She gave a small jerk at his outlandish words. Or maybe it was just a delayed reaction to his scorching kiss.
Holy crap, her lips would be tingling for a month.
“What did you say?”
He smiled mysteriously, but didn’t bother to answer her question.
Of course not. She could threaten and demand all she wanted, but the whole partner thing would be at his freaking convenience.
Turning, Cezar pulled open the door, revealing the towering vampire who waited in the hall with a grim impatience.
“My lord, you have news?” he demanded.
Anna resisted the urge to back away from the leather-clad giant who turned to stab her with a searching gaze. Yikes. He looked quite capable of sacrificing her on the spot.
“What of the female?”
Anna’s quaking knees stiffened. Female? Female?
The oversized vampire was lucky she didn’t have full use of her powers. He would look mighty funny plastered to the ceiling or tumbling down the hall like a soccer ball.
Perhaps sensing her flare of annoyance, Cezar reached out to grasp her hand, giving her fingers a little squeeze.
“She insists on knowing whatever information you have.”
A heavy, chiseled brow arched, but rather than the argument she was expecting the demon merely offered a smile. A smile that might have been more reassuring if it hadn’t included a pair of lethal fangs that could bite through a tank.
“Very well.” His unnerving attention switched back to Cezar. “The fairy is dead.”
“Sybil?” Anna breathed in shock.
Styx gave a short nod, his long braid threaded with turquoise beads swinging across his back. “Yes.”
“Good God.”
Cezar’s face revealed no shock. Instead it was a hard mask of granite that sent a chill down her spine.
“How did it happen?” he demanded in flat tones, his body coiled with anger. “You said her cell was protected.”
A matching anger briefly touched Styx’s eyes. He seemed like the sort of man who disliked it when things didn’t go as he planned.
“It was, and I don’t have a clue as to how she died. She has no visible wounds, and Gunter swears that no one entered or left the cell. She’s simply dead.” Styx reached up to touch a medallion that hung around his neck. “I’ve called for Levet to come and examine the body once night has fully fallen.”
“Levet?” Cezar scowled at the other man. “Dios, why?”
“He can sense magic that we cannot,” Styx said.
Anna struggled to keep track of the conversation. Inside she was a quivering mess. Sybil was dead. Granted there’d been more than a few times she would have willingly choked the life from the annoying bitch. And the knowledge she would never again have to look over her shoulder and discover the woman lurking in the shadows offered a sick sort of relief, but…dead? And while she was protected in this house where Anna had been sleeping like a baby?
The thought was enough to give her the heebie-jeebies.
With a shiver she crossed her arms over her stomach and tried to look brave. Dammit. She was the one who was demanding to be a partner in this nasty business.
I am woman hear me roar, she chided herself, not oh-my-God I’m going to toss my cookies.
“Who is Levet?” she forced herself to demand.
Despite her best efforts there must have been something in her voice that warned Cezar she was strolling near the edge.
His concerned gaze skimmed over her faintly green face before he tugged her to his side and slipped an arm around her shoulders.
“He’s a gargoyle,” he grudgingly confessed.
“Ah.” She couldn’t halt the short, wild laugh. “Of course.”
Cezar’s thumb rubbed the taut line of her throat, his touch magically easing back the panic that had threatened to boil to the surface.
“Don’t worry,” he soothed. “He’s the runt of the litter and the only frightening thing about him is his warped sense of humor.”
Styx regarded Cezar’s movements with a narrowed gaze. Almost as if he was startled by the vampire’s protective intimacy. Which was laughable. Anna knew firsthand that Conde Cezar made a habit of exchanging his women on a nightly basis. She had been one of the exchangees.
With an odd smile the giant vampire gave a dip of his head. “I will leave you to prepare.”
“Good idea,” Cezar murmured, shutting the door in the face of his king and crowding her against the wall before she knew what was happening. “Should we hit the shower first?”
A shower? Naked skin. Warm water. Silky soap. Hot, steamy…
The image of the two of them entwined as water poured over them was so vivid, Anna was forced to close her eyes and suck in a deep breath.
“Absolutely not,” she muttered, already feeling hot and steamy as he deliberately leaned into her body, his head lowering so he could bury his face in her hair.
“Why?” He nipped at her earlobe. “You can wash my back and I’ll wash yours. We’re partners, remember?”
Her eyes rolled to the back of her head as his hands stroked up her sides and then boldly cupped the heavy fullness of her br**sts.
Right. Now, they were partners. When he wanted to get up close and personal.
Well, she was going to…she was going to nip this in the…his thumbs teased the tips of her ni**les and Anna moaned.
What the hell was she going to do?
Something besides melt into a puddle at his feet, surely?
The thumbs did another gut-wrenching brushing motion and Anna knew she was about to drown in his potent passion.
Holy crap.
“The only shower you’re getting is going to be a cold one in your own room,” she managed to rasp.
He laughed, his fangs deliberately scraping against her neck. “Harsh.”
“Cezar, stop that.”
“Why?” His tongue replaced his fangs in his campaign to send her up in flames. “I can smell your desire.”
“You’re going to be smelling my fist if you don’t stop.”
He laughed. “So violent, querida. First handcuffs and now threats. You used to prefer your lovemaking far more gentle.”
Lovemaking?
No.
This was sex. Raw, animal sex.
Something she had sworn off two hundred years ago.
With a desperate wrench she was pushing him away and trying to collect her senses. A minute passed, and then five more, her rasping breaths the only sound in the room until she was at last able to meet Cezar’s glittering gaze.
“Go away, Cezar.”