She felt the precise moment when his patience finally snapped.
His arms caught her and pulled her to him. He kissed her back, thrusting his tongue into her mouth, drinking her in. Her head spun. He tasted like a drug. Heat blossomed in her chest and rolled down. Her body ached to be touched.
Another moment, and she would strip naked for him.
Rose pulled back. His arms held on to her, but she took a step back, and he released her. "Was that decent enough, Lord Camarine?"
He looked at her like he was about to pounce. "Quite."
"I thought I had to make the kiss memorable," she told him. "It's your reward, after all."
She was burning up. The air around her had turned viscous like glue. She had to gulp it to get any into her lungs.
Declan was having some issues coping with the sudden distance between them. His pants failed to mask a large bulge.
"I better go get some air," she said, turning away from him.
"Wait." She sensed him looming behind her. He leaned in, brushed her hair out of the way, and gently kissed the back of her neck.
A shiver ran down her spine.
He slid one arm across her shoulders and chest, above her breasts, pulling her to him. "Rose," he whispered into her ear, probably fully aware of what effect that small word had on her when he said it. His other hand caught her waist, trapping her. "Stay."
He kissed her neck again, and it took all of her will not to rub her back against him like a kitten eager for a stroke. Oh, get ahold of yourself. Don't be melting for him - that's exactly what he wants.
"Nice kiss," she heard herself say. "But no thanks."
She took his hands off her body. "You still have two challenges," she reminded him and escaped through the house onto the porch.
Chapter 17
OUTSIDE the sun shone bright, the early afternoon in full bloom. Rose breathed in deep, trying to calm herself. Part of her wanted to run back into the house; the other part laughed in cynical disbelief. Run and do what? Yell, "Here I am, take me, take me?"
She shrugged it off. She had to give it to Declan. The man could seduce. Not that he had to try terribly hard, considering the way he looked and what easy pickings she was. "You'll be completely safe, Rose, blah-blah-blah." Yeah, right. Safe. Eventually she would have to go back there and look him in the eye. She had no clue how she would manage that.
He was staying in her house, which meant some hard-and-fast rules were in order. No watching him while he waved his sword around in the morning. No thinking about him, unless it was about how she would win a challenge and kick his ass to the curb. No -
A man stood in the middle of the lawn, just beyond the ward line. He shimmered lightly, dark and translucent, as if made of many layers of dark panty hose. A hood hid his face, but she saw his hands. They were the mottled bruised color of the hounds' hide.
"It's taken you a while to notice me, my dear," he said. His voce was cultured and soft and he rolled his r's slightly. Just like Declan. "I was right. You're delicious."
What in the hell is that?
She stepped down off the porch and approached the man slowly. He seemed to float out of a puddle of the gray goo that served as hounds' blood, and as she came near, she saw the bodies of two hounds rapidly dissolving into it.
The closer she got, the stronger the stench of the magic became. A little more. Close enough so her flash wouldn't miss if she had to use it. "Who are you?" she asked.
"I'm Lord Casshorn Eratres Sandine." The figure dipped his head in a smooth bow. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance. Although really, politeness is unnecessary under the circumstances, but old habits die hard, you understand. You must forgive me this small indulgence."
Casshorn, the man who'd adopted Declan's changeling friend. A streak of alarm bit into her spine with icy fangs. That couldn't be a coincidence. She tried to show nothing and keep her voice calm. "The hounds that attack us, do they belong to you?"
"In the strictest sense of the word, they belong to no one. But I lead them and intend to continue directing their actions." He sounded so completely reasonable, as if he were her guest, discussing the latest gossip while drinking tea on her porch. "I am . . . a part of them. And they are now a part of me. It's a most curious symbiosis."
He raised his hand and showed it to her. The beginnings of black claws tipped his deformed, too-long fingers. His skin matched the color of the hounds, just a shade paler. "We are one," he said. A dark curtain of magic unwrapped and surged from him, streaming along the boundary of her ward and flaring up. Bright veins of purple and yellow twisted within it, like capillaries.
The magic flailed and pounded at the ward, trying to break through. She jerked back, but the stones held.
"Why are you killing us?"
"For your magic. Your deaths are incidental to the process. It is very simple, really. Your bodies contain magic. My hounds collect it and bring it back to me, permitting me to produce more hounds, et cetera, et cetera. I must confess, the process of draining the magic awakens baser instincts in me. A need to rend and tear into the flesh. To taste. It's an exquisite, almost painful ecstasy. And no matter how much I indulge, my hunger is never fully satisfied. I can continue on for quite some time without becoming satiated." He laughed softly, and she nearly retched.
"You realize that you're killing people? Whole families. Children."
"Of course," he chided gently and leaned forward to the ward, as if trying to tell her a secret. "To be thoroughly honest, I never cared for people. They are a bothersome lot, preoccupied with duty, expectations, and the minutiae of their lives." He rubbed his fingers as if trying to shake something from them. "I have done that, my dear. I've climbed the mountain of human ambition, and at the top I've found yet another mountain, alas with no lotuses of fulfillment in bloom."
"I think you might be insane," she said.
"Sanity is overrated compared to happiness, my dear. Taking possession of you, ripping sweet strips of flesh from your body and swallowing them whole, sucking on their juice, would make me infinitely happier than all the wisdom and ability to reason that the human race has to offer. And that brings me to the purpose of my visit. You've permitted Declan under your roof."
"And?"
"Declan has a problem. You see, he can't kill me if he doesn't find me. So he dangles you and your brothers in front of me like pieces of delectable candy. You're so . . ." He sighed. "Magical. Tempting. Make no mistake, my dear, I'll kill you. Declan knows it as well as I do. He's simply hoping to force me to kill you on his terms. If he were to go looking for me, he would have to face the wolf, and he doesn't wish it. They were friends once, he and the wolf."