My body ignited, every cell on fire, and I kissed him back as if I couldn’t get close enough. I nipped at his lips and tangled my tongue with his, magic beginning to spill through the room as passion flared between us.

“Shirt off,” I said, and he pulled back, his eyes widening at my boldness.

I smiled secretively. I guess working on my bravado had been worth it.

Ethan stepped back and licked his lips. “I have waited a long time for you.”

My fingers, which shook with nerves and anticipation, tugged at the bottom of his gray T-shirt, and ever so slowly pulled it up to reveal an ever-larger band of perfect skin above his waist.

“I don’t want to rush you,” he quietly said, “but I have things planned yet before the sun rises.”

“Patience is a virtue,” I told him. I slid my hands up the flat plane of his stomach, raising the shirt one brick of muscle at a time. When I’d gone as far as I could go, he lifted his arms and pulled it over his head.

“I will only entertain teasing for so long,” he said, but closed his eyes and sighed, his muscles tensing beneath my hands as I traced a finger down the center of his stomach. I felt the sharp intake of breath and saw the pained pleasure on his face as I tugged the belt at his waist. Fingers nimbled by sword practice, I unfastened the buckle and pulled it through the loops, then dropped it to the floor.

His eyes flashed open—and flashed silver. “Merit,” he growled.

I glanced up at him through my bangs, slipped off my leather jacket, and pulled the elastic from my hair, letting it fall loose around my shoulders.

Ethan stepped forward, sliding his hands into my hair and pressing his mouth to mine.

After a long, hungry kiss, Ethan finally pulled back, chest heaving, lips parted. He stared at me, his pupils fully silver, and let his fangs descend.

My heart pounded, the human nervous with anticipation, the vampire eager for action.

“Merit,” he said, then dipped his head toward my neck, letting his fangs graze the skin above the blood pulsing in my arteries. “You know what it would be like,” he whispered, his breath hot at my neck, enticing me to another memory of the blood we’d shared together. “You know how it would feel. For you to take what I offer.”

I shuddered from the memory, from the wine-warm taste of his blood on my lips, a flavor that had bloomed with heat and life and magic. It had been like drinking fine wine infused with pure electricity.

And now he offered it again . . . to be twice bitten.

I opened my mouth to answer—still not sure what words would spill from my mouth—but he pulled back.

“First things first,” he said, then took my hand and led me toward the double doors to his bedroom.

I paused at the threshold, our arms stretched between us, hesitation suddenly overtaking me. He’d done this before with a woman who’d betrayed him, a woman assigned to provide him pleasure.

Was I just the second round?

Ethan glanced back, and I looked up at him, reluctance in my eyes. He smiled softly, then tugged me forward. When our bodies were aligned again, he lowered his lips to my ear. “More than I have ever wanted anything,” he repeated, then stepped back again, eyebrow raised. “And you are vastly overdressed.”

I almost played coy, but I was past the need. The desire in Ethan’s eyes made bashfulness unnecessary. I stepped inside the room and closed the doors behind us. Then I pulled the tank over my head and unzipped the suit trousers, letting them fall to the floor.

That left me in the middle of Ethan Sullivan’s apartments, wearing nothing but the length of my dark hair and a couple of scraps of black silk.

And then I slipped away the silk.

I could hardly have planned a better seduction.

He let out a haggard breath, silvered gaze dropping to my bared breasts. Ethan wet his bottom lip, then glanced up, staring at me beneath mile-long lashes and half-closed lids. It was a look of such hunger and desire that my own fangs descended.

With vampire speed, he stripped himself of jeans and boxer briefs. And then he stood naked before me, this man who’d seen the crumbling of empires and had a store of knowledge humans would never be able to match. The sight of this naked man—this vampire who had been my greatest enemy, my fiercest desire—pushed every rational thought from my head. The first seconds after I’d become a vampire, the world had shifted on its axis, becoming louder, brighter, more.

But the entirety of that new world was nothing compared to the view before me, his sizable erection demonstrating the ferocity of his desire, his hungry eyes on me. Every muscle was defined, from his long, lean legs, to the lines of muscle at his hips, to the cording in his arms.

