Chapter 13

"Istill can't believe you threw popcorn at those girls texting in front of us."

"They asked for it." Malcolm leaned back in his chair and swigged his beer. "I mean, come on! How can you possibly do anything else while Thor is kicking ass on screen?"

I laughed, enjoying the chill vibe of this bar with its mellow music and Malcolm's company. It felt so normal. After the week I'd had, it was welcome and wonderful.

We sat across from each other at a small two-top in the back of the bar. "You Belong to Someone Else" crooned out of the jukebox next to the pool tables, where a few steroid boys yelled and laughed a little too loudly at their own antics. With the exception of a few other groups of two and three, the crowd was sparse.

I'd felt Jude's presence all night—sometimes closer, sometimes farther away. Just as he'd promised, I never saw him. Even so, I continued to glance around, wondering how he hid from view so well, wondering what he thought or might say about my outing with my "friend." The anticipation of our eventual tête-à-tête had my nerves on edge.

"You're so much fun," Malcolm suddenly blurted, taking hold of my hand across the table.

"Thanks." The mood shifted from silly to serious. "You are too."

He rubbed his thumb softly across my knuckles. His hand wasn't clammy like the first time on the Riverwalk. His gaze held mine with a tender smile, his lips quirking up more on one side.

I'd never noticed his eyes before. They were a shade of bluish-green that changed their hue in certain lights. Here, in the corner under a yellow lamp, they shone dark green in a smoldering gaze I wasn't used to seeing on him.

I glanced down at the table, my heart pounding in my chest. Not from butterfly feelings about Malcolm, but from what a certain stalking demon hunter might think of Malcolm holding my hand.

"I'm going to…" I pointed toward the restrooms, smoothly pulling my hand from his as I stood.

He nodded. "One more round?"

"Sure. One more."

Malcolm headed to the bar while I zigzagged around tables and through the pool area to the hall leading to the restrooms. I saw one of the muscle meatheads nudge his friend. Their attempt at low-talking was sadly inadequate.

"Nice."

"Think she'd want to play with my pool stick?"

A vulgar gesture, I'm sure, sent them all into raucous laughter behind my back. Drunken idiots. Why must guys do stuff like that? I wanted to scream at them, Can you please ogle me in a less conspicuous manner? But of course, that would defeat the purpose. And there's no way they'd know what the word "conspicuous" meant.

I glanced to the right, avoiding the asshats. One of their friends slouched over the front of the jukebox with both hands splayed on the top. His broad frame and beefy arms tensed as I passed, swaying slightly from side to side. The hazy light from the jukebox shone on a sickly pale face, eyes squeezed shut. I walked faster, afraid the guy might be about to puke.

Zipping around the corner past the employee-only closet, I found the women's restroom last on the left. I stepped into one of the three empty stalls and did my thing, then checked myself in the mirror while washing my hands.

Glassy, dilated pupils around black-lined eyes radiated come-hither—the effects of lots of laughter, three beers, and good company with a hot guy in a cozy place. It's true I'd had a good time. I always did with Malcolm. He was a good guy. The problem was I still didn't know what I was doing.

Did I really want to date him? Did I have time to date in between my demon defense training classes? Would Jude let me date?

I shivered at the flash of his dark eyes in my mind. Blowing out a heavy breath, I dried my hands and swung open the door.

"Oh, my God! You scared me."

Big-and-beefy jukebox boy straddled the doorway, both arms gripping the frame. His head drooped low as he stared at the floor, swaying slightly.

"Dude. The men's bathroom is behind you."

He didn't move. Well, except for the slow leaning of his body blocking my exit.

"Hey!"

I didn't want to push on him for fear he'd tip over and never get up. Then I'd have to do the polite thing and go tell his fucktard friends to come and get him.

"Hey," I repeated, reaching out to tap his shoulder.

The second I touched him, a huge hand gripped my wrist. He snapped awake, reaching for my other arm. Piercing, blood-red eyes bore into mine.

Gasping, I swung my other hand out of his reach then kicked out on instinct, aiming for his dick. Dad always told me to go for the most vulnerable spot I could reach. But he blocked with his other hand.

