The Dhampir

Chapter One

The vampire’s bodyguard was sloppy when he searched Genevieve Drake. He missed at least three places where she could have stashed weapons. Would have stashed weapons, if she hadn’t been going to an interview for a job she desperately needed. To add insult to injury, he smirked up at her when he crouched at her feet to pat her down, hands lingering on her thighs and calves.

Genevieve gave serious thought to kneeing him in the jaw.

Finally, after a last knowing leer, the guard ushered her into Hunter’s sprawling office, then closed the heavy double doors and left them alone.

“Ms. Drake.” Tall, radiating a power that made her Dhampir senses vibrate like harp strings, the vampire stepped around his big rosewood desk to shake Genevieve’s hand, his grip careful and warm. His touch sent a flush of magic radiating up her arm. Her mouth went dry, and she felt her nipples peak. “It’s a pleasure.”

Her body’s intense response surprised her. She’d felt dead from the neck down for months. “Please call me Genevieve, Mr. Hunter.” Not Genny. Never Genny. Smiling up at him, she used all her years undercover to keep her expression no more than pleasantly professional.

“It’s just Hunter,” the vampire said in a black velvet purr of a voice. He gave her a slow, white smile, his eyes the sharp and startling blue of an arctic wolf. His features were starkly masculine, with a long swoop of a nose and a broad, square chin. His hair was thick and black, just long enough to touch his collar.

He gestured her away from his desk toward two armchairs that sat facing each other. Just beyond the chairs, a plate glass window ran the length of the room. Sixty stories below, the glittering glory of Atlanta spread across the night.

As Hunter ushered her to the chairs, Genevieve studied him. If anything, the vampire was more impressive than she remembered. Easily six-foot-two, he had a powerful build that made him look like a warrior even camouflaged in black Armani. His tie was a splash of crimson against his white shirt, while cufflinks of onyx and gold adorned his French cuffs.

“It’s good to see you again,” Hunter said as they sat. The chairs were positioned so close, their knees almost touched. It was not exactly the arrangement she’d have expected for a job interview -- but then, this was not a typical job interview. “You were what -- fifteen? -- when last I saw you.”

“Sixteen,” Genevieve corrected. And madly infatuated with you. But that was something she had no intention of sharing. And anyway, it had been fourteen years ago.

Before Gary. Before she’d been left bleeding in a dirty alley with the last of her illusions in shreds.

Hunter probably knew about her painfully intense crush. Probably knew about Gary, too, for that matter. As her father always said, you can’t hide anything from a vampire, so don’t even try. “It was good of you to grant me this interview.”

“Not at all. I need an assistant, and you have excellent qualifications.” He watched her settle back into the chair’s soft wine red leather. His gaze sharpened. “Something concerns you.”

Genevieve hesitated, caught between her desire not to offend and her sense of duty. She needed the job, but her family had been Dhampir for sixteen generations.

Duty won. “Your bodyguard was more interested in feeling me up than in making sure I wasn’t armed. I could have knocked him cold at least twice. In my opinion, he constitutes a security risk.”

Hunter lifted a cool black brow. “He’s a former Navy SEAL.”

“And a current idiot.”

“You are blunt, bordering on rude.” Hunter smiled, satisfaction in his eyes. “And every bit as fearless as I would have expected of Tommy Drake’s daughter.”

She relaxed back into her chair. “Well, that’s a relief.”

“That I took the criticism well?” His arctic eyes heated to burning blue as he watched her cross her legs. Her knee inadvertently brushed his, and the contact sent magic flaring up her thigh. Straight into her sex.

She tried to ignore the pulse of erotic heat that flared low in her belly. “No, I’m relieved you ordered your man to play the fool to test my honesty. I’d hate to think you’d hire someone that sloppy.”

The vampire laughed, a deep, masculine rumble, seductive and warm. “No, I have not survived three hundred and forty years by surrounding myself with sloppy bodyguards. And there’ve been times even careful ones…” Hunter stopped and rolled his powerful shoulders as if shrugging off a painful memory.

“Sometimes it doesn’t matter how careful or well-trained you are.” Genevieve’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Especially if you’re betrayed.”

He studied her, going still as a predator. Seeing too much. “The scars from betrayal go to the soul. And they never quite fade, do they?”

“Not so far.” Genevieve forced a smile and deliberately sought to turn the conversation back to business. “What are you looking for in a personal assistant?”

You, Hunter thought, though he shrugged and hid his feral interest behind a polite mask. “The usual. Someone to deal with my business correspondence and those daytime errands a vampire cannot easily handle.” He dipped his lids to conceal the hunger he knew leaped in his eyes. He’d been making do with human lovers for more than a decade now, and his control was not what good manners demanded. “And then there are the traditional services of a Dhampir.”

She nodded. “My father taught me a great deal about handling personal security for a vampire. He’s served my mother for one hundred and twenty years.”

“Lady Loriel is envied his service, but I’m not looking for another bodyguard. I have ample security.” Hunter leaned forward and reached to take one of the hands she’d folded in her lap. Her hands were not as smooth as he’d expected, the tapered fingers rough with a warrior’s calluses. He found that pleased him almost as much as the clear green of her level gaze. “I need something more from you.”

Genevieve lifted a copper brow. “I would expect nothing else.” She traced a circle in his palm with the tip of one nail.

And then she drew her hand away. He let her go, managing to subdue a hungry growl. How could a woman look so cool while radiating such erotic promise? Her features were delicate in her heart-shaped face, though her lips were full, tempting, slicked with bronze gloss. A courtesan’s mouth. He imagined all the things that mouth could do to him, and hardened even more behind his fly.

Her hair seemed to burn, a blaze of copper fire coiled on the back of her head in a smooth, businesslike style that begged to be mussed. With such coloring, she should have had freckles, but her skin was as pale and perfect as fresh cream.

She was no more than average height for a woman, which made her almost a foot shorter than him. Her body looked as sweet as a ripe peach, delightfully full of breast and hip, and Hunter was glad she wasn’t one to starve herself to the boniness favored by modern fashion. He had no desire for a stick in his bed.

She wore a green wool blazer over a white silk blouse that revealed a tiny arrow of creamy cleavage. Her black skirt was just short enough to show the lace at the top of her black silk stockings. Emerald stiletto heels made her long legs look even longer.

Yet there was also strength in those smooth thighs and muscular calves. She was definitely more than the feminine bonbon she appeared.

Far more.

According to the dossier his chief of security had compiled, Genevieve had spent nine years with the Ayers City Police Department in North Carolina, the last five as a narcotics officer with a string of impressive arrests. Four months ago, she’d killed a man who’d tried to murder her to prevent her testimony at the trial of a gang of corrupt fellow narcs. She’d testified anyway and sent the crooked cops to jail.

No, not a bonbon. A strong woman, yes, an intelligent and sensual woman. One he meant to have.

And it was time to claim her.

“If we were human,” Hunter said, “I would ask you all the standard questions about why you want to enter my service.” His eyes flared with hungry determination. “But we are not human, and there is a surer way to see if you and I will suit.”

Genevieve swallowed in sudden dry nervousness. Stupid. She’d known what he’d expect. She just hadn’t known how much she’d dread the revelation of her secrets. “A psychic Union.”

He nodded, rising to his feet. “But it will require some preparation. Come.”

She looked at the square, masculine hand he extended to her. Putting her palm in his, Genevieve let him tug her to her feet. Again, his magic rolled through her, and her body responded with shivering waves of heat and need, so intense she had to bite back a moan. Her Dhampir body craved his with a strength she’d never felt before.