Without waiting, like the predator he was, he stalked one foot at a time toward me. Instinctively, regardless of my own needs, I backed away from him, prey escaping from predator.

That only enticed him more.

I backed away until I hit the door . . . until there was nowhere else to run.

Golden hair falling around his face, he half smiled at me, victory in his expression. He caught my wrists in his hands, raised them above my head, and pressed them to the wood behind us.

“You are caught, Sentinel.” His voice was rough.

I looked up at him through my own half-hooded eyes. “I wasn’t trying to escape, Sullivan.”

Even in lust, we were challengers, our bodies the score-cards in our personal battle against each other.

He kissed me, lips playing at mine, heat and friction and bare skin between us. And then he moved forward another inch and pressed his body against me, one thigh between mine, his marked arousal between us.

He loosed my hands, and I wrapped my arms around him, curling my fingers into the skin at his back. His hands moved to my face, fingers at my jaw as he weakened me with kisses, with the teasing nips of his teeth, with his fangs and the possibilities they presented.

Without warning, Ethan dropped to his knees, his hands sliding as he moved, and then his long fingers were around my breasts. My eyes fell shut, my body arcing forward into his hands.

“Beautiful,” he whispered, and then his mouth at my stomach, pressing kisses to my navel, his hands at my breasts, his fingers busy building a fierce and furious need.

I groaned at the sensation—lovely and inciting and completely unsatisfying all at the same time. I took a haggard breath and felt as if my skin were on fire.

Ethan chuckled. “You seem to be enjoying yourself, Sentinel.”

Slowly, I opened my eyes. “No ‘Sentinel.’ No ‘Sullivan.’ Ethan and—”

I paused, not sure if I was willing to take that step, to offer up my first name, to give him that right.

He smiled softly. “And Merit,” he decided for me, that crisp tone gone. He sounded not like a Master among vampires, but a god among men. He pressed his cheek to my stomach.

“I am undone,” he said softly.

I melted, my heart stuttering its rhythm. My hands found his hair, and I stroked the golden silk locks until he pulled one hand away and pressed his lips to the palm of my hand.

And then he was on his feet again. “Bed,” he murmured harshly and, with a hand around my wrist, guided me toward it. When we reached it, he switched our positions and lowered me down. I watched, eyes wide, as he moved above me, crawling along the length of my body. And then the weight of his rangy form was on mine and his lips and teeth were at my mouth, and his kiss turned frantic, lips and tongues and teeth and hands pushing, pulling, biting, nipping, trying furiously to get closer.

He braced an elbow against the bed and used his other hand to torture me, fingertips slipping across my ribs, the teasing nearly bringing me off the mattress, and then across the flat of my stomach and the tops of my thighs.

And then his fingers reached the core of my body, and I arched upward, even the slightest touch like licking flames across my skin.

He chuckled earthily. “I’ve only just begun, Merit,” he warned, and then he began in earnest.

“There is no going back,” he said. “Not after this.”

But I’d already made the decision to go forward. I had no interest in going back.

“I want you,” I told him, leaning up to press a kiss to his jawline.

That was proof enough for him. He moved forward again, and when our bodies were aligned, he pressed forward . . . and pushed the air from my lungs.

I arched my back, my hand reaching out for the headboard behind me, savoring the fire in my belly, the warmth of his body, the scent of his cologne, stronger now that we were together.

In every possible way.

My lashes fell again.

One arm on the bed to support his weight, he cupped his other hand at my face.

“Merit,” he breathed across my lips. He’d said there was no going back, but he was asking me again without words: Was I sure? Was I ready? For the act, the deed, and everything else that would follow it? The changes that would result?

I answered in the same way he asked—with my body. I arched my hips upward, pressed my nails into his skin, pulling him tighter against me. “Ethan.”

He growled, then dropped his forehead to mine and began to move his hips, filling my body, bucking his own against mine. He moved perilously slowly at first, his lips at mine, the movement a taunt, a tease, a promise of what could be.

A promise of things to come.

