“What are you doing, Elisa?” he asked. Caught between thrilling anticipation and abject terror, she heard the male interest behind the question, read the heat in his gaze that said he might know the answer better than she did herself.

She didn’t care. She wanted to touch his hair, bury her fingers in it, hold it tightly to draw him to her. She wanted to stroke the lines of that tattoo. Put her mouth against his throat, and feel the heat and life beating there, feel his hands on her as he took away any fear, burned it away with what he could do to her body. She saw a rapid montage of so many images—Willis’s stirring kisses, Danny and Dev’s carnal embraces in the firelight, Mal’s hand on her throat, eyes so close . . . Victor’s viciousness.

Mal had given her permission to take, but it was more than that. He’d approved her desire to take. No one had ever done that. She could choose.

She made another visual pass over his upper body, wondered if he was already aroused in the jeans he wore, if his arse and thighs beneath the denim would be as taut and muscled as what she was seeing, bare to her avid gaze.

“Elisa.” The one word was a near growl, so like his cats she almost smiled. It shot pleasure through her, enough that she shivered with it. “What are you doing?” he repeated.

She met his predator’s gaze, and answered his question.

“Running,” she whispered. And bolted out the French doors.

15

MAL had heard her on the stairs, of course. Figured she was coming down for a snack, and forced himself to stay where he was, not go sniffing out what she was doing. She’d been wrong, earlier today. She thought he was unaffected by her aroused state, when entirely the opposite was true. But he knew enough to curb unwise desires. Danny had sent her to him for protection and guidance, and the girl was messed up in too many ways, too much like the cats that came to him.

But then he’d heard her steps turn in his direction. He’d expected the quick, efficient step of the dutiful servant, coming to ask him if he needed anything. Though of course the dutiful servant hadn’t gone to bed like he’d told her to do.

Instead, her approach had been like that of the bobcat, stalking small game while remaining wary of rear attack by a larger beast. Then she’d paused at that demarcation line, before she stepped into his line of sight. He’d smelled her arousal, strong and unmistakable. Heard the increased pounding of her heart, the hitch of her breath, and his blood had run hot.

Now she gave him that one word, a deliberate reminder of his warning earlier in the day. If you run, I will take you down. He didn’t have to think. Before his accelerated heart could beat more than twice, the cadence of a full-out pursuit, he was over the desk and after her.

She made it almost twelve steps into the yard, and then he’d caught her about the waist. Elisa let out a startled yelp, a little amazed at how quick he’d been, as well as at the unyielding strength of that one arm. Then she was turning into him, practically crawling up his body to reach his mouth, to tangle her hands in the hair at his nape as she sought his lips with clumsy fervency. He cupped the back of her head, slowing her down, steadying her so their mouths could meet. Before she could decide how best to go about things, he took over.

The heat of his mouth was an inexorable, tempting pressure that had her lips parting, inviting him in before she even had the thought to do so. She strained on her toes to reach him, but then he dropped his grip around her back and waist to cradle her buttocks. He hitched her up so her bare feet left the tops of his and curled around his thighs, her heels hooking there. Digging his long fingers into her curls, he pulled her head back, broke the contact between their mouths so he could explore her face with his lips and tongue, a curiously intimate feeling as she went still and tremulous. Nuzzling the length of her nose, he passed over each of her brows, kissed her eyes and traced his tongue along her cheekbone, the shell of her ear.

Her fingers dug into his back, her thighs tightening, and his voice was as tactile as his mouth, rubbing them together, mind to mind.

Tell me, sweet Irish flower. Is your cunt weeping for me to fill it? Have you been dreaming of my cock inside of you?

She nodded against his mouth, her eyes closing. Yes, yes, yes. She needed his gentle fierceness, the raw language. Her body had been aching for what he’d shown her with Shira’s marking. His strength reined in, but no less able to pin her beneath him if he wished, make her submit.

“It’s been growing in you for a while, hasn’t it?” His voice was a hot wind, coursing through her body. He intensified it by speaking in her mind. Groomed from birth to serve, but the feeling you have now, it would have been there whether you were born a maid or a princess. It’s grown to a hard hunger, ever since you came into the service of a vampire. You crave a Master’s touch, don’t you, Elisa?

She didn’t know how to answer that. She knew only that tonight, she wanted, needed, to belong to him. As she always had, she’d take the joy of the moment, move forward and demand nothing more of the past than what was necessary to get through tomorrow.