And it scared the hell out of her. She didn’t want to be this vulnerable.

Hunter threaded her hand through the crook of his arm and escorted her across the carpeted floor to a door in the wall behind his desk. She wondered if he could hear her heart thumping like a rabbit’s. Probably.

This is stupid. Vampires always form psychic unions with their Dhampir lovers. Her mother had told her once that the mental link made passion even sweeter. Yet a knot of tension gathered in her belly as they stepped into the suite of rooms that lay beyond his office.

Hunter guided her through a library paneled with dark wood wainscoting. Persian carpets dotted the gleaming parquet floor. The air smelled of rich, hand tooled leather and well thumbed pages.

Beyond that was a bedroom with a massive walnut four-poster swathed in a hunter-green spread, warm and inviting. A mound of bright pillows lay piled in the bed’s center -- gold, green, deep blue. One wall was dominated by another long window, while opposite it, a fire crackled in a fieldstone fireplace. Rugs covered the polished wood floor, thick enough to feel decadent underfoot.

Genevieve expected that bed to be their destination, but Hunter kept going, through an arched door carved with intricate runes. Beyond lay a small room with curving plaster walls and no windows at all. Great walnut beams supported the ceiling, and the floor was an elegant mosaic. Tiny stones of turquoise and blue formed a pentagram within a silver circle. White candles burned at each of the star’s points, and a pallet lay at its center.

Hunter stopped her before she could step into the pentagram. “Allow me to prepare you,” he murmured, and reached for the buttons of her blazer.

Her heart shot into her throat, but Genevieve forced herself to stand still as he began to slip each gold button from its buttonhole. Hunger darkened the blue of his eyes to cobalt as his warm knuckles brushed her skin through the white silk of her blouse. His hooded gaze locked on her throat, where she could feel her pulse leaping. She was no longer sure whether it was with nerves or arousal.

Perhaps both.

His movements precise, deliberate, he slipped the blazer off her shoulders, folded it, and turned to place it in a wicker basket that stood just inside the silver circle. Her blouse was next, pearl buttons yielding to clever fingers that felt warm against her skin.

Finally she stood before him clad only in her skirt and bits of silk and lace.

Locating the front clasp of her bra, Hunter opened it and brushed the straps off her shoulders. Genevieve looked down, following his intent gaze. Her nipples had drawn as tight and red as rosebuds. She breathed in, working to center herself, to concentrate on her growing arousal and leave her humiliating nerves behind. The air smelled of beeswax and sandalwood incense. Soothing. Genevieve’s tense muscles began to relax, yielding to the spell he’d worked, not with magic, but with color, scent, sound, touch.

Distilled sensuality.

He folded the bra and bent to place it in the basket. Pivoting on his heels, he opened the top button of her skirt, placed high on one hip. Her zipper sighed.

There was no sound except for the faint crackle of the bedroom fireplace. Her skirt slid down her thighs, the fine wool rasping over the silk of her nylons. Hunter sank to his knees, his breath coming fast as he stared at her tiny thong. She could sense his need to simply snap the thin lace. Instead he drew the thong down her legs, slowly, patiently. She stepped out of it and watched him put it away in the basket.

Next he slipped the emerald heels off her feet, put them away, and began to roll her stockings down her thighs. Each sliding brush of his knuckles on her thighs, calves, ankles, wound her anticipation like a clock. Genevieve shivered, her mouth dry, her sex wet, swollen. Ready and wanting.

When she was naked, he rose and looked down at her with hot wolf eyes. For a very long time he said nothing at all, his gaze drifting along each curve, each swell and shadow. She’d never been so skillfully aroused.

Finally Hunter spoke, his voice a dark, demanding growl. “Undress me.”

As if hypnotized, Genevieve reached for the buttons of his black jacket and began to slip them through their buttonholes, one by one. He spread his long, powerful arms, and she tugged the jacket off his brawny shoulders, folded it neatly and added it to the stack of her own things in the basket.

Next came the shirt, warm from his skin, each button smooth and cool under her fingers.

His chest was hard as a marble god’s. His broad shoulders were powerful, torso sculpted into ridges of muscle and bone. Body hair decorated his strong chest in a dark ruff that narrowed into a thin trail down his tight belly. He smelled of sandalwood and spearmint, and some dark spice that she recognized as vampire.

His cock bulked against his fly, a jutting, impatient ridge, as his zipper whispered under her fingers. She knelt to pull off his pants, moving with the deliberate grace of a geisha performing a tea ceremony.

His legs were long, powerful -- horseman’s thighs, dusted in coarse, dark hair. And his shaft was just as beautiful as she’d known it would be. It tumbled into her hands when she freed it of the cotton of his boxers, a length of rosy flesh, hard as a lead pipe, with veins snaking to its dark, blushing mushroom head. A single tear of arousal beaded it, glistening in the candlelight. Unable to resist, she leaned forward and licked it away. He jolted against her with a low, famished growl.

Salty. Male. Irresistible. She opened her mouth wider and took him in, suckling him with gentle greed.

“Stop.” Hunter arched away, pulling from her lips with a pop. His eyes burned blue and hot as an arc welder’s torch. “If you keep that up, I will come. And I have other plans tonight.”

The Union. Fighting the unease that stirred at the thought, Genevieve smiled up at him. “If you insist.”

He kicked off his shoes and allowed her to finish removing his pants, boxers, socks. Her hands were shaking with hunger as she put the last of his clothing away. When she turned back to him, there was a silver goblet in his hands. He must have conjured it. “Drink.” His voice was very deep, a rumbling command.

Genevieve stood and accepted the cup. The engraved metal felt cool in her fingers. The first sip bubbled in her mouth, frothy as champagne on her tongue. It was sweet, flavored with honey and tart apples, cinnamon and nutmeg, but it burned like a shot of straight whiskey as she swallowed. A moment later, her skin went hot in a rolling wave.

Genevieve shivered, recognizing the race of magic through her veins, drawing lines of fire under her flesh. She handed the goblet back to Hunter, and he turned the cup so that he could drink from the spot her lips had touched. He drained the potion down in one slug. Light flared, and the cup became a dagger in his hand.

He began to chant, power words rolling from his lips as he raised his left hand and spread his fingers. Slowly, deliberately, he drew the knife across his palm. Blood welled from the wound; the blade must be as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel.

When he looked up at her, she presented her left hand. He used the dagger in a quick, stinging pass. Genevieve did not flinch. He covered her bleeding palm with his. She gasped as the flare of magic intensified with the mingling of their blood, jittering like an electrical charge, dancing on the edge of pain.

The knife became a silver bowl, and he positioned it under their joined hands. Blood mingled, flowing as a stream before slowing to trickling drops. When she glanced inside it, she discovered the bowl was full to the brim, though far less blood than that had fallen. More magic. Hunter must be powerful indeed.

When she looked up at him, he nodded toward the pallet without breaking off his chant. Genevieve moved inside the pentagram and knelt, folding her hands together. Her Dhampir body had already healed the cut on her palm. White silk yielded beneath her knees. Rose petals were scattered around her, covering the fabric like drops of blood.

Hunter knelt inside the wide silver circle, using his forefinger to draw runes with their mingled blood on the metal ring. Genevieve watched him, listening to the fall and rise of his chanting voice. Breathing in sandalwood and smoke, she felt her senses grow even more acute. She found herself swaying in time to his chant, eyes caught on his powerful bare back, the curve of his ass as he bent.