I twisted out of his grip, elbowing him in the chin and rushing against the farthest wall. Trapped in this too-close space, I quickly scanned the room for some sort of weapon. But of course, there was nothing. It was a fucking bathroom.

He stepped fully into the room, closing the door and sneering with delight. It was then I realized my VS was no longer humming under my skin. Shit. Somewhere between the movies, beers, and Malcolm's sweet smiles, I'd lost concentration and let my shield slide away.

"So, who's your master?" I asked the hulking demon in front of me, hoping, praying he was a lower man on the totem pole. "Danté?"

His massive head tipped at an angle. This guy was way bigger than I'd realized. He blocked the door completely. There was no way to squeeze past him. I squared my feet, preparing for his attack.

He noticed and grinned, unmoving. "Danté?"

"Yes. Danté. You know, one of the princes of darkness. I'm sure you know him. You guys all hang in the same crowd."

I sounded much more confident than I felt, a trembling now weakening my knees. And my voice. When he took another step toward me, I pressed back fully against the wall.

"My command comes from another master."

"Great," I mumbled. Two high demons after me. Then I remembered something. I pulled down the high collar of my button-down to reveal the bruised bite at my neck.

"Danté has marked me," I said, hoping this would be enough to make him back off.

Jude hadn't explained everything the mark meant, but I knew at the very least it was a warning to other high demons that I was taken. Not that I in any way considered myself property of a fucking demon. Still, I was willing to try anything to get this demon to back off.

His red eyes glimmered over the mark, then met mine again as he prowled forward, unperturbed. Definitely not the reaction I was hoping for.

"Danté will have to mourn your loss."

Fuck.My heartbeat fled into hyper speed. His formal words were disturbingly out of sync with the muscular exterior. I reminded myself that it was a demon inside who spoke, not the man whose huge frame was crowding me in.

"What do you mean, loss?"

I shifted left, closer to a stall door. His hand flicked an oblong shape out of his back pocket. An ice pick! What the hell!

I wondered briefly if he'd snagged it from behind the bar, which led me to ponder when and how lower demons hopped into their hosts. I didn't wonder long as he stalked closer, caging me into the corner. My left hand slid up the stall door, gripping the top.

"True," he sneered, glaring with so much menace I felt my pulse pounding in my throat, "it does seem a waste to dispose of such a lovely Vessel, but my master must have no challenger."

He lunged. The ice pick jabbed straight toward my heart. I arched my torso back just in time, grabbing his arm with my right hand, thrusting it forward, and slamming the stall door as hard as I possibly could. He grunted but didn't drop the pick.

The surprise gave me a split second to bend and duck behind him, darting for the door. As I gripped the door handle, a sharp pain stung my scalp. Yanking me by my hair, my ass hit the floor, and he dragged me back across the floor.

I cried out in pain, reaching back to claw his hand and wrist.

"No, no, my beauty. That won't do," he hissed.

He jerked my head to the floor, stretching my body out. With his hand gripping my hair, there was no way I could wiggle free. I rolled into a ball and kicked him squarely across the jaw over my head.

He yanked harder, knocking the back of my skull against the floor, clattering my teeth together. Stunned by the jarring pain, I couldn't move while he quickly immobilized me with a knee onto my stomach. I gouged the wrist with my nails, drawing blood but he kept his hand firmly entangled in my hair.

"Oh God, no," I whispered, feeling tears prick from both the fear and the pain.

The demon bent low, malevolent crimson eyes glaring at me.

"He won't hear you," he whispered, raising the ice pick again.

I froze, watching the swing of his arm, but it never hit its target. A sharp pull on my scalp, then I was free, his weight no longer on my chest.

Jude had the hulk of a man pinned against the wall. He'd sifted in superfast, a murderous expression tightening his face into hard, taut lines. A flexed arm shoved the point of his broadsword into the hollow of the demon's throat. I scrambled back to the wall near the door.

"Give me your name, demon." Fury and death shook his voice. The throaty malice of his command made gooseflesh rise on my arms.

I thought I'd seen Jude at his scariest after Danté had caught me in the alcove at his place. I was wrong. So wrong.

