That brought his eyes back to hers. His face, that perfect face that didn’t belong on someone so dangerous, tilted to study her. Sam might have the reputation of the devil, but the man’s face and body were pure perfection. All the better to tempt.
Sometimes she felt like everything about the man was a lie. But, fair enough, she was pretty good at deceiving, too.
She pressed, “You pay your debts, right?” He’d better. “Depends on the debt.”
That wasn’t the answer she wanted.
Sam lowered his arms and stalked closer until only a foot of space separated their bodies. The door was closed behind her, and when he leaned in, Sam slapped both of his palms against the wooden frame and caged her with his arms. “What do you need, Seline?”
She wasn’t surprised that he knew her name. He’d watched her often enough in the last two months. First, he’d watched her at Temptation. Going in as a dancer had been the only way she knew to get close to Sam—and she had to get close.
But when some ass**les had torched the joint, she’d had to come up with a real fast plan B. Since she knew Sam spent a lot of time here, she’d taken a waitressing job at Sunrise. All to stay close to him.
It had only been later that she’d learned Sam actually owned Sunrise, too.
“Seline?” His breath feathered lightly over her cheek. “What do you want from me?”
Her chin lifted but she kept her hands at her sides. Don’t touch him. “Protection.”
His brows rose.
“I won’t lie to you, Sam.” Yes, actually, she would. A lot. “I haven’t exactly been living the pure and innocent life.” Okay, that line was one hundred percent true. “I . . . made a mistake a while back, and now there are some people out there that want me dead.”
“Why?”
The door was shut. They were totally alone. She could confess to him. “Because I killed a man.” The words seemed to fall into the thick silence of the room. “I didn’t plan to do it. It-it was an accident—”
“Was it?”
Her hands clenched into fists. Ah, caught me. “No, it wasn’t.” Again, this part was true. The lies would only come later. “He was an ass**le who got off on hurting women. He used his fists any chance he had, and I wasn’t gonna be the next body he put in a box.” She wouldn’t be any man’s punching bag.
His eyes studied her. “You’re afraid.”
Only of a few things in this world.
“Is that why,” he continued quietly, “you’re always armed?”
He knew?
“With a gun close by, tucked in your purse or . . .” His fingers slid up her thigh. Up, up, stroking over her flesh until he found the sheath of her knife, tucked right on the interior of her thigh. “Or why you keep a knife strapped to your thigh?”
“You can’t be too careful,” she whispered, her body tight because he was still touching her—and she liked it. Can’t. Too dangerous. Wanting Sam could make her weak, and lust was a weakness she couldn’t afford right then.
Unfortunately for her kind, lust was like kryptonite. The closer the temptation, the stronger the weakness.
“So you need protection.” His stare narrowed on her. “What, exactly, does that mean?” He paused. “Do you need a guard? Someone to watch over you? Or . . .” His left hand rose. His fingers curved under her cheek and his thumb brushed over her lips. Her breath caught, and her heart raced in her chest. “Do you want me to kill someone for you, Seline?”
Killing would be easy for him. Sometimes, she worried it might become too easy for her. “I-I don’t know what to do. I’ve been hiding, and I thought I was safe, but they found me.”
“They?” His right hand still cradled her thigh and seemed to scorch her flesh.
“His friends. They know what I did, and they aren’t the kind of men you can just walk away from.” She let fear seep into her voice. The better to sound weak. Men liked it when women were needy, right? Help me. “They’re dangerous, Sam, and they’ve got a lot of power.”
His gaze searched hers. Then his mouth dipped close to hers. Seline stopped breathing. He was going to kiss her and her hormones would go wild. Control. She had to stay in—
He didn’t kiss her. He smiled. And dammit, she’d actually been pressing up on her toes to get closer to him.
Heat stained her cheeks. I don’t blush. But she was—or rather, she’d started blushing since she met Sam. He made her too uncomfortable.
“What makes you think I’m the kind of man who offers protection?”
She didn’t think he’d give her protection. She wasn’t a fool. He wasn’t the protecting kind.
He was the killing kind.
She wet her lips and felt the tension mount in his body. “I know what you are.” Half-truth. She knew what he wasn’t. She was still working on the rest. Out of a thousand possibilities, she’d narrowed down the choices to a top five list—and nothing on that list was good.
“And what’s that?”
Now this was the dangerous part. If she’d calculated wrong, he could attack her. Good thing she wasn’t very easy to kill. “You’re not human.” This she knew with absolute certainty. Demons didn’t play guard bitch to humans. The food chain didn’t work that way.
No change of expression crossed his face. But his head came closer to hers and his lips—why would that cruel edge be sexy?—pressed against her mouth. She expected the kiss to be hard and rough. What else? But when his mouth took hers, it was just . . . a taste.
His tongue licked her lips and stroked inside her mouth. Slow. Easy. As if he were sampling her.
Her tongue slipped to meet his. To taste. To want. Sam.
When he pulled back, she had to fight to keep her hands off him. Or rather, she had to fight not to yank the guy back and take a lot more from him. Dangerous.
His gaze studied her a moment, and she barely dared to breathe. “I’m not human,” he finally agreed, his voice a deep rumble. “But neither are you, sweetheart. Neither are you.”
True enough. Now this was the dicey part. Time for some half-truth, half-lies. “You know I’m a demon.” Yeah, and good for her, she could admit that truth without flinching in shame anymore.
“Like to like,” he murmured. “That’s the way, right?”
Right. In the Other world, paranormals could recognize their own kind. Maybe it was Mother Nature’s way of making sure the Other didn’t vanish into the mist. If you recognized your own kind, it sure made mating within the same subset easier. Demons could see right through the magic glamour that shielded their kind from human attention. The easiest tip-off that you were dealing with a fellow demon? Go for the eyes.