“Ethan,” I said, nipping back at his lips.

“Yes, Merit?” There was amusement in his voice.

“I will only entertain teasing for so long.”

He chuckled throatily. “Someone told me once that patience is a virtue.”

I wrapped my legs around his waist. “Someone wasn’t in a hurry at the time.”

He moved forward with such force that I actually gasped, my eyes flashing open, as if my body were shocked by the primal feel of it. “Someone should learn not to rush,” he said, lips at my ear, then nipped at my neck.

“Ethan,” I said, my lids already fluttering. He took that as an order, and began to move fiercely, his lips peppering mine with kisses as he worked his hips against mine. My body burned from the inside, smoldered as he fanned the flames higher.

“I want your teeth on me,” he hoarsely whispered. “Now.”

The parts of my body that hadn’t already been on fire instantaneously ignited.

Hips still bucking, he lowered his head, putting his neck within fangs’ reach. I slid my hands into his hair and pressed a kiss to the skin above his jugular, feeling his pulse beneath my lips.

My fangs elongated again.

“Now,” he said, and without a second thought, I leaned up, and I bit. I tasted fire and wine and Ethan, his life’s essence, his life’s force. The drink of all drinks. The hunger of all vampires.

His blood.

My throat moved in time with his ferocious thrusting. Above me, he groaned, the sound thick and guttural, as if he was giving voice to ecstasy.

Goose bumps lifted on my arms, magic seeping into the air as we took our pleasure.

And then his body arched, and he put a hand at my jaw so he could look into my eyes. So he could watch the expression on my face. “Merit,” he said.

The look in his eyes—possessive and primal—pushed me over. I sucked in a breath and called his name, fire spilling across my body, my eyes closing with the force of it, every muscle tensing, contracting, and, as the flame and power arced between us . . . releasing.

Seconds or minutes or hours later, I clutched at his back, his lips at my ear, his breath in gasps, even as tremors shook my body, my breathing ragged.

After a moment, Ethan pushed himself onto his elbows, kissed me roughly, and pressed his lips to my forehead. Then he dropped back to the bed, positioned himself on his side, and pulled my body against his. I nestled in front of him, his arm beneath my head, the warmth of his body cocooning mine once again.

“What’s your favorite thing?” he whispered, his lips at my ear.

“My favorite thing?” I traced a fingertip across his long fingers, across the veins in his hands.

“Tell me something you haven’t told another vampire.” The question was as sad as it was sweet. He wanted to know something dear to me . . . as long as it was a secret I’d held dear from others. Something I hadn’t yet brought across to the supernatural world into which he’d brought me.

“You know I’m a Cubs fan?”

“Yes, although why remains a mystery.”

I glanced back at him. “You’re not a White Sox fan, are you?”

“Of course not,” he huffed out. “I hardly follow baseball.”

“But if you did?”

There was silence for a moment. “If I had to, I’d root for the Yankees.”

I let out a groan. “I can’t believe I just did what I did with a Yankees fan. You really should have given me a little warning. Included a disclaimer. Something.”

“It’s just baseball.”

“Spoken like a Yankees fan. Anyway, you asked me what my favorite thing was. So, one year, I made this pledge to get a baseball signed by every Cub. I was going to donate it to this charity thing my mom was involved in. I was ten, and I spent a lot of time that summer at Wrigley, at practice, trying to get the guys to sign it. It took me four full months to get all the guys to sign it—there was a holdout.”

“For a Merit? Say it isn’t so.”

“I know, right? Joe Mitchell was pitching back then, and he kept holding out on me. He knew what I was trying to do, but he also knew who I was. I managed to corner him once, but he wouldn’t sign it until I got every other player’s signature on my own. It was a test, I think. A character-building exercise—let’s see if this Merit kid can do something on her own, not rely on her father.”

“So did he sign?”

“He did. Gave me a ‘Good job, kid,’ and everything, just like in the commercial. But by that time, it was nearly September, and I’d been following these guys around for months. I’d done what I set out to do, but that ball was hard to part with.”

“You didn’t keep it, did you?”