Gods, he’s beautiful. Not just his body, which was impressive enough, but the way he moved, rising with a thrust of his thighs, then crouching with muscular grace to draw each rune, moving in time to his chanting. Arousal pulsed low in her belly, tightening her nipples, swelling the lips of her sex.

She hadn’t been with a man in months. Hadn’t even wanted to be. Her seared heart had shrunk from the idea of sex, unable to tolerate any contact at all. Now her soul seemed to stretch toward Hunter like a plant seeking sunlight.

He finished the chant and turned. Genevieve inhaled sharply as the spell swirled up around them, sparks floating upward like a snowfall in reverse.

Hunter’s gaze met hers, and seemed to catch fire, burning blue as the heat of a jet.

Chapter Two

Genevieve’s aching nipples stung as Hunter looked down at her, his expression savage with hunger. He dropped to his knees so they knelt face to face. His hands caught her shoulders, pulling her up into a blazing kiss, his tongue tracing her lower lip until she opened for him. He entered, licking, nibbling. Her head spun with sheer, wanton pleasure. At the same time, his hands slid down her body, found her breasts, thumbed her nipples. The rasp of his callused fingers over her sensitive flesh only heightened her delight. She wound her arms around his shoulders and let her head tip back in erotic surrender.

Hunter dragged her close and bent her backward, supporting her with an arm around her waist as he kissed his way down the curve of her throat. He hesitated over her banging pulse, his breath warm. For a moment, the tips of his fangs pressed her skin. She could almost feel his need to bite.

With a low growl, he dragged himself away, began to kiss a burning trail down to her breasts. She gasped as he licked the eager pink tips, first one, then the other. Cupping her left breast, he stroked it as he suckled. His fingers pinched, squeezed, and again she felt the tips of his fangs, this time bracketing her nipple. She gasped.

His hand left her breast, feathered down her torso, tracing the rise and fall of ribs as his mouth suckled in delicious tugs. His teeth raked the sensitive tip, almost hard enough to hurt. She dug the nails of her left hand into his back as the right sought his head, threaded through the rough silk of his hair, fisted to keep him exactly where he was, doing exactly what he was doing.

Hunter’s fingers found the rise of her mons, traced through the soft copper curls, the swollen lips. His forefinger slipped between, and she moaned at the sensation, at how very wet she was. He growled like a tiger, the sound not entirely human.

Genevieve thought about how his cock would feel, sliding inside her slick heat, and whimpered.

Hunter growled back and lowered her to the pallet. She strongly suspected he’d laid her down because he wanted his hands free. And she was right, because he put them both to use, squeezing, stroking, pinching, even as his mouth left her nipple to lick a wet, hot path down her panting torso.

Pulling away, he caught her knees, spread her wide, and moved between them. The blue of his eyes had gone almost white, glowing with magic. He smiled at her, upper lip curling just enough to show his fangs. His cock jutted, hard, thick, the heart-shaped head fat and rosy, furry balls drawn tight with arousal.

Hunter slid backward on the floor and lowered himself full length between her thighs. Pausing, he looked down at her sex. She followed his gaze to the bright copper of her maiden hair. “You look delicious,” he purred, sounding more tiger than man. Settling down, he bent his legs to avoid breaking the spell circle. “Let’s see if you taste as sweet as you look.”

The first lick made Genevieve jolt at pleasure as sharp as a sting. His hands slid up her torso to find her breasts as he began to lap her like a cat with cream, his eyes rolled up to watch her face, burning white.

Pleasure stormed her, a voluptuous assault on her senses, making her writhe, making her gasp, making her beg. “Please, God, Hunter, God, please, ohhhhh…” She had no idea what she asked for, and it didn’t matter anyway, because he ignored her and kept right on licking, tonguing between her folds, circling her clit, flicking it. Even as he savored her sex, his hands were busy on her breasts, tormenting her to a feverish pitch of need.

She had never felt so lost in raw eroticism, not with any lover she’d ever known. Certainly not with Gary. Hunter knew just how to use his mouth and hands to drive her mad.

Sudden unease blew through her pleasure like a cold draft in a warm room. She could lose herself in him… And she was still paying the price of the last time she’d surrendered to a man.

Genevieve tasted like distilled sex, a shot of fire straight to the groin. The scent of her intoxicated him. She was Dhampir, mate to Hunter’s vampire, no more human than he. And no human woman could give him what she could.

He had waited too long. He intended to wait no longer.

Watching her face, her lovely, lost eyes, Hunter sat up on his heels and took his aching cock in hand. Touched the head to her delightfully wet opening, and began to push his way inside. Her grip was so tight, he had to work at it, leaning forward, breath caught, as he entered by delicious inches.

Her eyes stared up at him, very wide, their clear green gone dark in the candlelit dimness, her full lips parted on an inhale. “Gods, Hunter…”

He leaned forward and braced himself on his forearms as he kept going, sliding deeper, deeper. And deeper yet into slick heat, until finally he was all the way in, and her lips were just inches away. Hunter desperately wanted to start thrusting, but that soft mouth beckoned, and he needed even more desperately to kiss her.

So he did.

Her silken lips yielded under his, and she breathed a moan into his mouth. Her legs slipped around his ass, calves impossibly smooth, and her nails found his back like sharp little cat’s claws. Her soft breasts rose and fell against his chest in panting breaths, warm, erect nipples brushing his skin as her pussy wrapped him in slick, swollen delight.

Unable to wait any longer, Hunter began to thrust, teeth clenched as he fought for control. He did not want this to end too soon. Fourteen years was a long damned time to wait, and he had every intention of spinning out the pleasure as long as he could.

So he entered and pulled out and entered again, slow as the tides, ignoring the gnawing bite of lust. Her need must have been as intense as his, because her nails tightened on his back, and her knees hugged his hips as though he was a rearing stallion. Her mouth moved in hot kisses, biting gently at his lips, sucking his tongue as her sex suckled his.

How the hell am I going to hold on?

Hunter felt huge inside her, moving in those sloooooow thrusts that tormented even as they pleasured. Hungry, Genevieve used her grip on his ass to pull herself up, rolling her hips to seek even more stimulation, even more delight.

Greedy for him. Lost in him. Senses overwhelmed, drugged with the taste and scent and feeling of Hunter. A Dhampir courtesan had told her once that no human man could match a vampire lover. She had not exaggerated.

Wild with hunger, Genevieve growled, “More. More, damn it!”

Hunter’s eyes blazed white as superheated steel, and his lips drew back from his teeth in something more snarl than smile. “As my lady demands.”

He began to grind, long, breathtaking thrusts, hips rolling to drive his cock so deep Genevieve skated on the edge of pain. She was too aroused to care, welcoming every white-hot sensation, giving it back thrust for thrust.

Teeth gritted, Hunter tossed back his head, muscles drawing into stark cords of effort in his neck. His eyes squeezed closed, and his lips parted, revealing the sharp, white length of his fangs.

Open for me. It was his voice, but she didn’t hear it with her ears. He’d touched her mind.

The Union.

The spell he had worked was attempting to weave them together, binding thoughts, senses, hearts. Which meant it was time to drop her mental shields and let the spell take hold. She closed her eyes and sought to surrender her mind to his.

And nothing happened.

Hunter drove in, roaring, thrust as deep as his cock could reach, just as she felt the hot fury of her own orgasm exploding like a star. Genevieve convulsed, feeling the rush and wash of his mind, but distantly. They had not achieved full Union. She fought to drop her barriers, felt him pressing gently, seeking to enter her mind as he’d entered her body.