The demon laughed, but not for long. Jude threw the sword aside with a clang, snapping the demon's head back, cracking it against the wall, and clenching the demon by the hair with violent force.

The creature cried out. I felt some small vindication for the swelling lump on the back of my head.

Energy shifted in the room. A whirl of electricity crackled, emanating from Jude. The familiar aura of blazing flame licked around his shoulders, head, and arms. An unnatural wind stirred the air.

"Verum vel infinitas infinitio nex."

Jude bit out the words. Truth or endless death.

I couldn't see Jude's eyes but guessed the black had flooded them entirely. The demon's angry scarlet eyes tried to resist Jude, but some force held him captive.

My VS responded to whatever was taking place, flushing my body with a wave of starry light.

"Garzel," grumbled the demon, his mouth twisting abnormally.

"Garzel," commanded Jude, "give me your master's name."

The demon beat its head from side to side, trying to break free. The demon's true form popped its horned head out from within the human shell. The left horn was broken, the right curved like a goat's.

Jude snatched the unbroken horn like the handle of a motorcycle, chanting low and literally yanking the creature violently from the human form. One hard tug and the nasty creature was out, held aloft in Jude's tight grip. The guy I'd thought was just puking drunk at the jukebox crumbled to the floor, completely unconscious.

The creature was much bigger than the first one I saw in the alley on my birthday. Long, gray skeletal limbs dangled from a bony body. An oversized chest cavity and emaciated pelvis held together by papery, leather-like skin wrinkled over the bony frame as it twisted and writhed, beating against Jude.

My demon hunter didn't budge an inch. Still as stone. One of the beast's arms contorted and shortened into a black batwing, then elongated again into its regular, ghastly form with filth-encrusted claws.

"You cannot shape-shift away, Garzel," Jude rumbled, then bellowed with power and rage, "Give me his name!"

I flinched at the violence in Jude's voice. Ripples of ethereal flame banked higher, reflecting in the demon's serpentine eyes.

"No," rasped the creature between tight lips, dribbling spittle.

The constant jerking of the demon had angled Jude so I could view his profile. He closed his eyes, not chanting but obviously doing something.

My VS throbbed in response. I gasped. Then all was silent and unmoving. No, not silent. Deaf. I could hear nothing, absolutely nothing. A vacuum consumed all sound until only the faint thrum of my heart beat within my ears. The ghostly light deepened to the darkest blue, touching everything with an eerie shade of twilight.

Jude opened his eyes but never moved. The demon hung there midair, no longer flailing, just staring wide-eyed into the mirror along the wall. I followed his gaze, not believing my own eyes.

The glass reflected a creature straight from darkest nightmares, from mythical underworlds, from horror stories of the ferryman and the Grim Reaper. Shrouded in tattered gray cloth, corpselike remnants of the grave lifted in a wispy wind that wasn't there.

Long, black-boned limbs extended from the gray trappings of death. A skeletal head of black bone, oddly stretched and angular, held eyes of liquid red. The words I walk through the valley of the shadow of death came to mind. This being was the shadow of death personified, carrying with it the promise of eternal night. And damnation.

The being floated closer, then crossed through the glass, sliding out of the mirror from some other dimension, gliding into our space, filling it up with static darkness. My pulse tripped faster, throbbing in my ears.

The thing spoke in a whispering breath. "Acherontis pabulum."

A cold shiver shot up my spine. Ominous words. Food for Acheron. Confused and terrified, I could do nothing but watch.

"Garzel." Jude's voice was clipped and hollow and other. Sound resonated like something trapped in a jar. I shrank farther into the corner. "Give me your master's name, or I give you to the Collector," he stated in a dark rumble. "Your choice."

Jude didn't even glance at the hovering, ghastly specter floating only a few feet from him, but the gangly beast did, closing his blood-red eyes in resignation. "The Collector's kiss."

Jude still held the demon by one horn. "So be it."

Without pause, he released Garzel the same instant the black-boned wraith opened its arms for an embrace. Sucked swiftly to the angel of death, its hideous head tilted, pressing a gaping, fleshless mouth to Garzel's.

