Death's Mistress (Dorina Basarab, #2)(54)

And then those same hands were sliding under the T-shirt, next to my skin, and my whole body started to tingle. “I thought we were in a hurry,” I said, gripping the fridge door tightly. The combination of heat behind me and cool, cool air in front was a little dizzying.

“Elyas is not expecting us for an hour.”

“An hour, huh?” I could do a lot with an hour.

Apparently, Louis-Cesare could, too, although it wasn’t quite what I’d expected. He pulled me away from the fridge, bent me over the marble-topped island and dug his fingers into the tense muscles of my back. I groaned.

He started at the base of my spine, teasing out the knots as skillfully as if he’d done it a dozen times before. My body recognized the coarseness of familiar calluses, and a heavy warmth spread through me. He paused to tug the T-shirt off over my head, and I didn’t resist.

When he reached my shoulders, which had been tight long before tonight, he leaned more of his weight into it, spreading his palms flat and moving them in slow circles along the lines of the muscle. When they were roughly the consistency of jelly, he moved on to my neck. I leaned into the strokes involuntarily, head rolling back as he kneaded away at the tension knotted around the base of my skull.

By the time he finished, the pain was gone, although it was possible that I’d fallen madly, irreversibly in love with Louis-Cesare’s hands. I might have said something to the effect, because he chuckled and brushed his lips over the back of my neck, meltingly warm. “Get dressed.”

“Thinking about it.” I wasn’t actually sure I could move.

He let his fingers, soft and featherlight, comb through the short ends of my hair. “Get dressed before I call Elyas and tell him we will see him tomorrow.”

Sounded like a plan to me.

“And before I take that pose as an invitation.”

I turned my head and found him right there, his breath on my face, and his lashes almost brushing my cheek. There was no conscious decision. I put a hand behind his neck, and pulled up to meet him, my lips finding his as easily, as naturally, as if we did it every day. He tasted spicy and musky and mouthwateringly sweet, like butterscotch candy right before it melts on the tongue.

A bone-deep shudder tore through him, and he gripped the back of my neck and returned the kiss, deep and hungry. His skin was hot to the touch; his mouth even hotter, wet and suddenly iron-edged with blood. The tenderness was gone, but I didn’t miss it. This was better; this was perfect, sensation spiraling out of control into blatant need.

My hands spidered up to tangle in the thick mass of his hair, and my leg wrapped around him. His hand clenched on my ass, pulling me against him, and he was already half hard behind the thin material of his trousers. One of us groaned—I wasn’t sure which—and his lips moved to my ear.

“Please get dressed,” he said hoarsely.

It took a second to register, and then I jerked away, snatching up the T-shirt.

“Make up your damn mind!” I told him, pulling it on. “One minute you strip me; the next you tell me to get dressed. One minute your tongue is down my throat, and the next you’re glowering at me. Do you even know what you want?”

“There are things we want, and things we may have,” he said tightly. “Sanity lies in knowing the difference.”

“Okay, you want to translate that for me?” I waited, but he didn’t say anything else, and his posture was as closed and uninviting as a statue.

Or like a guy who’s just remembered his mistress is waiting upstairs.

Screw this, I thought bitterly. It was exactly like last time, only then I hadn’t stepped back. I’d let him take my face in his hands, let myself lean into his touch, just enough to fall and keep on falling. Only to have him leave, without a word, to chase after his mistress.

It was the same woman he was going to redeem tonight. And then this would be over and he would be gone, and I couldn’t wait. I snagged my abandoned bottle and the duffel bag off the floor and headed for the bedroom without another word, frustration lingering like a sour taste in my mouth.

It’s the beer, I told myself firmly.

Mircea’s bedroom was the same gray expanse of boredom I remembered. Like the rest of the apartment, it was ultramodern, sleek and minimalist, like something transplanted from one of the glass-and-steel high-rises. It didn’t fit well in this old-world charmer any more than the blinding white bathroom did.

Some things just weren’t meant to go together, I thought viciously, and stepped into the shower. I turned it on high, refusing to think about anything except the pounding water and the enveloping steam. It didn’t work. That shouldn’t have surprised me. It hadn’t worked any better all month.

He was a vampire. I was a dhampir, born to detect the monster within the pretty package. And until now, I’d had a flawless record. But breeding, training, and experience all failed me in his case. When I looked at Louis-Cesare, I didn’t see a monster.

Part of the problem was his unique talent for appearing human. I’d never met another vampire who got all the little things right so effortlessly, who breathed as though he really needed to, whose heart rate went up when I came in the room, who flushed in passion. If it hadn’t been for the frisson that went up my spine whenever we met, he might have fooled even me.

But it wasn’t the appearance that had me so confused. A lot of vamps looked pretty damn human, but they didn’t act it. From the newly changed babies to the age-old consuls, every damn one of them evidenced the same focused self-interest, cold-blooded practicality and utter ruthlessness.