Tilting her head back even more, so that she could hold his piercing gaze, she said, “Making a reference like that to us being…you know.”

  “What? Intimate?”

  “Yeah. It’s got me wondering if your new strategy is to simply make me dislike you, since I’m clearly not afraid of you. Is it that important to you for me to keep my distance?”

  His brows went so high they nearly reached his hair. “Let me get this straight. The idea of having sex with me is grounds for dislike?”

  Gritting her teeth, she said, “Despite some of the comments you’ve made tonight…or this morning…or whatever the hell time it is, we both know you’re just messing with me. I’m obviously not your type.”

  “Not my type?” He made a sharp sound of frustration, absently rubbing his left hand over his bandaged biceps. “You’re being serious, aren’t you? You really think you’re not the type of woman I like to fuck?”

  Her face went crimson. “I know I’m not.”

  “I don’t screw around with human women,” he muttered, his veins thickening beneath his dark skin as he squeezed his hand around the wound. “But it doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want to.”

  Her soft snort seemed to set his teeth on edge. “So it’s my ‘humanity’ that’s the issue? Is that really what you’re going with?”

  He cursed under his breath as he turned away from the bed, starting that relentless pacing again. As if they could sense the tension in the room, the wolves began another incessant round of howling, accompanied by the nerve-wracking scratch of their claws against the door.

  Following him with her eyes, Lainey ignored the monsters and focused instead on the vampire in the room with her. “I’m not going to think you’re a jerk for being honest,” she told him, knowing exactly what he would say. Something along the lines of You’re a great gal, Lainey, but I just don’t think of you that way – and how many times had she heard that spiel before? Lifting her chin, she tried not to sound upset as she added, “We both know you’re not actually attracted to me, Nick.”

  “Is that so?” His voice was rough but soft. “You have no idea how tempted I am to prove you wrong.”

  She started to launch into another argument, but found the words quickly drying up on her tongue when she caught the way he was looking at her. It was unlike anything she’d ever seen before – a scorching look of raw, visceral hunger – and she went breathless, her heart pounding with shocked excitement. “If… If that’s true, then tell me.”

  He shuddered, the muscles beneath his olive-toned skin bunching with tension as he clenched his hands. He looked like a trapped panther prowling the confines of its cage, but she still wasn’t afraid. Captivated, thankful, hopeful? Heck yeah. Those were all far better words for what she was suddenly feeling.

  Licking her bottom lip, she said, “Better yet, why don’t you just show me?”

  There was something deliciously provocative about the way he angled his head as he cut her a sharp look of warning. But it was a bit intimidating, too. Not to mention primal and animalistic, making it clear he was anything but human. And yet, she still wasn’t frightened.

  As if he read that in her eyes, he growled, “You’re playing a dangerous game, Lainey.”

  “Oddly enough, Nick, this is the safest I’ve felt all night.” Her voice was quiet but firm.

  “Damn it, woman!” He turned toward her with a fierce scowl, eyes burning like blue chips of flame from beneath his dark brows. “You should be terrified!”

  With a shrug, she said, “If you want to scare me, you’re going to have to do a better job than you have so far.”

  “You have no idea what you’re asking for,” he snarled, moving so fast he was nothing more than a blur. Before she could process what was happening, she was standing on the pillows and his hard, muscular form was pinning her against the wall behind the bed. Sweat beaded on his brow, his breaths warm against her lips, eyes glowing and bright, the irises now a pure molten gold without even a glimmer of blue. She could feel the hunter in him – that dark wildness that saw her as something more like food he could fuck than as a woman he could pleasure with his body. Could see the battle he was fighting to keep that brutal predator in check. Keep it from breaking loose and doing something she knew he would regret.

  He’d said he didn’t screw around with humans, and Lainey could suddenly see why.