At once, I heard and felt a piercing sorrow wash over me. Overlapping voices cried and wailed in soul-deep anguish. I pressed my hands over my ears but still heard the tormented cries.

Hot tears streamed down my face, though the pain I felt wasn't mine. Pain that was sharp and intimate, as if the voices broke all barriers, piercing straight to my heart and shattering it into tiny pieces.

Garzel's sinister eyes glared at me, an unspoken warning, just as the Collector inhaled. The demon evaporated into a black stream of vapor, sucked into the mouth of the grim creature.

Jude bowed his head to the Collector. It swept one black arm outward in a regal gesture of farewell, slipped back into the mirror, then vanished. Instantly, the blue-tinged room brightened, and I could once again hear the hazy sound of music and voices from the bar. I panted, my chest heaving, trying to wrap my mind around what I'd just witnessed.

Jude took two long strides and lifted me by my upper arms. His dark gaze shimmered with emotion—compassion, fear, frustration, anger. Definitely anger. He shook his head in slow motion from side to side, pulling me within a hair"s breadth of his chest. Black eyes scanned my entire face in a swift blink.

"Oh, Genevieve, Genevieve." My name slipped from his lips like a broken prayer. "What am I going to do with you?"

"Must something be done with me?" I choked out, body trembling, tears still coming, though I hated it. I wasn't usually a crier, but apparently, near-death terror did that to me. Also, those terrible cries, their pain.

"Be calm." His voice soothed. He brushed the tears from one cheek with his thumb. "Relax. The pain will disappear soon enough." He brushed the other cheek, both hands cupping my face in warmth and safety.

I closed my eyes. "I feel so empty," I whispered, a deep ache expanding in my core.

"I know. The feeling will subside. Relax."

"What was that thing?"

Opening my eyes, I caught him staring at my lips. One thumb brushed across my partly open mouth. I shivered again. His eyes met mine, unguarded, sparking with glittering shards of gold.

The anger now gone, another heated emotion swirled feverishly, touching the contours of his face with a melting quality. He wanted to kiss me. No mistake. I was shocked by the sudden intrusion of desire cutting through the fear and unfathomable sorrow. His gaze held mine a moment more, his thumb stroking down the column of my throat.

Then his face shuttered closed, his mask well in place. Even while one hand gripped my waist when I swayed and tightened to keep me upright, he broke the intimate closeness.

"I'll explain everything, but we need to get out of here. Garzel may not have been working alone. I'm in no mood for any more tonight."

Loaded words.

"No, wait!" I said, realizing what he was about to do. I pushed out of his grasp. "I can't sift out! Malcolm. Damn. Poor Malcolm. I can't just disappear."

No longer touching me, Jude held a blank expression, void of the heat visible seconds before.

"Genevieve. Listen to me very carefully and do exactly as I say."

Hell. Angry Jude was back.

"Listening," I said with not a hint of snarkiness or humor. I might be brave, but I wasn't stupid.

"Walk straight through the bar, tell the boy you're not feeling well, and you need to go home. You have exactly eight minutes. Go a second over, and I'll sift into his fucking truck and take you without warning. I'll be waiting for you in your bedroom. Eight minutes, Genevieve."

A whoosh of wind rocked me on my heels. He was gone.

"Eight minutes!?"

I dashed out of the bathroom, dusting off my jeans and smoothing my hair as I sped down the hall around the corner, where I slammed right into Malcolm, holding a beer in each hand.

"Hey, you okay? I was starting to worry about you."

"Um, yeah, well, I'm really not feeling well. So sorry, but can you take me home?"

Concern written all over his face, he set the beers on a stool, took my hand, and guided me back through the bar. I didn't even think about warning the muscle-bound dweebs their friend was unconscious in the ladies' bathroom. He was going to wake up with a nasty headache, but somehow I didn't feel that sorry for him. Jude had said demons could only possess those open to them, which meant in some small way, the guy had asked for it.

Malcolm opened the passenger side of his truck for me, hopped into the driver's seat then headed out. Thankfully, the bar was near City Park, not far from my apartment.