Warm lips found the pulse thumping hard in her throat. He bit down and began to feed. Genevieve gasped as her pleasure wound. Buried to the balls in her, Hunter drank her blood in slow swallows, his mouth working on her skin.

Genevieve, open for me.

Desperate now -- Will he turn me away if I can’t do this? -- she fought to drop the barriers that protected her mind. One fell, and she felt him move deeper. Then another, and he slipped further inside.

And then…

Nothing. That last barrier felt impossibly solid, a massive weight she couldn’t move no matter how she set her will against it. She could feel him outside, but she couldn’t lift it, and he couldn’t break through. It might as well have been solid lead.

Despite the pleasure he’d just given her, she wanted to cry.

When he rolled away with a sated purr, Genevieve rose, walked to the basket of clothing, and began to dress mechanically, a sense of failure nagging at her. Not only had she blown her chance at becoming Hunter’s Dhampir mistress, she had no chance of becoming any vampire’s lover. Not if she couldn’t form a psychic Union.

She’d fucked up yet again.

At least she didn’t have to worry about pregnancy. Vampires could have children -- otherwise there’d be no Dhampir -- but it took one hell of a powerful spell. And neither vampires nor Dhampir caught diseases of any sort, thanks to their magically enhanced immune systems. Which, given Gary’s habits, was a damned good thing.

Small favors.

“What are you doing?” Hunter watched her, his body sprawled lazily across the pallet. He did not look disappointed, though he had to be.

She’d failed him.

“I’m going home.” Without bothering with her stockings, Genevieve picked up her heels and dropped them on the floor, then stepped into them.

“Not yet.” It was an order, stark and undisguised, spoken in an Alpha Male growl.

Genevieve looked around to find Hunter on his feet, sliding his trousers over his hips, watching her, determination in his gaze. She frowned at him. “Why not?”

He gave her a charming smile, though his gaze was cool. “My cook has prepared a meal for us.”

“Thank you, but I’m not hungry.” Not with failure tying her belly into a sour knot of disappointment.

“Your body needs fuel to replace the blood I took.” The smile broadened, though the charm still hadn’t reached his eyes. “She really is a very good cook. Her filet mignon is so tender you could cut it with a spoon.”

Hunter obviously had no intention of letting her leave, and Genevieve felt too dispirited to argue. She forced a smile. “It sounds delicious.” She’d just push the food around on her plate until she could escape.

* * *

Atlanta sparkled through the curving glass window like a woman swathed in diamonds. The table for two in the dining nook off the bedroom was draped in white linen and set with crystal and Royal Dalton bone china rimmed in gold. The flatware, too, was accented with gold. She had to call on her childhood training to remember which fork to use.

The plate before her was as elegantly arranged as the table. The bread sat perfectly browned and crusty next to spears of fresh asparagus awash in butter, and rare filet mignon dribbled with creamy béarnaise sauce. Despite her despair, Genevieve took a bite. Hunter was right. The meat was impossibly tender and so exquisitely seasoned she found she wanted to eat despite the depths of her gloom.

Unless she missed her guess, Hunter’s “cook” had trained at Le Cordon Bleu.

Across the table, Hunter tucked into his own meal with evident appetite. It was a myth that vampires could not eat solid food. All those she’d ever known had relished a good meal. Nor were they undead corpses who slept in coffins and drained people like six-packs. True, vampires were creatures of magic, and they needed infusions of human life force to survive, but the pint or so of blood they drank to get it did their donors no harm. No vampire could drain a human, and would have to be mad to try. All that life force would burn the killer from the inside out.

Between her wandering thoughts and the delicious meal, Genevieve relaxed enough to speak her mind. “This is delicious. I wish I’d been able to form a Union with you. I’d love to be able to eat like this all the time.”

Hunter glanced up at her in mid-bite, one dark eyebrow lifted. “I have no intention of giving up. We will eventually succeed.” Calmly, he put the bite in his mouth and chewed.

Her fingers tightened on her fork. “I tried, Hunter. It was as if there was a brick wall between us, and I couldn’t break it down.”

He sat back in his seat and stretched his long legs out, crossing bare feet at the ankle, his gaze coolly assessing. Finally he said, “When you were sixteen, I had a vision. My Dhampir assistant had just left my service, mostly because we hadn’t really suited. I was searching for a replacement when I visited Lady Loriel to ask her help. She’d left the room to get refreshments.”

“I think I remember that,” Genevieve said. “I was home from boarding school for Christmas break.” And mooning after you.

He nodded. “I sat gazing into the fire when I Saw us together. You were obviously an adult, and I could feel my love for you, and yours for me. The strength of that passion was such that I ceased my search for a new Dhampir lover and made do with humans while I waited for you.”

Genevieve stared at him, her jaw dropping. “It’s been fourteen years!”

“It certainly has,” Hunter said dryly. “So you can see I won’t be discouraged by one minor setback.”

She frowned at him. “I see why you didn’t say anything then, but what about after I became an adult?”

He shrugged. “I knew about your family tradition of entering the military or police service. And it’s a wise policy. One may be legally an adult at twenty-one, but emotional maturity takes a bit longer.” Hunter lifted a brow. “And since I was more than three centuries old, I could afford to wait. Especially since my vision strongly suggested you wouldn’t find anyone in the meantime.”

“Still, I wish…” She broke off. She would not suggest that she could have avoided her nightmarish relationship with Gary if Hunter had claimed her sooner.

His blue gaze darkened, and a muscle worked in his jaw. “I would, however, like to know about the man who inflicted such scars on you.”

She stiffened. Gary. He’s talking about Gary. “What scars?”

“The ones that blocked our Union.” He cut his filet, sawing his knife with far more force than the tender meat required. “Tell me about him.”

“I’m sure your security chief compiled a very complete file.” She didn’t want to relive the humiliation yet again.

“He did. And yes, I’ve read all the newspaper stories and court transcripts. Plus a few details gleaned from other sources. But what I want to hear are the details you couldn’t tell the humans.”

“And there was a lot I couldn’t tell the humans.” Sighing, Genevieve looked down at her plate and pushed a piece of asparagus around. If Hunter had waited so long for her, he deserved the truth. Gaze still fixed on the vegetable, she began to speak. “You know of my family’s tradition of service. The theory is that working with humans helps one understand them, the better to protect the vampire you serve. And you’re right. You do need a few years to mature, so you’re not quite so feckless when you come into your full powers.”

He nodded. “Many Dhampir families have similar traditions.”

“So I got a job with the Ayers Police Department. It’s a good-sized town for North Carolina, and it’s got all the usual problems -- drugs, domestic violence, poverty. Still, I enjoyed being a cop there. Catching bad guys, making a difference -- it was very satisfying. And I have some talent for magic, which came in handy.”

“I’d imagine so.”

Genevieve smiled slightly at his sardonic tone. “I never entrapped anyone, but I could cast a very good Don’t-Notice-Me. More than one crook committed crimes right before my eyes.”

“Your superiors must have loved you.”

“I had the highest arrest and conviction rate in the department, even as a rookie. Older, more experienced cops went nuts trying to figure out how I did it.”

“I can imagine.” His tone was dry.

“Some of them hated my guts even before everything went south.” Genevieve sighed. “In retrospect, I can see I got overconfident. I set myself up for a hell of a fall. And I fell a long, long way.”

Chapter Three

“So then they asked you to become a narcotics agent,” Hunter said, taking a bite of his filet. “And you met Gary. He’s the one, I gather.”

