“No,” he said. “He doesn’t come between us. I won’t allow him to touch your mind, your heart or your soul when you’re with me. Not now, not ever.”

She gave a short nod, the only acknowledgment, but it was a significant one, because she obviously wanted to mean it. He was used to terrible things happening to others, because that was his world. He would have killed Elceus for harming her, because Elceus had crossed the line. But here, seeing it so personal in her face, it wasn’t about balance. It was about his desire to fucking destroy anything that caused her a moment’s pain.

She was on a dangerous edge, and she needed him to keep her from falling off the wrong side. Banding his arm around her waist, he slid his hand from her hair to her nape and brought her down to meet his lips. Hot and demanding, his tongue tangling with hers, driving her mind only to desire. As he began to stroke inside of her, he controlled her movements so she was like a doll in his arms. She could only hang on, make tiny, pleading cries, her wet heat clutching him until his release shot forth. She let go a moment before him, so that he swallowed her cries into his own mouth as his body shuddered.

As he plunged into the pleasure of it, his last thought was that, yes, he’d never been so hard, never been so aroused. But most important, he’d never felt so closely bonded with a woman as he did at this precise moment. Not in nearly thirteen hundred years.

That was a serious problem.

SO HE WAS REALLY GOOD AT SEX. IT DIDN’T MEAN unicorns would spring out of his backside and the world would be bathed in rainbows. She told herself that, a reality check, when they were done and she was wondering if she was ever going to breathe normally again.

But he had a way of distorting reality. She’d strained against his magic in those climactic moments, sought pain to spice the pleasure. Now he touched her upper thighs where the energy binding had cut. When he rose, holding her around the waist to steady her, he let her feet touch the ground, then surprised her by dropping to one knee and brushing his mouth over those abraded places, using his tongue like an animal salving a wound. His jaw pressed against her mound, and when he passed over her thigh, he laid gentle kisses on her sex, still convulsing from the shattering climax. She held on to his shoulder, not sure what this was, feeling strange about it, but not able to say anything. Then he rose.

“Do you think there’s any bacon left from breakfast?”

It was such a change of paradigm, his face so serious, an odd chuckle bubbled up in her. It made her feel better. She wondered if it was calculated. If it was, he was kinder than she’d given him credit for.

“We can go see,” she said. Glancing at the clock, surprised to find it close to three, she added, “The rest of the staff is usually upstairs preparing this time of day.” Something she needed to do as well, but not quite yet.

“All right.” He pulled on the jeans, no underwear, which was distracting enough. Groping for her clothes, she came up with his shirt and her panties. It seemed fairly natural to slide it on, button a couple buttons. She liked his scent.

He glanced at her, stopped. Coming to her, he buttoned a few more buttons, until the panties were fully covered, since the shirt fell to her knees. She noted he was okay with a couple buttons at the top being open so he could gaze down the front fairly easily.

He looked down at the burn marks across his jeans. “You owe me a new pair of pants.”

“When they pay top dollar for that effect on the runways? Not a chance.”

He rolled his eyes, looped his arm around her neck and pulled her to him. She braced herself on his chest, wondered as he pressed a kiss to the top of her head. Then he dropped a hand and squeezed her ass hard enough to earn a yelp. “Come on, I’m hungry.”

The main library was on the second level. One set of stairs shouldn’t do her in, but when she stopped on the landing, she swayed a bit. She’d fed well last night, hadn’t fed off his energy this time, merely twining it around them to launch their coupling to an even more intense level, even though she wasn’t sure if that had been at all necessary.

He’d filtered the dangerous aspects of the magic just as he had before, almost as an afterthought, as if it was no active threat to him at all. Did he realize what a gift that was to her? Of course not. Unless he’d experienced years of being unable to release during sex, he couldn’t really understand. But he didn’t have to understand to make it the best experience she’d ever had. Twice in a row.

Now, though, she was wondering if she should have fed. Her legs were shaky because of the workout.

“Here.” He presented his back. “Hop on.”

Smiling, she looped her arms around his neck as he bent a knee to lower his height. Catching her legs, he lifted her onto his back with a quick hitch. “For such a badass witch, you’re short,” he observed as he took the winding staircase with ease. “Though nicely top-heavy.”