"I hate that you're feeling bad." Malcolm kept glancing at me with a worried expression. "Is it your stomach?"

I nodded, doing a damn fine job of using my anxiety as a disguise for a stomachache. Three minutes had passed. I watched the clock on the dash, tapping my foot at each red light.

"You okay?" he asked, noticing my fidgeting.

"I'll be fine. Just need a little Pepto and bed."

"You want me to stop and get you something?"

"No!" I yelled. He flinched. "Um, I mean, no thanks. It's not that serious. Just probably overworked and all… Thanks."

Malcolm nodded and, by some miracle, had me on my doorstep with one minute to spare. As Malcolm faced me at the door, I was very aware that Jude was waiting in my bedroom. In my bedroom! My stomach did a flip-flop at the thought, and I realized perhaps my stomachache wasn't a total ruse.

Malcolm tucked me into a bearlike hug, planting a kiss on the top of my head. I have to admit it felt quite nice in his arms. He was such a gentle soul that I felt comforted by his close presence. Comforted but not safe. I glanced behind him, so sure a demon or that Collector thing would pop out and snatch us both.

"Sorry to end the night this way, but I should go in," I mumbled, giving him a gentle squeeze and pulling back.

"I had a wonderful time tonight. I'd like to spend more time with you."

I looked up and nodded, smiling as best I could. He leaned down for what I thought would be a peck goodnight. He gave me a soft close-mouthed kiss, pulled back a second then leaned toward me again. This time, he pried my lips apart, slipping his tongue in tentatively. It was such a shock, I didn't resist. I mean, I had given all the signs I'd enjoyed the night and would welcome a little affection.

Still, I stood there, letting him kiss me. Doing nothing may have given him the wrong impression, because his lips pressed harder, then he gave a soft moan as his tongue plunged in with sloppy earnestness.

"Oh, Gen," he whispered across my lips, diving back in for more full-on tongue thrusting.

His other hand slid down my neck, fumbled over my shirt, over my breast, stopping to cup and squeeze. What the hell! Didn't I say I had a stomachache? Not that I really did, but come on. I eased away, breaking contact and pushing his hand away. The whole event lasted all of maybe twenty seconds but felt way longer.

"Good night, Malcolm."

Before he could say or do anything else, I slipped through the door and locked it shut, leaning against it. Pressing the back of my hand to my lips, I took a deep breath. The apartment was ghostly quiet. Mindy had texted me while we were at the movies that she would be out late with Dave. Though the place was silent, I was not alone.

I crept toward my room like someone going to the hangman's noose. I hoped Jude hadn't seen or heard what just happened on the doorstep.

Walking closer to my bedroom, I sensed him there. My VS recognized the hard strength of his presence, wrapped in flame.

My mind drifted through the different sensory signatures I'd discovered. Kat felt like warm waves on a sandy shore. Those lower demons felt like needles prickling along my spine. The Dungeon master, Dommiel, exuded a penetrating fear before intense pain, if that made any sense. Danté was the ice man with a capacitating gift to freeze with a burning touch.

But Jude. He was all heat and steel and rock-solid, bone-melting beauty. His presence felt like unquenchable fire and impenetrable armor all at once—smothering and burning me with an insatiable need to bask in the nearness of him.

Within his fiery aura, I felt protected, rocking gently within his ship of flame, sure to be taken to safe harbor. I stopped walking, inhaled deeply and blew out a shaky breath, willing myself to be calm before I stepped into the bedroom.

The lights were off. A dark form stood tall and still, his profile silhouetted by the faint light filtering through sheer curtains. A long, sharp line angled against the wall—his broadsword. He didn't face me as I entered. When he spoke, his voice was steady, level, distant. Cold.

"Do you trust me, Genevieve?"

A simple question. Of course, I did. Everything I knew about Jude incited trust. Though the man himself was still a mystery, he'd done nothing to make me doubt his intentions. Having saved my life now several times and having never harmed me in any way, how could I not trust him?

There was a heaviness in his voice, as if this question held the weight of something far greater than I could fathom.

My reply came out low but strong. "Yes."

