A costly admission. It gave her more power. He should know that. “Todd.” She obliged him softly. “Why are you here?”
“Maybe I like the band.” His lips hitched into the briefest of smiles and that sexy dimple winked at her. “Or maybe it’s the singer.”
Oh, but the guy was smooth. Humans were often so gifted with their words. Especially the men.
She’d known human men who could lie their way into almost anyone’s bed. But—
But Cara didn’t get the feeling that Todd was lying to her. She took another sip of her drink, conscious of the warm weight of his hands on her arms. She wanted those hands on other parts of her body. She wanted them out of the bar and back at her place.
She wanted Todd any way she could get him.
Cara lifted a brow. “So what is it that you want to talk to me about?” She could hear him easily in the bar, even though voices and music surrounded them.
He brought his face close to hers. Stared into her eyes and said, “My dreams, Cara. I want to tell you all about my dreams.”
The glass nearly slipped from her fingers. “Dreams?” He remembered them?
Men weren’t supposed to remember dreams of a succubus. Pleasure, passion—those were the only impressions meant to stay in a man’s mind. The succubus herself, well, she should be forgotten.
“You’ve been in my head,” he said. “Awake, asleep, I just can’t escape you.”
And she couldn’t escape him. “Do you want to escape?”
He brought his lips down onto hers. Kissed her once. A slow, leisurely taste of her lips, then a deep thrust of his tongue into her mouth. The human sure knew how to work his tongue.
When his mouth lifted, she wanted to moan at the loss.
“No.”
At first, she didn’t understand. Was he rejecting her? Then he said, “I don’t want to get away from you.” His eyes narrowed. “I just want you.”
“Do you usually get what you want?” She bet that he did.
“Sometimes I do.” For a moment, his lips tightened. “Sometimes I don’t. Guess that’s the way it is for us all, right?”
The way for humans.
“We can play the game, Cara,” he told her, rubbing his hands up and down her arms in a rough caress. “I can be the gentleman.
Take you out on a dates. Movies. Theater. Whatever you want.”
He was what she wanted. The lust between them burned too bright for a slow courtship. She needed release. Pleasure.
Him.
Was it because he was a sensitive? Was he somehow magnifying the feelings of desire? It could be possible. Human psychics were rare. She’d only encountered a handful of others. Dr. Drake was by far the strongest she’d ever met.
Todd was strong, too, but his power was different.
Maybe because he didn’t even realize he had it. If he channeled his magic—
Well, she wasn’t exactly certain what would happen.
Her gaze dropped to the hands that still held her. She lifted a brow.
With a muttered curse, he released her.
Able to move more easily now, she pushed her glass back across the bar. Gave an almost imperceptible nod to Cameron. Despite his pissy mood, she’d managed to grill him about the detective earlier in the evening. Grudgingly, Cameron had admitted that the cop was known for being on the level. Not one to take a bribe or to “misplace” evidence. And, apparently, if the gossip around town was anything to go by, Todd had quite a reputation with the ladies. Not that she’d been particularly surprised by that news.
Cameron had also said the guy was a straight-up asshole, but Cam usually said that about human males.
Judging by Cam’s continued glare, she figured he was clinging tightly to his asshole theory.
“I’ve never really had much use for gentlemen,” Cara murmured, and the words were true. Of course, she hadn’t really met that many gentlemen.
“So what do you want?”
She leaned toward him. Put her hand on his chest so that she could feel the fast thump of his heart. “I want to get out of here. Go someplace dark and quiet. And I want you with me.” Under her. In her.
Now that she’d lowered the walls around herself just a bit, the lust was bursting though her body like water that had been contained behind a weak dam.
His jaw clenched. “You sure?”
“Very.” She smiled at him, stepped back. “But the choice is yours, Detective.” He was the one taking the bigger risk. He just didn’t know it yet.
She wouldn’t hurt him. She never hurt her lovers. Well, unless she meant to do so.
And she’d only meant to kill once.
A life for a life. Primitive justice, but it had been what her sister deserved.
She shook her head slightly, trying to push away the past. Now that she’d started thinking of Nina, that terrible night kept slipping into her mind.
This really wasn’t the time to think about death and darkness. With Todd, she only wanted to think of pleasure and life.
She held up her hand. Offering, waiting.
“There’s something different about you,” he said. “I know it.”
He was right, but he had no idea just how very different she could be. Perhaps she’d show him.
He reached for her hand.
The choice was made.
The whore had the cop under her spell. From the shadows, he watched as Cara and her detective left the bar…the human had his fucking hands all over her.
The fool didn’t know who— what—he was touching. And he sure as hell didn’t know what price he’d pay for his pleasure.
The others hadn’t known, either. They’d fallen so easily for Cara and her lying eyes. Fallen…then died.
A smile curved his lips even as his hands clenched into fists.
Cara should have learned by now—the humans weren’t for her.
Just how many would he have to kill before she learned her lesson?
Dr. Emily Drake stepped out of the elevator and into the dimly lit parking garage. It was late, well past midnight, but her vampire client hadn’t been able to make it into the office any sooner. And Marvin had insisted on seeing her. Seemed he’d almost taken blood from a human the previous night. The near miss had so rattled him that Marvin had been physically sick ever since.
Poor Marvin.
A classic bloodphobic vamp.
But the guy was making some incredible headway. At least he wasn’t afraid of the actual blood anymore.
No, now he could drink the blood just fine, provided he didn’t have to get it straight from a source.
As she walked, Emily clutched her keys tightly in her right hand. The garage was all but deserted, the fluorescent lights flickering above her. Her car waited up ahead, maybe fifteen feet away, and—
Someone else was in the garage.