She snorted at that. “You can’t even feel where your wings come out.” She pressed against his back. “Are they magical or anatomical?”

“A little of both. Happily, I can feel your tits no problem at all.”

“Barbarian.”

He squeezed her thighs where he held them secure on his hips. Her calves were crossed low over his abdomen.

“Let’s go to town tomorrow morning,” he said.

“What?” She could think of a couple reasons that was a bad idea, neither of which she was going to share with him. “What about our prisoner?”

“He’s not leaving the property with our tracers on him,” he said, revealing that he was fully aware she’d marked Isaac as well. “Town’s less than six miles away. Demons almost always strike at night, so if she doesn’t show tonight, there won’t be much to do tomorrow. And I get bored easily. I’m sure you have errands you could do in town.”

At the kitchen entrance, he let her down but didn’t let her go just yet. Instead, he lifted her hand, brushed his lips across her knuckles, giving her a tantalizing sense of moist heat, then pushed her gently ahead of him into the kitchen. As she’d expected, no one was there this time of day. Matilda had already left for the day. Mikhael pulled a container of bacon out of the fridge with a satisfied grunt. He also brought out the container of chocolate-covered strawberries along with some whipped cream and a half bottle of white wine.

“That whipped cream is the real thing,” she said, appreciating his consideration of her own appetites.

“Who says you’re getting any?”

She punched him in the side and he ignored her, reaching over her to put the containers on the counter with the wine bottle. Then he put his hands to her waist and boosted her onto the cool marble surface, inserting his body between her thighs as he opened the strawberries. Dipping one into the whipped cream, he offered it, but held the treat out of reach, waiting until she put her hands down, parted his lips so he could feed her from his hand.

When he offered the wine, pulling the cork, she took it straight from the bottle. Holding it to the side, she slid her hand up to his neck and brought him down to share. She flirted with his tongue, giving him the taste of strawberries, wine and cream, and his palm curved around her ass to bring her up against his lower abdomen where he was pressed against the counter.

She drew back, giving him a speculative look. “Where are the kitchen knives?”

His gaze didn’t leave her face. “Three feet to the left, behind you, just beyond the range of your reach.”

“How many are there?”

“Seven. One’s missing.”

“Probably in the dishwasher from cutting the fruit for brunch. You never let your guard down.”

“Sounds like you don’t, either, if you’re interrogating me when you should be letting me make you incoherent with lust.”

“You blew out my brain cells a little while ago. I’m recuperating.”

He passed his fingers over her mouth. “Maintaining the protections on this place. On your staff. It takes a lot from you. That’s why you don’t leave the property.”

She stiffened. Damn it, Li. The handsome Asian prick bastard.

“I have everything I need here. My protections help them make me a lot of money.”

“Money is a means to an end. It’s not the end for you. This house, this property, it’s top-notch, graceful, beautiful. Much like its mistress. Quality’s important to you, but not the price tag. This place represents safety, a haven, a place you’ve constructed that belongs to you, a world you’ve made to control all the variables.”

She set aside the wine. When he touched her face, trying to draw it back up to him, she resisted. But he insisted, so she glared up at him.

“This place is your law, your morality,” he continued, “because whatever it needs for protection, you provide. Its enemy is your enemy.”

Lifting her hand to his lips, he pressed his mouth to her palm, and then to her wrist. “That much is true,” she said, mollified a bit. She didn’t want him to be an enemy, though she was afraid it was eventually going to end up that way.

“Go to town with me tomorrow,” he said, making those distracting nips against her flesh. “I’ll reinforce your shielding and power here so you don’t have to worry about them.”

“I can do that part, if you…shield me.” She couldn’t believe she’d said it, but then his head lifted, eyes studying her.

“What do you mean?”

She sighed. “That’s why I don’t go to town…often. Even without releasing the energy, males…get aggressive, distracted. I can’t be in public venues, random gatherings of people, because I can’t control every impact. I can protect one or two of my staff when they go into town for supplies, but that’s because I do it from here, where my magic is strongest.”

He nodded. “All right. You handle the shielding here; I’ll protect you, give you a glamour. Or an antiglamour as the case may be.” Amusement flitted through his features as he bent to brush her lips.