He continued to gaze toward the curtained window, his frame stiff and unyielding. I stepped farther into the room, standing at the edge of my bed.

"Do you believe I am thinking only of your safety when I tell you to do something?"

Uh-oh. I knew where this was going.

"Jude, listen, I know that—"

"Answer the question." His sharp tone halted the pitiful excuses about to spill from my mouth.

He turned to me then. Though I couldn't see anything but the black outline of his body, I felt the weight of his eyes. Could he see me in the dark? I wondered what other gifts a Dominus Daemonum might have in his arsenal.

"Yes."

He walked toward me, stopping outside that personal zone he so often liked to fill up with all his manliness.

"Then tell me"—his voice monotone, but sharp as a razor—"why do you value your life so little to leave this apartment for what, a romp about town with your boyfriend? You don't seem to comprehend your new reality at all."

His voice was calm but edged with danger.

"I just thought, well, Kat said today… I mean—"

"Do you think I care if you go out with the boy?"

"No. Well, yes. Maybe."

"You're free to do as you please, within reason. If you prefer to spend your time bar-hopping, that's entirely your decision. But understand this, every time you step foot out the door, you're risking your life, your very soul. Is it really worth it to sip beer and hold hands with the boy?"

My mouth went bone dry. He was so pissed.

"Why do you keep calling him a boy? He's twenty-one years old. He's a grown man."

A derisive noise, almost a snort, came from the shadow before me. I felt the touch of a shimmering flame he wore like a coat wherever he went.

"Mmm." He inched into my space. I inched back, feeling like cornered prey. "And tell me, how do you know he's a grown man?"

Words dripping with sarcasm. Malcolm was a good friend, possibly more than a good friend. Angry heat flushed my cheeks. "He's…he just is!"

"‘He just is.' Excellent definition. I'll have to remember that."

He mocked me. I was glad to have the darkness to hide the smug smile he surely wore and the humiliating flush crawling up my cheeks.

"Well, he's a gentleman, that's for damn sure!" I snapped back.

He inched closer. Though my eyes had adjusted, I could only see his outline in the dim light.

"Really? Gentlemen molest women on their doorsteps without invitation nowadays? Interesting. I hadn't realized the definition had changed so much over the decades."

"What? You saw! You watched me when he—?" I broke off, shame and anger making my voice shake. "That's why I went out on my own tonight. I don't want a babysitter all the time!"

Closer still. The backs of my knees bumped the edge of the bed.

"Babysitter? Sweetheart, I'm not sure what mirror you're looking in, but you are by no means a baby any more than that boy is a grown man."

Sweetheart? He'd never called me an endearment, and though I caught the condescending tone, the possessiveness in his voice struck me near dumb.

"Well, what's your definition of a grown man, since you know so much?"

Already breathless, I hoped he couldn't sense my nerves fracturing on multiple levels. The overwhelming sensation of his nearness in the dark was heady, intoxicating. I felt dizzy, wanting to grasp his shoulders for support, but I didn't dare touch him.

"A man," he said, deep voice like velvet, warm breath caressing my cheek, "knows when to take action and when to be still, knows his strengths and his weaknesses, knows control when it is necessary and release when it is essential. And a man"—his voice had dropped deep, throaty, close to my ear—"knows when a woman wants him and how to please her."

Two words popped into my head, and before I could possibly consider the consequences, the challenge shot from my mouth.

"Prove it."

Jude crushed me onto the bed before I could blink, his glorious, hard body caging me in. A large hand hooked behind my knee, bending it as he fitted his body over mine. He pressed lower, his hard bulge pushing into the vee of my jeans.

God!Very hard. I froze.

Long fingers spread into my hair, gently tugging so the column of my throat arched for him. I made a breathy sound as he scraped his stubbled jaw along the soft curve of my neck, trailing warm lips back over the rough abrasion. He tilted my head straight again, grinding against my pussy in one slow movement.

"Ah." A helpless pant escaped my lips.

If I could see his face, he would probably be smiling. I was boneless, mindless beneath him.