“Yeah. He was my sergeant.” Genevieve began to cut her meat with vicious strokes of her knife. “Gary was as handsome as a TV cop. Even thought of himself as Crockett from Miami Vice. I thought he was courageous and principled, a knight in shining armor like my father.” She snorted and stabbed a bite with her fork. “He was more Vic Mackey, that crooked cop on The Shield. I was just too dumb to realize it.”

Hunter shot her a cool look. “One thing you’ve never been, my dear, is dumb.”

“When it came to Gary, I was a moron.” Brooding, Genevieve sat back and swirled the champagne in her glass, watching the pale bubbles rise to the surface with a chorus of tiny pops. “I should have realized what he was when he told me he wanted to become lovers. I pointed out how many rules we’d be breaking, but he didn’t care. He wanted me, and as far as he was concerned, rules were for other people.” She lifted the glass and drained it. “That says it all, doesn’t it? Especially the part where I went along with him, even knowing it was wrong.”

“Sometimes the heart misleads.” Hunter poured her another glass, then sat back to drink his own. “I gather you made yourself invaluable.”

“I designed a spell that could fool anyone into thinking I was a crack addict jonesing for a fix.” Genevieve smiled slightly. “Dealers fell for it every time. These were guys who could smell a cop coming a mile away, but none of them ever made me. Gary would wire me up, take me to the spot the dealers worked, and we’d take ’em down.”

Hunter frowned. “That sounds dangerous.”

“Oh, it was. Dealers tend to be paranoid and well-armed, and they’re perfectly willing to shoot a cop rather than go to jail.”

“I gather your so-called lover didn’t give a damn about the risk you ran.” A muscle flexed in Hunter’s jaw, and anger chilled his blue eyes as pale and cold as arctic ice.

“Not as long as I was helping him get rid of the competition for his other… employers. Seems there were these two Russian brothers who wanted to take over the drug trade in Ayers, but a Latino gang and an African American gang already had a lock on the market. Neither of those groups had any intentions of letting the Russians in on the action. So the older of the two Russians -- he ran a construction company -- approached Gary about wiping out the competition. Offered him a very fat cut of the pie, too.”

“And Gary had you.”

“Me, the gullible Dhampir who never thought to cast a spell to find out if her lover was a crook.”

“Not that gullible. You did eventually uncover his crimes.”

“Yeah, when I overheard a phone conversation Gary had with the Russian about their charming little conspiracy. I was two rooms away at the time, and he had the television turned all the way up, so it never occurred to Gary he had anything to worry about. He didn’t know about Dhampir hearing.”

“Finding out what he was must have been painful.”

“Among other things.” Genevieve grimaced, remembering the humiliation and burning rage as she realized the man she loved had been using her for months. “That’s when I started collecting the evidence I needed to take him and the Russians down. I worked for months to put together the best case I possibly could, and then I took it to Chief Marston. Videotapes, photos, the works.” She smiled, knowing her expression was more snarl than anything else. “I put the cuffs on Gary myself.”

Hunter leaned forward to fill their glasses again. “The prosecution said you constructed an airtight case.”

“While the defense painted me as a murderous girlfriend out to bring Gary’s whole team down because he’d rejected me.” Genevieve downed the wine in one swallow.

“An argument the jury didn’t buy.” Hunter toasted her with his glass. “After which the local paper wrote a glowing story about the heroic cop and her one-woman battle against corruption. At great personal risk.”

“Which was ninety percent bullshit.”

“So why did your chief offer you a captaincy?”

“Who told you that?”

“Marston did. He also said you’d be a shoe-in to be the next chief when he retires in a couple of years. He couldn’t understand why you weren’t interested.”

“That’s because he doesn’t know about Dhampir.”

“Well, I do, and I’m not sure I understand either.” Hunter smiled. “Not that I’m not grateful, mind you. But you could do a lot of good as a police chief, and you’re idealistic enough to find that a tempting thought.”

Genevieve turned her head to stare blindly out over the city. “I’m not nearly as idealistic as I used to be.” Watching the lights twinkle, she added, “I’m Dhampir, or I’m nothing.”

“You’re not ‘nothing,’ Genevieve.” Temper heated Hunter’s blue eyes. “You’re a principled, courageous woman who trusted the wrong man, but you didn’t let it break you.”

She gave him a smile, knowing quite well he probably thought she was a fucking idiot. Hell, so did she. “So what now? How do we form that Union you want?”

“Let me give it some thought. I’ll come up with something.”

Genevieve shrugged. “I’ll do whatever you want.” It wasn’t as if she had much choice.

“Right now,” he said easily, “what I want is to share a shower.”

And an A-negative nightcap before bed, she thought, but she didn’t let the cynicism show. “Sounds good.”

* * *

It was no surprise they couldn’t form a Union, Hunter thought. The last time Genevieve Drake had trusted a man with her heart and body, her life had ended up in ruins.

Now Hunter was asking her to trust him with her soul. Regardless of what her conscious mind wanted, her subconscious had slammed the gates, barred them, then dug a moat out front and filled it with piranha. He wasn’t getting in without a fight.

Fortunately, Hunter wasn’t the kind of vampire who gave up. On anything. Ever. And he certainly wasn’t giving up on the woman he’d waited on for so many years. He was just going to have to get creative.

Luckily, he was a very creative man.

I need to get her calmed down first, Hunter decided. Stop pushing and she’ll stop backing away.

The spell, he saw in retrospect, had been exactly the wrong thing to do. True, the magic had been necessary to create a Union, and its magic still waited, ready to snap into place when she dropped her barriers. Unfortunately, the long, complex buildup must have made all her instincts for self-protection howl like wolves.

So Hunter walked into the master bathroom without watching to see if she’d follow. When she did, he calmly dropped his pants as if planning to shower alone. She blinked, and he hid a smile. That got her attention.

She obviously expected him to stay on her heels, pushing and nipping and generally trying to force her surrender. But there was a reason he’d taken the name Hunter.

He knew how to conduct a pursuit.

Hunter turned on the shower and tested the water as she undressed, still pretending to ignore her. In reality, his every sense was focused on her -- the shimmer of her hair in the bathroom lights, the soft pink pucker of her nipples, the grace of her body as she bent to slide her skirt down her long, long thighs. She smelled of Dhampir and sex, and ever so faintly, of the blood he’d taken. His body betrayed his attempt to feign indifference with the quick rise of a hungry erection. He glimpsed her slight smile and stepped into the shower.

Genevieve could give a dead man a hard-on. And no matter what the myths said, Hunter was far from dead. That was obvious from the pulse he could feel in his dick.

By the time she’d stepped into the walk in shower, he’d started to soap up. When she stopped to stare at the snaking path of suds down his torso, he hid another smile. The girl did like his body, bless her hot little Dhampir libido.

Not as much as he liked hers, of course, but still.

“Need any help with that?” Genevieve rasped, her gaze on that trail of bubbles.

“Why not?” He handed her the cake of soap.

Hunter watched with hypnotized fascination as she rolled the soap in her hands, working up a lather. Genevieve gave him a wicked little smile, pressed the cake against his belly and began to rub it slowly up and down.

Then she wrapped the fingers of her free hand around his jutting cock. He sucked in a breath as she began to stroke him with those soapy fingers, up and down. He had to swallow before he could speak. “Mind if I return the favor?”

Her wicked smile widened. “Why not?”

Hunter cupped her bare breast, enjoying the soft satin texture. Rasping his thumb across the jut of her nipple, he smiled as she shivered in pleasure. Her fingers tightened on his cock, and he did some shivering of his own.