  As if he saw that spark of understanding in her eyes, he flinched, something shadowed and pained moving through his savage gaze, and just like that, her flash of trepidation vanished, fleeing as swiftly as it’d arrived. She knew he’d seen it, though, and for a moment she was worried he would pull away from her. But then his big hands were wrapping around her smaller ones and lifting them over her head, trapping them against the wall, his massive erection pressing against her lower belly as he stared into her eyes. “When you’re bound like this,” he said, stroking his thumbs against the damp heat of her palms, “I could do anything to you, Lainey. Anything. And there’s nothing you could do to stop me.”

  “Like you said before – chains or no chains, Nick, you could take what you want from me anytime you wanted it.”

  “And that frightens you,” he whispered, the look in those inhuman eyes daring her to disagree. But despite everything, she still wasn’t afraid, truly believing that just because he could hurt her didn’t mean that he would.

  When she shook her head in response to his statement, he cursed something guttural in Spanish that sounded exceptionally dirty. In English, he simply demanded, “Why? I know you’re not stupid, so what the hell is your problem?”

  “I don’t know how to make you understand,” she whispered, wishing she could break out of his hold and touch him. She wanted to rub her hands all over that hard, breathtaking body. “I’m not sure I even understand it myself. Did you…have you used some kind of vampire trick to mesmerize me or something?”

  He gave a sharp snort. “We have enough advantages over humans without needing to be able to control your lust.”

  “Then I guess I just want you,” she said, giving him a tremulous smile.

  “Fuck!” His body shook as he pressed his forehead against hers and released his grip on her hands. But he didn’t stop touching her. Instead, he ran his hands down her arms, over her chest, a thick, guttural sound in the back of his throat when he reached her breasts. “You feel so fucking good,” he growled, rubbing her nipples through her shirt with his thumbs. She groaned in surrender, tilting her pelvis toward him, and his hands left her breasts in a flash, his breath hissing sharply through his teeth as if she’d hurt him.

  Before Lainey could ask him what was wrong, he slammed his hands against the wall on either side of her head, his breaths coming hard and fast and rough. In the next second, she heard an odd, high-pitched grating sound, a gasp of shock rushing past her lips when she looked from side to side and saw that he was scraping two vicious sets of talons down the metal surface of the wall. As she brought her startled gaze back to his face, she gasped again at the sight of the deadly fangs gleaming beneath his upper lip. They were long…sharp…lethal.

  If ever there was a time to be out of her head with terror, Lainey knew it was now – but the haunted look on his beautiful face nearly broke her heart. In that single instant, she could see and understand so much, as if she were slipping right inside him, strolling through his mind, sneaking peeks at his secrets. Sensing, with some unknown skill, what he required to ease the struggle and tension seething inside him.

  He started to pull away, but she caught his face in her hands and leaned forward, pressing a tender kiss to the corner of his mouth. He drew in a ragged breath as she kissed the other side, his chest working like a bellows. “Shh,” she whispered. “Just take a deep breath and trust me.”

  “I can’t,” he panted, jerking his head to the side. “Goddamn it! Breathing you in is the last thing I should be doing. You’re too—”

  He cut himself off with a low growl, and she wanted to stamp her foot with frustration. “I’m too what?”

  “Forget it,” he snapped, jerking away from her. “This isn’t happening, Lainey.”

  “Nick, it’s going to be okay,” she murmured, sinking to her haunches as she watched him step off the bed with pantherish skill. “Just come back.”

  She could see how badly he wanted to, but he jerked his head in a sharp, negative shake, refusing to look at her as he scrubbed his hands down his face. “Can’t.”

  “You can. I trust you. Now come back to me.” She didn’t understand why this was so important to her, but it was. It mattered in ways that meant a hell of a lot more than sex – though she had a feeling that any kind of sex with Nick Santos would be pretty damn meaningful. “Please.”

  “Christ, Lainey.” Dropping his hands, he turned his head toward her, his expression tight with lust and need and things that were too wildly primitive for her to even comprehend. “I might be the vampire, but you’re the dangerous one.”

