That to avoid the pain, he had to push away the love.

He released the vampire and sank his fangs deep into the p.r.o.ne woman's neck, feeding from her. The s.e.x-charged blood raced through him, pulsing eagerly through his veins. As her body went limp, he dragged his mouth from her neck and pulled himself from her, still erect and still unsatisfied.

He turned to her friend, despite his feeding he was feeling light-headed, almost weak. He shook his head and finally allowed himself to fully appreciate the fire searing his back, the drip of blood from where she had stripped the skin from him with the whip she held in her hand.

A whip studded with small silver barbs.

He realized then why the weakness grew with each pa.s.sing moment. The silver had delayed his vamp healing. Only feeding more might help.

But with every second that elapsed he weakened.

He moved toward the woman and she lashed out at him again, catching him across the chest with the whip. He cried out in pain, but she drew back her arm, readying herself for another blow.

With an explosion of speed, he snared her arm and carried her back against the wall. She laughed loudly, almost madly, and licked at the blood running from the slashes in his chest while dropping the whip. Before he realized her intent, she snared a silver dagger from a sheath on her belt and plunged it into his side. The knife vibrated against a rib bone before sliding deep.

Diego staggered back, clutching the hilt, and she picked up the whip again, advancing on him.

"Like to play, do you? Like to bite? We can bite back, you know," she said, anger coloring her words and bloodl.u.s.t spurring her attack.

He barely had time to raise an arm to block the blow. The silver barbs raked furrows in his forearm, and he stumbled back, legs unsteady.

As he fell to the floor, his vision beginning to fade from the pain and loss of blood, he thought he saw something race past him. The sound of flesh striking flesh snagged his attention and he saw the woman fly across the room and into the wall. Her head connected with a loud thud and she dropped to ground, dazed, but still alive.

Hand on the hilt of the knife, which he was too weak to draw out, he looked upward as a shadow fell across him. Surprise filled him as he realized who had come to his aid."Stacia? Didn't know you were back," he said, trying to seem nonchalant before the vamp elder. But he coughed after he finished, bringing up blood. The dagger had pierced his lung, and when he sucked in a breath, he heard a gurgle welling in his chest.

"Mio amico. What were you thinking? I could hear your pain in my head from nearly across town." Stacia knelt beside him and gently eased his hand away from the knife buried deep in his side.

"Wanted to hurt," he somehow managed to say, each word taxing his failing energy. He almost wished that the connection he shared with Stacia-a connection created because they had fed on each other and often-hadn't alerted her to his troubles.

"You managed that quite well, my love." Stacia swiftly jerked the knife from his side, dragging a ragged gasp from him.

His vision blurred again. She cradled him in her arms, and he protested as fresh waves of pain erupted across his back.

"Feed. It will help you heal," she said, and suddenly her wrist was at his mouth, urging him to suckle. Only Diego knew that Stacia's help likely came with a stiff price.

Certainly stiff, my love. She mentally broadcast the message visions of what she wanted and flooded his mind, a.s.saulting him while bringing intense physical need.

He opened his mouth and barely grazed her wrist with his fangs. But she once again exhorted him to strengthen himself so that he might later satisfy his need and hers, raping his mind with visions of the payment she would demand and he couldn't refuse.

Stacia was an elder, and with her power, whatever she wanted, she could have. That she was willing to feed him in return was more than she gave most.

Biting down, careful of the seemingly fragile bones of her arm beneath his mouth, he sucked. The first taste of her blood surged through his body, numbing the pain from his wounds. With each drag of his mouth, her blood energized every cell within him.

The demon sensed his body repairing itself, and as the discomfort and injuries fled, a knot of physical need grew deep in his loins.

Physical because he knew that the satisfaction that came, much like that from the woman he had taken earlier, would be empty.

Devoid of any meaning without the emotion he had experienced with Ramona earlier.

Just as only blood could sustain his body, possibly only Ramona could feed his soul.

As Stacia sensed the change in him, she encircled his erection, her hand stroking surely before she let him ease back to the cold floor of the room. When her gaze met his, Diego knew it was time for payment.

In no time he had pleasured her to the brink of completion. But he knew only one thing would bring true release to each of them, because only blood truly called to their hearts.

Burying his head against the madly beating pulse at her neck, he sank his fangs deep, as she did, and the ardor of the vampire's kiss swept through him.

It was as it should be, he thought. Pleasure and pain. Blood and s.e.x.

The vampire way. A puny human like Ramona had no place in such an existence.

Chapter 14.