Lazily, he lowered his head and kissed her. His tongue slipped between her lips, tasting champagne and filet and himself as they stroked each other slowly. When he ran soapy fingers across her clit, she purred pleasure into his mouth.

Sliding his hands under her ass, Hunter lifted Genevieve into his arms and braced her against the wall. And slid his cock into her hot depths. They both groaned in erotic delight.

He started thrusting slowly, working his cock in and out of her hot, tight grip. She wrapped her long legs around his ass and ground right back at him. “Oh, gods, Hunter!” Throwing her head back, she braced her shoulders against the tile, the better to ride him hard.

In that moment of abandonment, as she soared into orgasm, he reactivated the Union spell and reached into her mind. Her pleasure became his became hers, a luscious spiral into delight.

Until he slammed into the psychic wall in the core of her consciousness. She froze in mid thrust, and he felt anguish replace her desire.

All right, damn it. Time to stop fooling around. Hunter growled a spell, and the dagger appeared in his hand. Genevieve’s eyes widened in alarm -- and what had that bastard Gary done to her, that she’d automatically think he’d conjured the knife to use on her?

He gritted his teeth in rage and ran the blade down his left pec. A flick of his fingers banished the knife, and he used the same hand to catch her by the back of the head. “Drink,” he growled. “Take my blood.”

Even as he pulled her face against the bleeding cut, Hunter kept rolling his cock deep in her sex. Exchanging blood was part of the magic between Dhampir and vampire, and it might help the Union form.

Genevieve pressed her mouth to the cut and began to lick.

His blood seemed to burn on her tongue like a shot of straight whiskey. She shivered and went on licking, though she’d never drunk vampire blood before.

The surge of magic hit her hard and fast, rolling up out of her belly, lighting up her entire nervous system like the Fourth of July. Euphoria followed, blazing and bright, until she felt like dancing. Instead Genevieve ground down on his cock, letting the pleasure that had faded resurge to carry her up a spiral of delight.

Hunter rumbled a sound, half growl, half laugh, and resumed those delicious, jarring thrusts, until he howled out his climax.

Genevieve screamed in reply, magic and delight convulsing her body and sending her flying.

Chapter Four

By the time they staggered out of the shower, dawn was entirely too close. Hunter’s gaze met hers, and he reached out to brush his knuckles against her cheek. “Stay with me.”

Genevieve licked her lips, seduced by his warmth, by the darkened blue of his eyes. “All right.”

He walked over to the vanity and reached into the cabinet to pull out a blow dryer and brush, then beckoned her over.

She shot a wary glance through the open bedroom door. The horizon was beginning to lighten. “But the sun…”

“I’ve got time.” There was that smile again, the one Genevieve couldn’t resist. She joined Hunter as he turned the dryer on. He stepped around behind her, making her acutely aware of his height, the breadth of his shoulders, his sheer male size. Aiming the dryer at her hair, he began to brush the long copper strands. She found herself relaxing as he brushed in long, slow strokes, as though he had all the time in the world.

Finally he turned off the dryer and put it aside, then went back to brushing. “Your hair is beautiful. So soft, so bright, a thousand different shades of blazing silk -- copper and autumn and gold.” His voice was a low, deep rumble. “You are beautiful.”

“So are you. I’ve never known a man more handsome. Not even…” Genevieve broke off. No, she didn’t want to rouse that ghost just before bed. She changed the subject. “The dawn…”

“I know.” Setting the brush aside, Hunter caught her by the hand, then led her into the master bedroom. She heard a deep mechanical hum as thick metal shades rolled down over the wall-length window.

Hunter tossed back the dark green spread, sending the mound of pillows tumbling to the floor. “Ladies first.”

Slipping between the sheets, she rolled onto her side as he followed her, curling his big body around hers, surrounding her in warm strength. Genevieve relaxed back against him as he slid his arms around her and drew her close. She heard him rumble, a deep male purr of satisfaction, as though he had her precisely where he wanted her.

She knew when the sun came up because he went lax against her back, tumbling instantly into sleep in the way of vampires at dawn. Genevieve snuggled into him, conscious of the warm power of his muscular body, the length of his cock, softened now, curled against her butt. The clean male scent of him surrounded her. Sudden exhaustion weighed her eyelids -- probably an effect of his blood. With a sigh, she followed him into sleep.

* * *

Hunter knew at once it was more than a dream. The sensations were too sharp, too vivid. Almost hyper-real. He could feel rough stone under his booted feet, and the air was full of the smell of blood and human suffering. And something else. Something dry, musty, rank. Not a mammalian smell at all.

Reptile.

Something slithered. The faint rasp of scales on stone. A hiss. Someone sobbed, the sound muffled, barely audible. He recognized the voice anyway.

Genevieve.

Darkness lay so thick around him not even Hunter’s vampire senses could penetrate it. He breathed a spell, and the ring on his right hand began to glow. A massive white heap heaved and writhed in the pool of light it cast, dully gleaming. White coils splattered in red, roiling, rasping against the stone floor.

Hissssss.

The hair stood up on the back of Hunter’s neck. It was the biggest snake he’d ever seen. Had to be nearly as thick as his chest. He had no idea how long the beast was, because it coiled around and around like a fat spring, lashing and twisting as if it had something caught in its coils. Color shone bright against the pale scales, a flow of copper silk between two coils like a spill of blood.

Hair. Genevieve’s hair.

The coils parted, and light reflected between them -- the shine of eyes in the shadows, staring out at him in desperate terror. She made a sound, muffled, gasping, half scream, half wheeze.

Hunter roared a spell, and a sword filled his hand, a two-handed blade that blazed blue with magic. He leaped forward, swinging the great weapon up, preparing to hack right through the monster… Only to freeze in mid-stroke, realizing with a sudden sick panic that if he started hacking into the thing, he might kill Genevieve as well. He needed to find out where she was before he could save her.

An easy bound carried him to the top of the pile of coils. Hunter balanced there, sure-footed on the shifting mass much as he’d once balanced on the spars of a ship in a storm. Shifting the blade to his left hand, he aimed the stone of his ring down into the coils. He stared down into the dark center of the coils, searching for her.

An arm flailed upward, fingers clawing for air. The snake had wrapped around her like a boa constrictor crushing a mouse.

The head. Where the fuck was the monster’s head? If he could cut the head off…

“Ga…” The sound wheezed from the mass of coils. “…reeeee…”

“Hang on, Genevieve!” He gritted his teeth, trying to determine where it was safe to stab. “Stay with me… Where’s the fucking head?”

“Ga… reeee…”

Maybe there. He drove the sword downward through the top of the snake’s coil with all his strength, as if he were trying to drive it into solid rock. The snake hissed and convulsed, tossing him off like a stone shot from a sling. Hunter hit the ground, rolled to his feet like the martial artist he was, and charged the snake again as it lashed and hissed in pain. Genevieve struggled in its grip, her face dark, the cords of her throat standing out with effort. “Gaaaareee!” she gasped. “’S Garree!”

Gary? Why the hell was she calling that bastard’s name?

The snake rolled, and there was its head, rearing over Genevieve, its mouth open to reveal fangs the length of his forearm, dripping venom yellow as piss. There was something wrong with its eyes. They weren’t beady, like a reptile’s. They were oblong, with whites in the corners and round hazel irises.

Human eyes.

“It’s Gary!” Genevieve screamed.