  She shook her head, filled with confusion. “I doubt that. I mean, I’m practically a librarian.”

  He gave a throaty laugh as he rubbed a hand over his eyes, the dark, husky sound making her tremble and melt. “I never would have guessed that a smart-ass little bookworm could tie me up in so many knots.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment, so thanks.”

  With those simple words, she had him clenching his jaw all over again. “You shouldn’t be thanking me!” he roared. “You should be slapping my face and demanding that I get you out of here. You should be cursing me to the depths of hell and telling me to keep my bloody hands off you!”

  “But I happen to like your hands on me, Nick. And call me practical, but I’d rather be in here with you than out there with them any day of the week.”

  He glanced at the bite mark on his arm. “You might not think that come the next nightfall.”

  “Why?”

  Instead of answering, he grabbed the tray and started heading for the doorway she now knew led to a kitchen. “You must still be exhausted,” he said over his shoulder, his tone low and flat. “You should get some more sleep before you start feeling ill. Once the sun is up, the wolves will quiet down a bit, so the howling shouldn’t keep you awake.”

  “Nick, wait! I want to—”

  But he’d already touched a switch on the wall that muted the light and disappeared through the doorway, leaving her alone.

  Scooting down onto her side after turning the top pillow over, Lainey huddled beneath one of the light blankets and tried not to dwell on how frustrating Nick Santos – badass vampire with a serious attitude problem – could be. Or all the things he wouldn’t tell her. Prickly, irritating male!

  But most of all, Lainey tried not to think about how badly she wanted him.

  Chapter 4

  Dripping with sweat, Nick attacked the set of weights he kept in the back room of the bunker, so jacked up with adrenaline and tension, he probably could have opened the outer door and taken on the entire wolf pack on his own. But he wouldn’t risk putting Lainey in harm’s way. If his rage weren’t enough to cut them down, she’d be the one to pay the price. Which meant he’d just have to find some other way to work through this internal chaos that was being caused by the most severe, excruciating case of sexual craving he’d ever experienced.

  And for a woman he shouldn’t – couldn’t – touch.

  He was a hair’s breadth away from going back into the main room, ripping the clothes off her delectable body, and claiming her in ways that were raw and primal and possessive. He wanted to fuck her until she was boneless with ecstasy, and then fill her with his seed. Wanted his tongue on her clit, and lower, where he could thrust it inside her hot little pussy, over and over, as he devoured every juicy drop of her pleasure. Wanted to eat at the tender flesh between her thighs until she was coming so hard he could drink her down, drowning in her, while he drove his greedy cock into her beautiful, smart-ass mouth.

  And that was before he even got to the blood part. To his need to sink his fangs into her soft throat and feel her blood rushing, warm and slick and sweet, over his tongue.

  Nick had been dangerously fascinated by the human ever since he’d first laid eyes on her earlier that week – helplessly intrigued by her beauty as well as her courage – and now he was paying for it. Clearly the last damn thing he needed to be doing, after what had happened to him, was putting his hands on her. Hell, his natural hungers were violent enough – no telling where they could go with the wolf’s blood flowing through his veins, creating havoc in his system.

  And yet, the instant he heard the rustling of the bedding, his heart started to pound with anticipation. When a glance at the clock showed it was already nine, he figured she was probably awake. Making his way through the rear passageway that connected to the bathroom, he took another quick, deliberately cold shower.

  When he was done, Nick sent up a silent prayer that his brothers would hurry up and find their asses soon, not knowing how much longer he could keep it together, then headed into the kitchen to put on a fresh pot of coffee. A few minutes later, he’d doctored Lainey’s with cream and sugar, keeping his black, and carried the two mugs into the main room, hoping they could start fresh for the day. He didn’t want to spend what time he had left with her arguing. He just wanted to soak up as much of her as he could, from as safe a distance as possible.

