“Hello?” I said to the girl, hoping my voice would wake her up. I knew not to touch her because she could have internal injuries, but I wanted to be sure she was okay. The girl didn’t answer, so I checked under the car to make sure no gasoline was leaking. It was a pointless action though, with the amount of rain we were getting, a fire was unlikely.

I walked over to the drunken man again and told him to sit. He looked down like he’d just noticed I was there. He stumbled, and I caught his arm and helped him sit on the pavement.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“Dan Collins.” He spoke his name slowly as if speaking was a chore. I scanned the surrounding area and made sure no one was focusing on me. I turned my back towards Dan and conjured two umbrellas. My clothes were thoroughly soaked, and I was beginning to shiver.

“Here,” I handed the man an umbrella and then opened mine. “The police are on their way,” I told him. Although drunk as a skunk, worried awareness shone in his glazed eyes. He’d be charged with a DUI at the very least and vehicular manslaughter if the young girl died.

Footsteps approached behind us. I turned and saw a tall man with long black hair that hit just above his shoulders and was as dry as the desert. I blinked a few times to make sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me. None of the abusive rain beating against me touched him. He wore black dress pants that fit snuggly against his legs and a black V-neck sweater that hugged his broad chest.

“Hey, don’t touch her!” I yelled as the man reached his hand out to the young girl. He turned his head towards me, and I froze in my place. His eyes swirled with different shades of gray like an angry thunderstorm brewed deep within him. He had to be a supernatural, but I’d never seen anything like him before.

The man smiled and gripped the young girl’s shoulder. A rush of cold air whipped all around the car and penetrated me to the bone. I shook violently against the icy coldness. “What—who—are you?” I stuttered through my rattling teeth. The man didn’t answer and as soon as I saw the ghostly figure of the young girl float out of the car, I knew what the answer was. My mouth hung open, and I stared wide eyed at the spirit who was staring down at her dead body.

“You’re a reaper, aren’t you?” I managed to choke out. The man smiled, and then the wailing of sirens made me turn my head. When I looked back, the man and the ghost were gone. The drunken man didn’t seem to notice what had just happened.

Paramedics rushed to the girl and the drunken man, but there wasn’t anything they could do for her. I gave them all the information I had, which wasn’t much, and then called Aiden for a ride. Within ten minutes, he pulled alongside the road in a black escalade.

“What happened? Are you hurt?” He threw the questions at me in a hurried rush while his arms wrapped around my soaking wet frame. I absorbed what little heat he provided.

“I’m fine. I was in a cab when the accident happened,” I said against his chest. Aiden guided me to the SUV, and I happily climbed out of the rain. The ambulances took off with the man while the other medics were working on lifting the girl out of the car and onto a stretcher with a black body bag. My heart sank when they laid her atop the bag and began shuffling her arms and legs into it. I hated death, no matter the cause, but especially when the victims were young.

“How did you end up standing on the side of the road?” Aiden asked as he cranked the heat to full blast. The contrast of the warm air hitting my frozen body made me shiver.

“The cab driver wasn’t going to call the police, so I jumped out and called them. I wanted to make sure they were all right,” I told Aiden. Out of my peripheral I could tell he was staring, but I ignored him. Aiden was really protective of me, sometimes to the point of being annoying.

“Look, I’m fine. I did the right thing, who knows how long it would’ve taken the police to get here if I hadn’t called them.”

“Why didn’t you call them from the cab? Why did you have to stay, in the middle of a thunderstorm no less?” Aiden’s voice was calm, but a twinge of anxiousness colored his tone.

I let out a heavy breath. “I don’t know.” It was the truth. It had been stupid to jump out of my cab in the middle of nowhere. I wasn’t helpless though, I had magic on my side. “Can we just go back to your hotel, please?”

Aiden pulled back onto the road and within ten minutes we were in his hotel’s parking deck. We walked to the elevator and rode up to the sixth floor in silence. When the elevator doors opened, I followed Aiden down the long skinny hallway and to room 614. Once the door was shut, Aiden’s arms wrapped around me and our mouths met, eager to make up for lost time. It didn’t matter that he was annoyed with my stupidity or that I was ticked he thought I was as fragile as an eggshell. In the end, we loved each other and were hungry for one another.

Aiden’s deft fingers unzipped my wet jacket and let it fall off my shoulders where it plopped to the floor. He bent before me and untied my sneakers. When both shoes were off he moved upward where he skillfully tugged my tank top off and threw it across the room. Lowering his head to my cleavage, he bit through the front clasp of my bra, freeing my breasts. Aiden’s tongue darted out and swirled around my excited nipples sending a flood of heat through my body that erased any chill I had previously felt. He nipped at one and sent a jolt of desire ricocheting through me. I moaned with delight as he led me towards the bed. Sex with Aiden was exactly the stress reliever I needed.