The snake struck at Hunter in a blur of white, fast as a rattler despite its size. Even as its head flew forward, he swung his sword with a heaving effort of vampire strength. The blade sliced through the snake’s head, and the halves tumbled in two. Instead of blood, a ghostly glow spilled from it.

As his blade sank deep, malevolence exploded into Hunter’s awareness, a stench sensed with the mind rather than the nose. His consciousness reverberated with a dying howl of rage, and he thought, This is no dream.

The headless snake writhed and lashed, lifting Genevieve in its flailing coils and slamming her against the ground, floor and walls, helpless as a doll. Even as Hunter jolted forward to help, the snake faded away like a ghost. She tumbled across the floor to lie dazed and gasping.

“Genevieve!” He went to his knees beside her.

She looked up at him, her gaze blank.

Hunter snatched her into his arms. “Are you all right?”

For a moment all she could do was cling to him, sucking in great heaving breaths of air. “Thank you,” she wheezed finally. “Gods, Hunter, thank you!”

He met her gaze. “What the hell happened, Genevieve? Show me how he did this to you.”

It seemed as if he fell into the vivid leaf green of her eyes. The floor dropped from beneath their feet, and they whirled away.

* * *

The day was gray and cold. The light seemed odd to him, too bright, almost blinding despite the overcast. Daylight, Hunter realized with a start. He had not seen daylight in more than three hundred years.

And he wasn’t seeing it now. Not through his own eyes, anyway. He heard the impatient click of a woman’s boot heels on pavement, heard her voice in his ears as though he himself spoke. “Damn it, Tina, where the fuck are you?” Genevieve growled. “You told me to meet you here, but I’m here, and you’re not.” She slapped her cell phone closed and jammed it into the pocket of her jacket.

He was seeing the scene through her eyes, Hunter realized, startled.

A memory zipped through her mind. Tina had called half an hour ago, scared to death. She’d heard Gary was out on bail and gunning for her. Gunning for Genevieve too. By going to the police chief with their story, by talking to the District Attorney, Tina and Genevieve had brought a shit-storm down on Gary’s head. And he intended to shut them both up.

At least according to panic-stricken Tina Murphy, hooker, drug addict, and Gary’s snitch/fuck buddy.

After overhearing Gary’s phone call with the Russian, Genevieve had tracked Tina down. The woman’s pimp was connected to the Russian gang, and Genevieve had suspected Tina knew something about Gary’s crooked dealing. She’d persuaded the hooker to tell her what she knew. Which hadn’t been all that hard to do, since Tina happened to be pissed at Gary at the time.

Tina had been Gary’s favorite CRI -- Confidential Reliable Informant. In other words, snitch. Tina was also Gary’s go-between to the Russian gang. Tina had known everything, and she’d given Genevieve a sickening earful about just how crooked Gary really was.

And Genevieve hadn’t suspected any of it. Especially not that Gary had been cheating on her from the first.

Genevieve paced the filthy alley as her anger rose, just as it had so many times over the past months. How many times had that bastard smiled into her eyes and lied? She’d been such an idiot. She’d bought all his lies about serving and protecting, about stopping the poison that wrecked lives and drove people to crime. Most of all, she’d believed he loved her.

And all along, Gary had been taking bribes and helping the Russians muscle in on the town’s drug trade. And she’d helped him. Moron. I’m such a moron. She cringed to think about what her parents would say about her gullibility.

Genevieve frowned, as worry wormed its way through her temper. Where the hell’s Tina? The woman worked the corner of the adjoining streets, so she’d gotten into the habit of ducking down this alley to give blow jobs or meet the cops she was informing for. But she wasn’t on her corner, and she wasn’t here, so where was she?

Had Gary gotten to Tina? Had he killed her?

It was one thing to be taken in by a lying sociopath. It was another to get somebody murdered. And if Gary had killed Tina because Genevieve had convinced her to inform…

“Genny?”

At the sound of that far-too-familiar voice, Genevieve whirled, her heart in her throat. Gary. Oh, fuck. And he was standing between her and the alley entrance. Gods, she really was a fucking idiot. Not to mention in deep shit, because as the breeze blew past her former lover into her face, she smelled gunpowder.

Which meant odds were good Tina was dead. And unless she got a hell of a lot more lucky than she’d been lately, so was Genevieve. Her lips peeled back from her teeth in a snarl of pure rage as she went for the gun in her shoulder holster.

“Genny, baby, wait.” Gary spread his hands, pleading in his hazel eyes. “I just want to talk.”

He just wanted to kill her. “Fuck you, baby.” But her hand hesitated on the grip of her pistol. God help her, she wanted to believe him. Still.

“Genevieve, Tina lied.” He took a step toward her, the wind teasing his shining blond hair. He looked broad-shouldered and handsome in his leather bomber jacket. “Her pimp put her up to it. She’s an addict and a whore. I can’t believe you’d even listen to her.”

God, he’s good. Genevieve knew the bastard was lying, knew it. And she’d been a cop for a decade, so she was used to being lied to. Yet his body language, his eyes, his face -- there wasn’t one twitch, one hint that he was lying. “Why in the hell didn’t you go to Hollywood? You’d have an Oscar by now. De Niro has nothing on you, you son of a bitch.”

Wounded pain flashed in Gary’s gaze before he drew himself up, his face going expressionless. Just like a proud, innocent man facing baseless accusations from the woman he loved. “I can see I’m wasting my breath. You’ve bought every lie she told you.”

“You killed her.” Genevieve jerked her chin toward the dark green Dumpster surrounded by garbage. “She’s lying in there right now, isn’t she?”

For the barest instant, panic flashed in his gaze. It was the first genuine emotion he’d shown. “You’re crazy.”

“And you’re a murderer, Gary. A corrupt sociopath who knows how to make all the right faces and say all the right things.”

“And you’re a bitch.” His hand flashed into the pocket of his jacket. The pocket where she’d already noticed the hole from his earlier gunshot.

Genevieve was already moving, diving aside as she drew her own gun with Dhampir speed. The nine-millimeter roared in chorus with Gary’s .38. Something shoved her hard, high on the chest, right under her collarbone. She hit the ground on her ass, rolled. Scrambled for the cover of the Dumpster.

“You bitch!” Gary yelled, pain and astonishment in his voice. “You shot me!”

“Good.” She clawed for the cell phone in her pocket, jerked it out, thumbed 911. “Officer down! Alley between…” It took her a minute to remember the streets. It was getting hard to breathe. “Oakdale and Green Street. Detective Genevieve Drake. Gary Sommers just shot me. And I strongly suspect he killed Tina Murphy. Check the Dumpster in the alley.”

“Fuck! The fucking crazy bitch shot me!” Gary bellowed, apparently trying to be heard over Genevieve’s phone. “She ambushed me! She probably shot Tina too! Crazy bitch.”

“You’re repeating yourself, Gary.”

“Who is this?” the 911 dispatcher demanded.

“Detective Genevieve Drake, Ayers Police Department.” The pain was starting, radiating through her chest in sick waves, followed quickly by nausea. She swallowed hard, fighting the need to vomit. “Sommers is armed. Thirty-eight.” His clutch piece.

“I hope you fucking die, Genny!”

“Same to you, dickhead.”

“You weren’t even any good in bed.” His voice was growing weaker now. “And stupid. God, you’re stupid. Every lie I told… you believed. And inside, I was laughing.” He sobbed in pain. “Christ, it hurts.”

“Good.” Genevieve rested her head against the cold metal of the Dumpster. The stink coming from inside was more than rotting garbage. It was the reek of blood and piss and shit. Poor Tina. “Hurry up and die, Gary.” She closed her eyes, listening to the distant wail of sirens. “Now’d be good.”