“Oh, no. I gave it up, but it killed me. That baseball was like a touchstone. Not because it was collectible—although they did have a great season that year—”

“Go Cubbies.”

I grinned. “That’s my boy. It was more like the baseball was a scrapbook—an album of how I’d spent the summer. A reminder of the games, the players, the heat, the hot dogs, the entire experience.” I was silent for a moment. “I wish I still had it. To remember the summer days, the sunlight. The heat.”

“It helps to have those touchstones,” he said. “Tangible memories of the people and places and things you wish to remember when they’re gone.”

“Is that why you have so many collectibles?”

“Well, part of the reason is merely the passage of time. I’ve lived the lifetimes of many men. I’ve seen things, and I’ve brought forward my own touchstones, as you said. But, yes, you’re right. Those things remind us who we were. Being immortal doesn’t make that any less important.”

“That makes sense,” I said, but it took time for me to answer him, to force the words from my lips. The sun had risen, and it was pushing me asleep.

“Sleep,” Ethan said, and as if he’d issued a command I couldn’t disobey, I did.

He pressed a kiss to my shoulder. “I need you.”

My body slow and sluggish as if moving through water, I turned my head and squinted at the clock on his nightstand. “It’s two o’clock in the afternoon,” I grumbled, and curled away from him, hitching up my knees and curving my hands into my chest. “Go back to sleep. You can have me at dusk.”

There was a rumbly laugh behind me before his fingers splayed and dipped between my thighs. He kissed my neck, then flicked his tongue against the tip of my ear. “Please, Merit?”

My eyes still closed, I smiled a grin of feminine pleasure. I’m pretty sure that was the first time Ethan had ever said please to me. How was I supposed to say no to that?

But then his voice turned more urgent. “Now,” he growled, his erection against my back.

In answer, I slid my hand behind me and around to the small of his back, pressing his body closer.

“If we keep this up,” I said quietly, “we’re going to kill each other.”

He shifted to raise his body over mine, silver eyes staring down at me. “We’re immortal. That would be quite a battle.”

I pushed a lock of hair from his eyes. “An historic battle.”

“A battle for the ages. You could write about it.”

I credited the hour, the fact that the sun was high above us, but that seemed the funniest thing I’d ever heard. I chuckled and soothed my hands down the sculpted muscle of his back. “Far be it from me to turn down a research project.”

Now what?

I yawned and stretched, still buried in piles of cool cotton blankets, then opened my eyes. Ethan stood beside his bureau, already showered and dressed in unbuttoned black trousers. He had just begun to button the button-down shirt that lay open across his torso. He glanced back, smiled politely, and finished fastening his shirt. “Good evening.”

“Good evening?” I didn’t mean to make it a question, not intentionally, but even I could hear the uptick at the end of the sentence.

Ethan chuckled, then moved to the bed, leaned over me, and pressed a kiss to my forehead. He must have seen the surprise in my eyes. “I told you I wasn’t your father.”

“I clearly wasn’t giving you enough credit.”

“I’m sure that’s not the first time.” He sat down on the edge of the bed, pulled on socks, then slipped into chunky black designer shoes.

I sat up, pulling the comforter around me. “Nor will it probably be the last.”

Ethan snorted and, when he was shoed, went back to the bureau and slid trinkets and change into his pockets. “It’s eight thirty. We’ll need to leave for the Breck estate shortly, so if you’d like to pretty up before we leave, now would be a good time to do it.”

I glanced down at the comforter. “Probably the blanket would be a little too casual.”

“Probably,” he agreed.

“It goes against everything I believe in to ask you this question, but what would you have me wear?”

He perched one elbow on the bureau, then linked his fingers together. “They want us to see them in their natural habitat, so to speak. I assume they’d ask the same of us.”

“Armani for you?”

He gestured at his suit pants and button-up. “And jeans, I assume, for you?”

“But of course. Opportunities to wear denim to the office don’t come along very often in Cadogan House.”

Ethan chuckled, then pushed off the bureau and pulled a black suit coat from a valet stand. “I hear the Master can be such a pain in the ass.”

He definitely had his moments.