"But you," his words whispered out in a sigh. "This job. It's like a freaky head-over-heels dream."
"Flirting with-"
"-a gorgeous witch. It doesn't eat at me like enforcing does. Beating skulls and forcing up nightmares? I have to drink heavily following such tasks. But seduction and dancing and slow, gentle kisses? I haven't needed blood since meeting you."
"Good for you."
"Though I have craved it." His look crept down her face and to her neck. Dez could read his thoughts and they made her shiver.
"I can resist," he finally said. "If I wish. And I do. If it takes me forever to get that book, I'm all for it."
"I have a feeling Himself won't be keen with a leisurely approach."
"I fight the coercion as we speak. Half of me wants to stand here in the sunset, enjoying your presence, thinking of how many ways I can touch you to hear that sweet whimper you gave me last night while dancing in the rain. The other half wants to kiss you hard, seduce you relentlessly, weaken you until you fall to your knees before me pleading to take the book."
"Hmm, since I know the ultimate goal, I don't think seduction will have quite the result you desire."
"You never know what can happen, Dez. Himself said seduction was your weakness."
And Himself would know. Because he knew all.
"Why are you telling me all this?"
"So you will understand I'm not doing this because I want to. I have no choice."
But he was doing it. And even if he thought he was enjoying the seduction-and she in turn did, too-it could only ever lead them to one result.
She could fight Ivan off until the end of never. Yet Dez knew Himself would keep pushing his fixer back at her. Because this time it was different. For as many times as Himself had sent a lackluster fixer after the book before, this time she sensed it would be a fight to the finish.
"It's a lonely life," Ivan said.
And the chill of his loneliness shivered across Dez's shoulders. She could relate. And that softened her to his dilemma.
This was going to happen. The seduction. The fight for the book. The struggle inside herself against Ivan's attraction. She needed to be smart and control it from the get-go if she wanted leverage later on.
And so she would attempt to match his battle strategy.
"So kiss me," she said lightly. And she hoped this effort would not fall so flat as the night at the dance had.
"Really?"
She nodded and splayed out her arms in a sort of have-at-me gesture.
Ivan approached, ready to touch, but then paused. Even in the growing darkness she spied his provocative smile. "Can I kiss you where I've been dying to kiss you?"
Dez lifted a brow.
"Be daring," he said with a hoarse rasp that spoke of craving and needing something more desperately than air. "Take a chance, Dez."
A dare? Dez never refused a dare. Or rather, the nerve of him! To imply she wasn't up to a challenge put up her ire. And then, as quickly, it fell away, to be replaced with the resolute lightness she required to not become mired in the darkness.
A kiss in the place of his choosing? "I keep all my clothing on?" "For the kiss, certainly."
"Then have at me."
A curious smirk curved the vampire's lips. But why she considered him merely a vampire made Dez wonder. What did he call himself? A vamp-witch? A vitch? A wampire? Silly.
In the moments Dez had pondered the moniker, Ivan slipped around behind her. She wasn't sure what he was doing back there, but remained determined to stand firmly. Never let them see you falter.
The pebble-littered grass crunched. Had he fallen to his knees?
A stir of warmth coiled in Dez's belly, contradicting the shiver-raising goose bumps along her arms. The ocean air misted softly.
Waves schushed the beach with a rhythm older than time.
A tug at the waist of her skirt made her briefly stiffen. Dez sucked in a breath. She let go of the robe openings. The soft fabric swished across her hip, though he held it up to cover her derriere. A wide hand spread across her bottom, cupping it, holding her as he wished.
Delicate touches from Ivan's fingers traced along her exposed lower back and tugged the robe farther to one side-not too far, but enough for the breeze to whisper across her flesh.
The chill of warning was quickly replaced by a hush of warm air. Breath. He breathed upon her skin.
Dez closed her eyes. There, at the rise of her derriere, where her flesh dented in two concave curves, he kissed her.
His lips barely traced the needy heat of her skin. It felt as if he would not complete the kiss, that he would suddenly retreat and step away, but he did not.
Dez swallowed. Her fingers curled as she clasped her hands to her chest. One of her breasts was exposed. She sucked in her bottom lip.
The scorching slash of his tongue frenzied her nerve endings. And the touch traveled her body, racing up her spine and tickling over her shoulders. Her nipples hardened, pressed against her wrist. Her belly tightened. Her loins hummed, seeking, praying for the sensation to linger, to never stop.
The barest scrape of teeth shocked her to gasp in a breath. Dez bit in the edge of her lower lip.
Arms falling out at her sides, her fingers grasped, wanting to touch him, to rake through his thick, dark hair. To hold something. To anchor herself to him. But she could touch nothing, and so she opened her palms to the cool air. And even the breath of the breeze worked as if a lover's tongue upon her palms.
This was as close to undone as she could dream to be. But it wasn't quite there. Complete surrender must never come.
And when she stumbled, losing her balance, Ivan wrapped an arm across her stomach and stood up behind her, drawing her close. His fingers threaded through hers and he brought it around to clasp under her chest.
"Dimples of Venus," he whispered aside her ear. "There at the base of your spine and the rise of your gorgeous ass. I felt them last night when your soaked dress clung to you. Turned me on. Tasted like a dream. Haven't been able to think of anything else all day."
