Storm's Heart (Elder Races #2)(31)

The policewoman’s mouth twitched but she quickly sobered. “Councillor Severan will speak with her highness at her earliest convenience. One of her attendants has been insisting on delivering that message in person.”

He mentally dismissed the attendant. Tiago and Cameron had already agreed; nobody was allowed on the floor that wasn’t on their preapproved list. “Tell Severan her highness is indisposed. We’ll get back to her when we’re ready.”

Rogers lifted a sandy eyebrow. “Are you sure you don’t want to tell the Councillor that yourself?”

“I’ve got my hands full at the moment,” he muttered. He slammed the door shut and glared at it as he heard Rogers laugh.

Niniane listened as Tiago spoke with whoever had knocked on the door. Soon enough his arrogant, oversized silhouette filled the kitchen doorway.

She turned off the faucet, picked up the nearest full glass and threw the water on him.

He stood absolutely still, a giant statute of carved muscle and bone. Something dangerous throbbed in the air between them. Her heart pounded. “You did not just do that,” he said in a conversational tone. “Nobody is that suicidal.”

“You can’t do anything to me. You swore you would protect me, and I’m injured.” She picked up the next full glass and threw the water on him. “What is my name, ass**le?”

He tilted his head and put his hands on his hips as he regarded her. His obsidian gaze glittered with a strange light.

“My name,” she said between her teeth. The next one was a mug. She threw the water on him. “You know what it is. I’ve reminded you often enough. Funny enough, it is not ‘Tricks, goddammit.’ And if you ever shorten it to Ninny, I WILL BITE YOUR NOSE OFF!”

His broad, powerful shoulders jerked, and the clear sharp lines of his stern mouth spasmed. “Back in New York you told me I was supposed to say something else. What was it again? Oh yeah. Goddamn, ma’am.”

“Don’t you dare laugh at me!” she shouted. She grabbed hold of the next mug with both hands.

Suddenly he was behind her, his sodden chest pressed against her back. His hands encircled her wrists. He said in a strangled voice, “Lady, back away from the kitchen sink.”

She clung to the mug with all her strength as he tried, gently, to pry her fingers away. Water sloshed over the rim, splashing their hands and drenching the countertop. “It’s the last one,” she panted. “I’ve got to throw it.”

He buried his wet face in her hair and exploded. She tried to twist her wrists out of his grasp, quite without hope of getting free, as he roared with laughter. He managed to say after a moment, “I don’t think you have a single sane synapse firing in your brain.”

“I don’t think you’re any judge of sanity,” she snapped. Disgusted, she dropped the mug onto the counter. They had jostled all the water out of it. “And in case you’re thinking of patting me on the head and calling me ‘cute’ again, I’ll have you know all of my weapons are still poisoned.”

He let go of her wrists and turned her around, pressing her back against the counter. His drenched T-shirt soaked wet patches into her lounge suit, the muscles of his hard torso flexing with sinuous strength. The sparkle in his eyes turned smoky as her curvy body wriggled against his. “Oh, I don’t want to pat you on the head, faerie,” he said low in his throat in a deep purring growl that vibrated through her body. He bent closer until his lips brushed hers. “I want to f**k your mouth.”

Said mouth dropped open, and the breath left her body. She couldn’t believe what she just heard. “You–you what?”

The world swung as he picked her up and carried her in long, swift strides to the bedroom. He set her on the bed. She suddenly found herself lying down, as he planted a knee on the mattress by her hip and pinned her wrists over her head with one hand.

She looked up his body, from those strong legs that went on forever to the tight angle of his hips, the lean, long torso and the cut of his muscled arms. He bent his head until his mouth just brushed the sensitive skin of her open lips, and he spoke the words right into her body. “I said I want to f**k your mouth, first with my tongue”—he licked her lower lip—“and then with my finger, and then with my cock. Maybe that will shut you up.”

“You can’t talk to me that way,” she whimpered. He was outrageous, completely uncivilized. She had to find the switch in her head that would turn off her traitorous arousal. She twisted her wrists against the long fingers that held her with such ease.

“Why not?” Sharp white teeth nipped at her upper lip. “Don’t you like it?”

Like it? Like was far too insipid a word for how she reacted to what he did or what he said. His raw sensuality was whipping up a hurricane in her body. Confused and a little scared, she shifted restlessly, and his black glittering gaze swept over her.

“You said you were sorry. Right after you kissed me,” she said. She hadn’t meant for it to sound so breathless or accusing.

“Hell, yes, I was sorry, but not because I kissed you. There I was, eating you alive while you were exhausted, wounded and burning up with fever. I had no idea I could be such a low-down, self-serving bastard,” he said. He brought his other hand up under her soft loose shirt, and he gently cupped her ribs where her knife wound was. “How are you feeling, faerie? Does it hurt?”