But more was at stake.
She would be winning tonight. And when she did, maybe she could score her freedom as well. If she could just get him to accept a wager. . . .
“Come to bed, Josephine. We’re both adults. We both know what’s about to happen. I haven’t even nicked my skin.” When he shrugged from his shirt, his torso flexed in a drool-worthy display, every sinew contracting. His shoulders were broad, his arms long and strong—
Her eyes widened at his right arm. A tattooed sleeve of intertwined runes covered his skin from his shoulder to his wrist.
Red hot, Rune. Red. Hot. His generous biceps bunched when he tossed the shirt away. As his dick hardened, his jeans forced his erection to grow toward the side; it stretched to his hip.
He knew the effect he was having on her, and his lips curved into that slanted half grin/half smirk, the diabolically sexy one that made her pant—the one that said, I’m about to do filthy things to every inch of you.
Just to stoke her need, he daubed the tip of his tongue to the corner of his mouth. That tiny movement made her thoughts seize on his mouth—which he’d no doubt intended.
What would he do with that tongue? Those lips? Would he give her a blood kiss?
His eyes darkened to the deepest magenta as he raked his gaze over her body, as if plotting all the places he was about to sample.
She was getting a taste of the smoldering sensuality of his fey half. Jo like. She found herself grinning back.
Before she got too caught up in things, she should pitch her wager. “You wanna make a bet?”
“About what, dove?” He started on the bulging fly of his jeans.
“You’re going to try to get answers from me. And I’m going to resist you. We should wager who’ll win.”
“I have thousands of years of experience with this. And no one has ever resisted me—even when I had one hand tied behind my back. Now? There’s no chance of it.”
“So you’ve been a sexual torturer for thousands of years?”
“Aside from an assassin, I am also a secrets master. Often I acquire them through my own brand of interrogation. Face it, female, your ass is mine.”
“If you’re so certain, promise you’ll let me go if you lose.” Then she could return to find Thad. To start her new job of watching over him.
“What will you give me when I win, other than all your secrets?”
To protect the one she loved, she would withstand this guy. If she failed, then would anything else really matter? “Whatever you want.”
The dark fey was obviously liking that prospect. The magenta of his irises began to bleed out over the whites of his eyes. “That’s a far-reaching offer. You have no idea what acts I’d commit upon your body. . . .”
* * *
His words should’ve intimidated Josephine; she leaned in closer with interest. “What’s to stop you from doing them now?”
“I’ve never forced a female in my life. I’ve never needed to. I wouldn’t start with you.”
She raised her chin. “Do you take the bet or not?”
“Oh, I’ll take it.”
“How can I be sure you won’t back out?”
“We’ll vow to the Lore, of course.” As every immortal in the realms did.
“Yeah, of course,” she hastily said.
Her flashes of ignorance about the most basic things puzzled him. Perhaps she aligned with the Forbearers, an army of male vampires created from mortals. They were a soldiering mass of cluelessness about the Lore. Though she wasn’t a turned human, she might’ve been raised among them.
She flicked a hand at him. “You go first.”
“Very well. I vow to the Lore to release you from my imprisonment should you withhold your secrets.” His defeat was a ridiculous notion, but he played along.
“Right. I vow to the Lore to let you do whatever you want to me if you get my secrets.”
Whatever I want. His cock pulsed with anticipation. What would he begin with? How could he decide? The starved man presented with a bounty . . .
“Oh, and one other thing.”
“Hmm?” His eyes leisurely devoured her.
“We can’t have sex.”
He snapped his gaze to hers. “Repeat yourself.”
“I can’t do it tonight.”
Not to be inside her? He was about to shut this down, but curiosity got the better of him. “Why not?”
“I’ll only have sex in an exclusive relationship. You’re as inclusive as a guy can be. And I don’t want you to knock me up.”
“A vampire female is only fertile if she’s been eating food for some time. Have you been?”
She glanced away. No denial? Hadn’t she invited him for coffee? She lived in the mortal world, could have been eating to blend with humans.