The tickle of a kiss beneath her earlobe caused Dez to tilt her head.
"Didn't even have to remove your clothing." She heard a teasing chuckle in his tone. "Just a little rearranging." She'd never heard those strange little indents at the base of her spine called that before. Sounded exquisite, like something that belonged to a goddess. And standing in Ivan's arms brought her close to such status.
I could fly, she thought. Right now. So free. Even wrapped in his arms, I feel as if I could lift off.
And she had never mastered flying in her magic. So the feeling was quite remarkable.
"Invite me inside?"
Initially she processed his plea as inviting him inside...her. But foolish thoughts scattered, and Dez realized he wanted to go inside her house.
"You no longer need an invitation to cross my threshold." She pulled away from the intense heat of him and walked toward the back porch.
"But the roses!"
"Not my problem," she called back. "If you can make it inside, I'll have tea waiting."
"Make it brandy, and I'll tear through those damned thorns for another kiss."
"Where next?" she wondered seductively. "Behind my knees? On the inside of my elbow?"
"Wherever you command me to touch you, I will."
Chapter 8.
D ez hesitated over the simmering teapot on the stove. Ivan had mentioned brandy. She didn't keep alcohol in the house. Liquor, save the occasional glass of wine, didn't appeal to her.
"Maybe some chamomile will settle him down. Counteract the coercion?"
Doubtful. There was nothing that would work against a direct order from Himself, Dez knew. And though it sounded cliched, resistance was futile.
"Poor guy." And then she caught herself. "What are you saying?"
Because the coercion was making him horny and call out promises to kiss her wherever she commanded. Behind the knees?
What woman was going to turn down that offer?
"A woman who knows better."
A clunk up above redirected Dez's attention. The clatter was followed by his groan. "Must have found the open attic window."
She'd been keeping it open to air out after eradicating a family of bats a few weeks ago. Bats kept the yard free of insects, but she didn't want them nesting in her house. They hadn't known what had hit them when she'd zapped them with a death spell. One never knew when a spell might require eye of bat. All her spells were simple ancient works that required stuff like that.
Turning the burner to low, she collected teacups from the cupboard and set one across the counter before a stool and one before her. The chinoiserie porcelain cups were the only personal touch in the kitchen. She didn't collect keepsakes or mementoes.
She'd given up on sentimentality centuries earlier.
As protector of the Grande Grimoire, she was required to keep the receptacle for the book open. No personal objects must clutter the atmosphere. Nothing must block the magic that constantly entered on a supernatural stream of energy. She no longer felt the cacophony of spells that had once bombarded her mentally and physically. The centuries had taught her to ignore it, and perhaps she'd even built up a magical hazmat suit of sorts to it all.
Footsteps crossed overhead.
It was funny, her allowing her natural enemy into her home without a fight. They'd done the fight, and while she knew she could again win, the effort didn't feel necessary tonight. This challenge had switched channels to something more intimate.
"Your house is cozy when it's not raining inside," Ivan commented, as he trundled down the stairs. "What's this color on all the walls, like a moss?"
"Yes, a pale sea green. I did the whole house in the whitewashed shade. It's very soothing. Also it doesn't block magic like some more vibrant colors have a tendency to do."
"No decorations. Not a single knickknack. Very simple. Unlike you."
Dez smiled. Most men wouldn't comment on decorations. Ivan was a surprising contradiction of gentle giant, vicious fixer, and charming seducer. And he was exceptionally right-on regarding his judgment of her.
"So what's this room?" He twisted to look over the still room just off the kitchen. The high glass ceiling filtered in cool moonlight.
"Eye of newt? Hair of dog? You're kidding me. You have a shelf full of cliches."
"These days modern witches would do to add a few cliches to their arsenal."
Ivan tapped a glass jar sitting on a shelf near the entrance. "What's this?"
"What does it look like?"
"I don't know. A frog heart?"
"Fairy heart."
"It's still beating."
"Yep. Had it for decades. S'pose I should use it before it expires."
"You're crazy," he said, and walked into the kitchen.
"Says the man who sips warm blood from the necks of mortals to survive."
"Touche."
"I see you found the attic window."
"Cleared most of the vines on the first leap." He tugged up a pant leg to reveal a slash through his thick leather biker boots. Dez could smell his blood. "Those things hurt like hell. What makes a woman plant them all around her house like that?"
"For the very reason they disturb you."
"You hate vampires that much?"
"On the contrary. I've nothing against the vampire race. I don't appreciate my property being trespassed on by a blood hunter who's looking to take out a witch. The war makes it difficult to be open to others."
"I have a sense you're not easily open to anyone, vampire or not." She shrugged. "Again, I have my reasons."
"We feel much the same about the war. I've never had a prejudice toward witches, but I'll be damned if I haven't had a few encounters with a wild-eyed witch looking to take down a vampire. You do have the upper hand, you know."
"Yes, we can take out a vampire with a splash of our blood. But you're resistant, so what do you care?"
"I do care," he said on a somber tone. "About my fellow vampire nation. And the witch nation. I wish there was a way to make it all stop. To bring peace to the two races."