Thankfully he didn’t demand an answer. Instead, he moved them to a stretch of lawn adjacent to the house. Laying her down upon it, he knelt between her knees so her legs had to be parted for him. His attention moved over her breasts, the nipples shamelessly hard and pushing against the fabric, then down to the tender curve of her stomach. When he placed a hand on her upper thigh, even through the nightgown, she felt the heat and strength. A tiny noise escaped her lips, a needy sound.

“Took off your panties, did you? Came down without your wrap, knowing a man would see your body through this thin thing, be teased by it. Did you think of someone seeing you, like Kohana, or one of the others? One who might get the wrong idea?”

“No. I . . . I thought I was alone. I didn’t even know you were here. I just needed to feel . . .” Suddenly she was uncertain of him, and herself, and what he might think, and cold invaded the heat. “I wasn’t trying . . . I don’t. I’m not like that.”

“Shhh. I see that. I feel it. Easy.” His knuckles turned, stroked down her leg. “I was just unsheathing my claws, Irish flower. You bring that out in me.” His lip lifted in a brief, feral smile that brought the heat back. Then he leaned over her, his dark hair falling forward, so it brushed over her nipple. She arched to that faint touch and his expression intensified. “You thought I might take you like this, just slide that thin gown up and sheathe myself deep inside of you. But I want more than that. We’re taking this off now. I’ll see you naked to me.”

The neckline had several buttons down the front amid a tiny bit of embroidery of dainty roses. He flicked them open, slid a corner back enough to reveal a collarbone, and then bent closer. She closed her eyes as his hair whispered over her face and his mouth pressed to that bone. The sharp drag of a fang made her draw in a breath, tightened her stomach further. He eased the gown off one shoulder, then the other, and began to pay close attention to them, moving out of the shallow valley of the collarbone to the curve of her right shoulder, nuzzling and nipping at it, while his hand tugged the gown down even farther on the right side.

“You taste like the grass we were lying in today. The sunshine you absorbed earlier in the day, before I rose. The food you helped Kohana prepare. You baked a chocolate cake for them.” There was a trace of amusement in his voice. “With icing.”

“They . . . they liked it.”

“I’m sure they did. They’ll refuse to let you leave. Did you have any icing left?”

“I . . . I did. But Tokala . . . licked the bowl . . . and spoon.” He’d enjoyed it so much she’d thought about making another batch the next day and perhaps asking Mal if she could take a taste to the children. Jeremiah had shown a liking for chocolate before, at the station.

“You’re starting to think about asking my permission for things. I like that.” It shows you think you might be able to trust me.

Or I just don’t want you yelling at me.

He muffled a chuckle against her, and the vibration sent out a composition of reactions from her nerve endings along the top of her breast and upper arm. I don’t yell. My punishments are far different from that, sweet Elisa. “Maybe you’ll make me a batch of that icing and bring it to me here tomorrow night. Do you know what I’ll do with it?”

She didn’t, but she was having a hard time thinking, for now his mouth was cruising over the top of her breast, following the path of his breath from his chuckle. When his lip settled on the upper curve, so close to her nipple it was pressing against his jaw, she felt that contraction between her legs again. He was between them, so she couldn’t squeeze down on the feeling.

“No, you can’t close them,” he whispered. “Just like you won’t be able to do so if I choose to take you to my bed at dawn, tie your legs so they’re spread, each ankle hooked to a bedpost, your arms tied above your head. I’d lay down next to you so I can touch you as I sleep, my dreams haunted by the perfume of your cunt, soaked for me, your mind begging me to wake, to come inside of you.”

She’d expected the wild animal. She hadn’t expected this skilled mastery from a male who stayed cloistered on his island. Apparently he was better traveled than she’d believed. It frightened and thrilled her at once. Perhaps a sophisticated woman would know how to play this game, but she was close to begging now. Her eyes were almost as ready to weep as much as the other parts of her body were. Please . . .

There was a stillness to him as he paused over her breast, drew the nightgown down another few inches so her breasts emerged, the cloth tucking in under their rise, framing them for his gaze. “Keep begging, Irish flower. You’ve no idea how hard that makes me. You’ve got beautiful breasts. You’ll eat some of that cake yourself so they’ll get as full as they once were. Understand?”

She nodded, willing to agree to anything. “What were you going to do with the icing?” She couldn’t take too much more. Her body was overloading with need, and her deeper emotions were too close. Please ...