  “I’ve got coffee,” he said, his heart giving a strange thump when he caught sight of her. She looked completely adorable sitting there on the bed with her back propped up against the mound of pillows, her hair a wild tangle of golden waves that tumbled around her flushed face. If not for the chains and manacles on her delicate wrists, she’d have reminded him of a drowsy, brown-eyed nymph.

  Then again, knowing what he did about nymphs, the chains were probably spot on.

  With a half-smile on those rosy lips, she eyed his bare chest, bit her lip as she did a fast visual sweep over the front of his jeans, then locked that heavy-lidded gaze on the steaming mugs of coffee. “Mmm. You’re an angel.”

  She must have caught the word he muttered under his breath, because she laughed and said, “Oops, sorry. I know how much you hate that. Would devil be better?”

  “Did you sleep okay?” he asked, ignoring her question as he used his elbow to flick the light switch to a brighter setting, then walked over and handed her one of the mugs.

  “Better than I thought I would. The howls woke me up a few times, but you were right about them quieting down.”

  “Most of them are probably asleep,” he told her, taking a sip of his coffee. “In fact, four of them are actually sleeping against the door.”

  Her brows lifted with surprise. “How do you know?”

  “For one thing, I can smell them through the air vents.”

  A strange look crossed her face. “Your sense of smell is that good?”

  He took another drink from his mug, and said, “Think bloodhound, but about a hundred times better.”

  “Whoa.”

  “I’m a vampire, Lainey. Not a human. I might look like you, but I’m not.” And the sooner she got that through her stubborn head, the better off they’d both be.

  “I know what you are, Nick. Trust me, the fangs were a dead giveaway. But that’s not the problem,” she murmured. “The problem is that I need a shower.”

  He couldn’t read her mind, but it was obvious from the look on her face that she was embarrassed. “There’s no need to worry,” he said with a wry smile, sitting in one of the chairs he’d left by the bed. “You smell incredible, Miss Maxwell.”

  “Hardly,” she scoffed.

  He cocked his head a bit to the side as he studied her. “But you can have a shower if you want one.”

  That brightened her right up. “Really? In private?”

  Shit. Just the thought of watching her soap up that sexy little body made his dick twitch. But he knew better than to tempt himself. “Yeah,” he croaked. “In private. You want one right now?”

  “God, yes. I’d love that. Thank you.”

  Standing up, Nick pulled a small key from one of his front pockets. He was careful not to touch her as he took her mug, setting it on the floor beside his own, then unlocked the shackles as she held her wrists out to him. As soon as she was released, she rubbed her wrists and scooted over to the side of the bed, then moved to her feet not far from where he stood, her body no doubt feeling stiff and achy from lying down for so long.

  “I’m afraid the water won’t be very hot,” he warned her, watching as she lifted a feminine hand to rub at the knotted muscles in her neck.

  “I don’t care. It’ll still feel great.” Looking down at her bloodstained clothes, she added, “But it sucks that I don’t have anything clean to change into.”

  “Wait here.” He headed through the doorway on the right and made his way back to the small room that he used for storage and workouts at the rear of the bunker, grabbing what he wanted. When he came back into the main room less than a minute later, he handed her a stack of clothing. “They’ll be too big for you, but you can use these.”

  She gave him a blinding smile that damn near knocked him on his ass. “Thanks, Nick.”

  “Come on, then,” he grunted, painfully aware that he needed to put some space between them before he did something monumentally stupid. Like pull her against his chest, bend her back over his arm, and kiss the ever-loving hell out of her.

  She followed him through the doorway on the left, through the small kitchen, then into the narrow surveillance room that connected to the bathroom. He’d been hoping she wouldn’t stop to study the wall of video screens that covered the right side of the room – but should have known she was too curious to pass them by. The instant she spotted the screens, she walked over to the desk that hugged the wall, keeping the clothes he’d given her clutched in her arms as she leaned forward and studied the one that revealed the wolves gathered just outside the door. The shadowy shapes of more wolves could be seen in the distance, a few glowing sets of eyes burning in the stygian darkness, while the others slept.