Aiden pushed me onto the bed, and I stretched out so he had a clear view of what was waiting for him. He stripped off my yoga pants and white lace panties, then stepped back to admire the view. Sitting up on my elbows, I gave him my best “come and get it” look. A grin lifted one side of his mouth up and mischief played within his blue eyes.

Oh he wanted to play, did he?

I bent my left leg up and languidly raised my right crossing it over my knee, giving Aiden a slight peepshow. He unbuttoned his shirt while watching me. I smiled, my body excited and happy that this gorgeous vampire was mine.

He walked over to the desk in the corner of the room and pressed a button on the CD player. Bad Company’s I’m Ready for Love rang out of the speakers, and I laughed hysterically. Bit by bit he pulled his shirt off while his hips rocked with the music. My laugh died down to mere giggles as I watched his abs and hips move.

He made his way to the bed with a satisfied smile and I grinned. The art of seduction wasn’t over yet. I hopped off the bed and said, “Sit.”

Aiden laughed but complied by sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Close your eyes,” I ordered, and he squeezed them tightly closed. I conjured a stripper pole and a black and hot pink lace corset and matching panties. I was determined my strip tease would bring him to his knees, and I’d be declared the winner of our playful foreplay.

I magically produced my favorite Paula Cole CD and placed it in the radio. ‘Feelin’ Love began to play, and I gripped the pole with one hand and rested the other hand on my cocked hip. “Open your eyes,” I told Aiden. The surprise on his face was priceless, but when I started to walk around the silver pole, his mouth hung open, making me laugh.

Fiona had dragged me to a pole dancing class at her gym a couple years ago, it was a great work out, but I didn’t have much use for the moves, until now. Gripping the pole with both hands, I swung my body around and slid down the length. I whipped my hair around and did a bend and snap that would make Elle Woods proud. Aiden rested his arms behind him while his eyes devoured every inch of me.

I flipped up and gripped the pole with my legs so I was looking at Aiden upside down, and when I got to the floor, I bent so that my ass was front and center. Looking at him over my shoulder, I smiled and winked. I’d definitely won.

An hour or so later Aiden and I lay naked in each other’s arms, our desires sated. I was at peace beside him like all of my worries just fell away. I propped myself up on my arm and looked over at him. A stray piece of dark hair hung carelessly over his blue eye, a five o’clock shadow lined his normally clean shaven jaw, and his chest rose and fell as he tried to slow his panting. The muscles in his arms bulged while they were tucked behind his head. My eyes ran the length of his body, settling on his fabulously chiseled stomach and the dark trail of hair that led beneath the sheets. He was beautiful, and he was mine.

“Give me ten minutes and I’ll be good to go,” Aiden said with a smirk.

I laughed and lay back on the bed. Even if he was ready in ten minutes, I needed a day to recoup. Aiden had been rougher than normal and lost in my own desires I hadn’t minded. Our separation had driven us nearly mad, but the sex was fantastic.

Thoughts of the man I’d seen at the wreck occupied my mind as I stared up at the ceiling. He looked very normal, well maybe not normal, but human. He was gorgeous. The only clue that he was something otherworldly was his cloudy eyes. I was intrigued by him.

“What’s wrong?” Aiden asked.

I looked over at him quizzically.

“I can still feel you, Gwen. Your blood is still inside of me.” I had fed Aiden when I found out he was addicted to brew so he wouldn’t kill a witch to get his next fix. Since then he had been able to feel my emotions, though we weren’t bonded like Ian and I were because we hadn’t exchanged blood.

“How long will that last?” I asked him.

Aiden shrugged his shoulders. “Not long, a month at most. I’ll be sad when it fades, I like knowing how you feel, especially when we’re fucking. It’s so intense to feel the want you have for me, drives me insane.”

I smiled and imagined what it would be like to feel someone else’s emotions. I was bonded to Ian, but he had nearly perfect control over his emotions so they didn’t seep into me. I was happy he did, I didn’t think I’d like to feel emotions that weren’t mine. All of the talk about blood and connections directed my mind to what Ian told me, that Aiden could break the bond if he wanted to. I looked over at Aiden and wondered if I should bring it up or not. He wouldn’t be happy that I had shared a dream with Ian, but the more I thought about it, the more I needed to know the answer—or the reason why if he could break the bond, he hadn’t.