Then he looked back at Eve. Every man in the room was staring at her. He felt a sudden stabbing pain against his palm and looked down, realizing he’d just shattered the martini glass in his hand.
“Me singkorite!” With a gasp, a nearby waiter turned and scurried to grab a broom.#p#分页标题#e#
“Oriste.” Agata was suddenly standing next to him. She held out a small towel.
Talos took it. “Efkharisto.”
“You’re wasting your time with her,” she said quietly, nodding toward Eve. “You’re going to get hurt.”
“You’re wrong.” Talos wiped the blood off his hand with the towel. The cuts weren’t deep. “She can’t hurt me.”
But he knew he was lying. Eve had cut him to the bone long ago.
He watched her across the room, dancing with her eyes closed, her arms swaying over her head. His lust for Eve cut far deeper than any blade. Like every other man in the room, he wanted her so badly that every nerve in his body vibrated with her music. And after three months of constant longing, an increasingly frustrated desire had left him frayed like fabric, falling apart at the edges.
After being so close to her, courting her, of having her in his bed but not being able to touch her, he was going mad. Lust for her was killing him.
He’d been so certain that coming to the party tonight would cause Eve to regain her memory and return to the cruel, grasping seductress he remembered. And she had—but in a way he’d never expected.
She was taunting him.
Watching her move and sway, he swallowed his lust, his whole body in a hot sweat. As the song ended, Talos felt, rather than heard, the low deep growl of every man in the place wanting Eve. Felt the press of male footsteps and bodies leaning toward her.
As if coming out of a trance, Eve slowly opened her eyes.
Talos saw Jake Skinner reach for her as the dance ended. Reaching with his hands, with his hungry eyes, with his mouth—
Suddenly, Talos found himself across the room and in the middle of the dance floor.
He pushed his rival aside.
“Stay—away—from—my—wife!”
He drew back in shock. “Your wife?” Skinner gasped. He backed away, his face turning white. “You’re married?”
Eve just tilted her head quizzically. “As a matter of fact, we are.” She tossed Talos a look through narrowed eyes. “I didn’t know you cared.”
“I care,” he ground out. Tightening his jaw, Talos looked at his American rival. Every muscle was taut with the control it took not to attack the other man. “Stay away from my wife,” he said again in a low voice.
Skinner looked between them quickly. What he saw in Talos’s face must have convinced him, because he turned and ran, pushing his way past the party guests, nearly knocking over their hostess in his haste.
Talos felt the eyes of the whole room upon them. So much for telling Agata that he wouldn’t make a scene.
“Happy birthday,” he told Agata abruptly. “Thanks for the party.”
Lacing his fingers through Eve’s, he escorted her out of the building. Only when they were on the sidewalk and the cooling night air hit their skin, did he turn to her.
“You little fool,” he bit out. “What were you thinking with that little show?”
But she clearly wasn’t going to let him railroad her.
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” she retorted furiously, tossing her head. “Isn’t this who you want me to be?” She blinked back sudden tears. “And you think just because you don’t want me, you can pass me off to your friends—”
He pushed toward her, backing her into the darkness of the rough, rubbish-strewn alley.
“You think I don’t want you?” he said dangerously.
When her heels hit the stone wall, she stopped, lifting her chin. Her eyes shimmered in the moonlight as she matched him toe-to-toe, holding her ground.#p#分页标题#e#
“I think you’re a liar,” she said hoarsely. “You lured me into marrying you under false pretenses, and now you want to punish me for some reason. I don’t know why, but I was a fool to trust your words, your lying kisses. I can’t believe I ever let you touch me. I never will again—”
He cut her off with a kiss, pushing her back against the rough stone, holding her wrists like shackles against the wall. He spread her lips wide, thrusting his tongue inside her mouth, deepening the kiss until she sagged in his arms. Until she started to kiss him back.
The moment he felt her lips move against his, as she matched his fire with her own, a surge of reckless joy went through him that he could not control.