“Bitch.” His voice faded to a whisper. “Stupid… bitch.”

“You know what, Gary?” She lifted her voice and told the utter truth. “You weren’t any good in bed either. Half the time, I was faking it.”

Just before the darkness whirled her away, something touched her Dhampir consciousness. A vicious malevolence. “Go to hell, Gary. Leave me the fuck alone.”

Then she knew nothing else.

Chapter Five

Genevieve woke to the rolling rumble of the window shutters sliding up. Opening her eyes, she glimpsed the lights of Atlanta shining in the dark like a spill of stars spread on the ground. She could feel the warmth of Hunter’s breath on the back of her neck, a calm and even sighing.

She felt… good. Better than she’d felt since the alley. As if she’d washed something dirty away in a warm spring rain. “There was so much I didn’t remember,” Genevieve murmured, half to herself. “I’d forgotten how smooth he was. I’d felt like such an idiot because I hadn’t seen Gary for the murdering shit he was, but…”

“He was good,” Hunter agreed in his dark velvet rasp, sliding one arm around her waist. “I might have been able to tell he was lying from scent -- there’s a certain acidity in a liar’s sweat -- but there was nothing on his face to give him away.” His voice dropped. “Genevieve -- do you remember the snake?”

She shivered. Wrapped in smothering scaled hide that crushed her chest, wanting to scream, unable to breathe, yet knowing that not even death would bring escape. “Yeah. I remember. God, what a nightmare.”

“It wasn’t just a nightmare.”

Lifting her head from her pillow, Genevieve twisted her head to meet his gaze. “What else could it have been? There’re no such things as giant snakes.”

“Says the Dhampir in bed with the vampire.”

“Okay, so there are no such things as giant ghost snakes.”

Hunter propped his head on his fist as he lay on his side. “Genevieve, when I killed it, there was something there. I felt a presence. Something evil.”

Like the evil she’d felt just before she lost consciousness in the dream/memory. She rolled over to face him, frowning. “What are you driving at, Hunter?”

He hesitated a long moment before he finally spoke. “I’d heard of something like this, but I’ve never experienced it directly. I think that when you were lying in that alley as Gary died -- so close to death yourself -- you accidentally achieved a mind link with him.”

Horror iced her heart. “That’s not possible.”

“Not easy, but not impossible. Dhampir are psychic. Not as much as vampires, but you have a great deal of power. Some humans have abilities of their own too, though far less than we do. From what I saw, from what I felt, I suspect Gary was that kind of psychic.”

“So you’re saying -- what? He’s haunting me? Like a ghost?”

“I think he was. I definitely killed something when I cut into that snake.”

“But it wasn’t real, Hunter. It was a dream.”

“Who are you trying to convince -- me or yourself?”

Genevieve fell silent, considering the idea uneasily. “I do feel different this morning. Better. Ever since that day in the alley, I’d felt this… black weight. I even talked to the department’s shrink about it. He put me on antidepressants and said it was post-traumatic stress from killing a man -- especially a man I’d believed myself in love with. Though in retrospect, I can’t believe I could have fallen for that sociopathic fucker. I just wish I’d killed him sooner. Tina might still be alive.”

As Genevieve had predicted, the Ayers cops had found the hooker inside the Dumpster with Gary’s bullet in her brain. Which was why Genevieve’s shooting him had been ruled as justified -- it was pretty damned obvious Gary was dirty. He’d probably intended to dispose of both their bodies after he’d shot Genevieve.

“And I’m glad I helped free you of your ghost. Or bad memory. Or whatever the hell he was.” Hunter lowered his head. The kiss was almost impossibly gentle, a butterfly brush of lip on lip. Almost innocent, though her body’s reaction to it was anything but.

She cupped his cheek in her palm -- and gasped as the Union spell activated as if the barrier she’d fought so fruitlessly yesterday had never been there at all. I guess it was Gary keeping us apart. Bastard.

“Dead bastard,” Hunter breathed against her lips. “And good riddance. I hope he’s roasting in hell.”

“If there’s a hell, he’s in it.” She smiled up at him. “But I really don’t want to think about that cockroach anymore. He’s in the past. You’re my present -- and my future. I want you. Any and every way I can get you.”

He smiled and bent down for another kiss. She heard his thought as clearly as speech. And you’ve got me.

There was such warmth and strength in his mind. Such bedrock decency, so different from the malevolence she’d sensed when Gary died. She could feel just as clearly how much Hunter wanted her -- his genuine admiration, not just for her body or her beauty, but for her intelligence, her humor, and her sense of honor.

They kissed slowly, enjoying the lazy stroke of tongues and nibbling teeth. And each tiny pleasure built as they shared it, intensifying, adding to their mutual desire, whipping it into a hot storm.

Hunter began working his way down her body, licking, kissing. Reading his intention clearly, she fisted both hands in his hair and pulled his head up until Genevieve could give him a mock glare. “Oh, no you don’t!” She sent him a mental image: the two of them positioned for sixty-nine, deliciously busy between each other’s legs.

He grinned. “If you insist.”

Laughing like children, they rearranged themselves until she lay on top of him, head down along his torso. Then, hungrily, each began to lick, only to break off simultaneously at the storm of sensation. “Gods, that feels so good,” Genevieve sighed, before scooping his cock back into her mouth for a swooping suckle.

His only response was a shiver as he returned the favor, licking slow circles around her clit. Wrapping one arm around her right thigh, he slid two fingers into her juicing sex and pumped, once, twice, simultaneously flicking her button with his wickedly clever tongue.

Genevieve’s eyes damn near rolled back in her head. Somehow she managed not to come on the spot as she fought to concentrate on the length of thick cock she was sucking in long, hard pulls. It wasn’t easy, especially when he sought out her breasts and began to tease her pebbled nipples.

Oh, gods. She couldn’t even tell who’d thought it.

The sensations that arrowed from Hunter’s mind to hers were breathtaking, incredibly alien, yet so delightfully sweet. She cuddled his balls in her free hand, squeezing with gentle care as she stroked his shaft with the other.

Both of them quickly realized they’d never last with pleasure bouncing back and forth between their minds like a tennis ball, each round intensifying it. Finally, unable to take any more, Genevieve dragged herself off Hunter’s cock, turned around, and mounted him like a horse.

It felt as if he penetrated her all the way to her back teeth. Genevieve groaned, shuddering in a delight and pleasure she knew he shared. He groaned back, and they began to thrust, slowly, him grinding upward as she ground down. Sliding a thumb between their bodies, Hunter found her clit and circled it. At the same time, he returned his attention to her breasts for squeezing strokes and gentle pinches.

Genevieve tossed her head back until her hair brushed his sweating, working thighs. Bracing her hands on his chest, she jogged up and down, feeling their mutual delight spiral, higher, tighter, sharper, digging deep, flinging upward.

Until she heard his rasping howl of delight.

But there was something else he needed. Something else they both needed. So she lowered herself until her body was stretched along the length of his. Until his lips touched her leaping pulse.

Hunter bit deep. Even as she felt the stab of pain, her climax surged over her, sweeping her up the curve of orgasm. She screamed, and he groaned, sharing her orgasm as she’d just shared his.

Genevieve quivered helplessly as spasm after spasm rode them both in time to his swallows. When it was over, they lay in a panting pile of exhausted, sweat-slick bodies.

United in heart, in soul, in mind. Forever.