The certainty came to her on an icy wave of knowledge as Emily’s psychic gift flared to life.Hell. Who was—
She spotted the Jeep then. Parked behind one of the large columns. Nearly hidden from prying eyes. The perfect place to wait for unsuspecting prey.
Her shoulders slumped in relief when the driver’s side door opened. Of course. She should have known he would be there. When she worked late, he usually showed up, even if he was working on a case.
“Colin.” He stepped toward her, and for a moment, the glow of the shifter caught her stare. All shifters carried that glow, and as far as she knew, she was the only person on earth able to actually see it. The glow was a soft shine, kind of like a second skin. It was the beast glowing.
He opened his arms to her, man and beast, and she went to him without a second’s hesitation. He pulled her tight against the hard length of his body. Held her close against his heart. Just the way she liked for him to hold her.
“I thought you were going to start walking down with one of the security guards,” he growled, lowering his face to the curve of her neck and biting lightly.
Same old argument. “I can take care of myself, you know.” She was far from helpless. The guy should’ve realized that by now.
His head lifted. His blue gaze met hers. “Just do it for me, okay? For my sanity, will you promise to only come in the garage this late if you’ve got a guard?”
Emily gave a grudging nod. She didn’t like having to wait on security, but she would— for Colin. Hell, she would’ve waited that night, but she’d been in such a hurry to get home and see…him. “If I get the guards to escort me, does that mean you’ll stop stalking the garage?”
He didn’t answer. Just kissed her. A hard, deep kiss that had her moaning and wishing they were far away from the cold garage and instead in a warm, comfortable bed.
Her fingers curled over his shoulders, and when he broke the kiss, she was the one who almost howled in frustration.
“I need you to come with me to the station,” he said, voice soft.
Her eyes widened. “Wh-what?” Not the sensual night plans she’d been hoping for.
His stare was solemn. “I think we may need you on another case, baby.”
At his words, and at the darkness she saw lurking in his gaze, her sexy excitement began to fade.
“The place is deserted now. McNeal asked me to bring you in, see if you could look at the files.”
Her fingers clenched around the strong muscles of his arms. “Just what do you think we’re dealing with here?”
His hands smoothed down her back. There was tension in his touch and in his face. In the faint lines around his eyes and the tightness around his mouth. “A being that can kill a man with a touch.” A hard exhalation of air. “Know anyone like that, doc?”
Yes, unfortunately, she did. The cold from the garage crept through her bones, settled in her heart.
Cara.
Todd followed Cara back to her place. She waited for him on the steps of her house, anticipation building in her and making her heart drum far too fast.
When he joined her, lust had hardened his face.
She kissed him. Because she needed to. Her tongue snaked into his mouth, teased his. Pleasured.
Oh, but the night ahead was going to be so good. Because she was finally going to be bad.
She broke the kiss, gazed up at him. “No regrets, Detective?” There was still time to call it off, if that was what he wanted.
“Not a damn one.” He grabbed the keys from her hand, managed to unlock the door, then all but dragged her inside.
She’d always loved a strong man.
His mouth was back on hers before the door slammed shut behind them. Tasting. Devouring.
Cara had known it would be like this between them from that very first moment. She’d sensed it from the first look, and she was tired of fighting a hunger that just grew every minute.
The Monster Doctor had been right when she told her, weeks ago, that some instincts shouldn’t, couldn’t, be suppressed.
It was time for more pleasure.
Her fingers found the front of his shirt. Jerked. Buttons popped off and flew and she growled into his kiss.
His head rose, a hard smile curving his lips. “So that’s the way you want to play?”
Then his hands were on her. Not her shirt. On the fabric of her skirt. He shoved the soft cotton up, and then his hand was on her thigh. Fingers stroking.
Her chin lifted and her breath panted out a bit faster. Higher. Just a few more inches, and he’d touch her just where she wanted him to—
His fingers trailed over the crotch of her black lace panties. He licked his lips. “You’re wet.”
Because she was so turned on that her body was about to explode. The sexual tension between them was so thick she could see it in the air and the powerful rush from that need was driving her wild.
So much wonderful energy.
His fingers curled around her underwear. Gripped. Yanked.
The fabric gave way with a soft rustle. Then his hand was on her sex. Parting her folds. Fingers sliding into the creamy warmth.
Her skirt was bunched at her waist. Her high heels pressed hard into the floor. Her breasts, aching, swollen, pushed against the cups of her bra.
And she was about thirty seconds away from her first release with the good detective.
The very good detective.
His thumb caressed the hard button of her need and he drove a finger, broad and long, into her core.
Her lips parted on a moan, but he caught the sound with his mouth, drinking it in and then thrusting his tongue deeply past her lips…
just as he thrust his finger into her body.
One finger.
Another.
The man had big hands—long fingers, strong.
So good.
A slow thrust. Withdrawal. The swipe of his thumb against her clit. A thrust, harder, knuckles deep—
The release hit her. A fast, hard pop of pleasure that didn’t satisfy. Oh, no, not even close. It just made her hungrier.
Her sex clenched around his fingers.
Oh, but this was going to be fun.
Cara brought her hands between them. Pushed against his chest.
His lips tore from hers. He gazed down at her, cheeks stained with color, lust on his face. Then he blinked, shook his head. “Cara, you look…different. So fucking beautiful, but—”
Shit.
The sensual energy was literally absorbing into her skin. The faint shine of the magic would be noticeable to him this close.
But not as noticeable if the lights were off.
She broke free of him, hating the loss of those clever fingers. Moving fast, she hit the lights and plunged the room into darkness.
He swore.
Stepping forward, she grabbed his hand. “Come with me.”
A rusty laugh slipped past his lips. “Right now, I think I’d follow you to hell.”
She stumbled at that. Had to choke back her instinctive protest. Finally managed to whisper, “The bedroom will be far enough for me.”