I bit my lip to keep any other embarrassing noises from escaping, as if that might help. His hand at my knee slid up along my thigh to my hip, massaging gently. Even through my jeans, his touch seared me to the skin.

"Let go, Genevieve." I still held my bottom lip tightly between my teeth. "Open for me."

God, the man's voice rumbled so low, a rough whisper caressing me in a tangible way, forcing me to obey. I did as I was told. Those lips I'd caught myself staring at entirely too often showed me the difference between the boy on the doorstep and the man on top of me.

Slowly, slowly, his lips urged mine apart with gentle yet determined movements until I tasted the invading heat of his mouth. His tongue came in—exploring, demanding, claiming me as his own.

I'd felt desire before, but not like this. An aching need wrenched at my core, tightening low and deep. His aura of fire singed me from the inside out, waking every sense, wrapping me in palpable longing. A burning tendril reached out, weaving around me, into me, pulling me toward him like the tide to the moon. How did I ever mistake Danté for Jude? I knew in that moment no man would ever come close to him, no matter how long I lived.

I threaded one hand into the hair at his nape, shocked at the silkiness. My other hand moved along his neck to the crook of his jaw, feeling the muscles work as he continued his deep invasion.

I couldn't keep the little whimpering noises from escaping my lips. He responded at once, pressing his erection harder, grinding against me, kissing more deeply, nipping at my lips with his teeth, then devouring me again with heavy intent.

My back arched, a primitive response, pressing my breasts against his chest. The friction wound a knot in my abdomen. He moaned.

Christ!The sound made me want to give him everything, give him all of me. My other leg bent of its own will, inviting and cradling him between my thighs. Right where I needed him.

I rocked up, rubbing my clit along the length of him. His fist tightened in my hair, his mouth coasting along my jaw.

"Fuck, woman," he rumbled, scraping my neck with teeth then licking with his tongue. "You should tell me to stop."

Curling my fingers into the back of his shirt, I rocked my hips again, moaning at the pleasure of my clit rubbing against his hard dick.

"I don't want to stop," I panted.

For the first time, it was true. I didn't want to wait any longer. I wanted Jude to rip my clothes off and do everything to me.

Plunging both hands under his shirt, I glided my nails to the front and down his rigid abdomen. He bit me at the base of my neck, quickening my pulse and heating my blood. I reached down between us to unsnap his jeans. Before I'd gotten to the zipper, both my wrists were bound above my head.

"Fuck," he grated, his eyes squeezed shut.

Jude froze for a few seconds, panting, still holding my wrists captive. My mind a haze of lust, I wanted to ask why he was stopping, but I was also inexperienced and a little shy when it came to sex. I also couldn't stand the thought of me begging him, only for him to reject me. Because this definitely felt like rejection.

Though his voice came out calm and steady, the rapid tattoo of his heart vibrated through his chest to mine. He lifted his body an inch, no longer touching but hovering in torturous intimacy. I almost cried out in anguish.

"Proven?"

Proven? What was he talking about? My brain had nearly melted away the conversation before this more than heated interlude. I could hardly form a coherent thought, much less speak, still panting and wanting more.

A throaty laugh. His chest rumbled, inadvertently, or maybe on purpose, rubbing the tip of my breasts, torturing my hardened nipples. I definitely whimpered at that.

He bent his head, keeping our bodies apart, sweeping his lips lightly along mine, giving me a brief, wet kiss, tugging at my lower lip before letting go. He released a jagged breath.

"Don't settle, Genevieve. Don't let strangers grope you on dance floors. Don't allow college boys to fondle you in doorways. Don't waver in uncertainty about your own desires. Even ageless, life is too short to live halfhearted. Know what you want. Endeavor to seize it, and keep it when you do."

The mattress shifted as his weight lifted off the bed. A swift whooshing sound, and he was gone. His heat lingered on my swollen lips, my chest, and lower. I curled onto my side, feeling bereft and so very alone.

I'd forgotten all about Garzel and the Collector and Malcolm. None of it mattered as Jude's advice swirled in my mind, specifically the last words he spoke to me.

Endeavor to seize it, and keep it when you do.

"I thought I just did," I whispered into the dark.

There was no answer.