And then the front doors blew open, allowing another dozen vampires to pour into the room. I don’t think most of the patrons noticed, other than those getting jostled aside as the new arrivals cut a swath across the floor. But the power emanating off them almost knocked me down.

They were all masters. Third-level, at a guess, easily able to have courts of their own. Which made it a little ridiculous that they were after one lone dhampir. I mean, I’m good, but I’m not that good. They surged forward, and I didn’t even hesitate. I turned on my heel and ran.

The pulse of the music felt like the rhythm of my heart—fast and frantic—as I fought my way over the sticky floor to the elevated DJ booth and climbed the vibrating metal frame. The lousy visibility wouldn’t bother the vamps, but it was a different story for me. I needed a vantage point.

The DJ was another young Asian guy with a fall of bleached blond hair. He was also human, judging by the fact that his tank top was stained dark down the spine. “Lost my date,” I yelled.

He nodded in time with the deafening music. “What’s your name?”

I pretended I couldn’t hear him and scanned the room. It was obvious at once that the ground floor was hopeless. The warehouse dated from the bad old days before anyone started worrying about things like natural light or ventilation for the toiling masses. It had no windows that I could see that hadn’t been bricked up long ago. But there was a catwalk around half the room with the old manager’s office perched in the middle. And I was betting he’d had light.

The DJ grabbed the back of my jacket as I started down. “Hey, hey, hey,” he said into his microphone, “if anyone out there has lost a lady, she’s up here keeping me company. Don’t hurry to claim her, all right?”

He turned a spotlight on me, causing the eyes of half the people—and all of the vamps—in the place to swivel in my direction. I hit the switch for strobes, slammed my heavy-ass duffel into the side of the DJ’s head and jumped the six feet to the floor. I landed badly enough to almost twist an ankle, and knocked over a guy with a tray of Jell-O shots. The room went black-and-white and stuttering as I slipped in the mess, righted myself and headed for the balcony.

I didn’t make it.

Someone darted in from the side, snapped the strap on the duffel and took off. I changed course to follow and saw the duffel disappear into the hallway beside the bar. It was empty by the time I got there, but a door beside the ladies’ was just closing. I kicked it back open and got a brief glimpse around—a desk, a chair, a sagging fan set in a water-stained ceiling—and then a furious vampire caught me by the wrists, using his body to pin me to the desk.

I tried to wrench free, but nothing happened. I tried again in disbelief, because I’m stronger than all but the senior masters. This time, he did let go, but only so he could grab my hips instead. He swung me up and slammed me backward onto the scarred wood, clearing the surface with a sweep of his arm. Papers, a laptop, glass and metal went flying, half of it shattering against the nearby wall.

I managed to wrestle a knife out of my boot, but he grabbed it before I could drive it home, flinging it away to land quivering in the side of the fake wood paneling. I got an elbow in a sensitive spot, but he pinned my wrists to the desk. He pressed his hips hard against me and swore softly, viciously, “If we get out of this alive, I will kill you!”

Startled out of fighting for a moment, I paused, staring at him. There wasn’t much light in the room, but a few beams of pale blue leaked in from the hall. They struck highlights in the thick auburn hair, which as usual was confined by a gold slide at his nape, and turned his face into a sculpture of elegant bone, skin and shadow. It made him look more dangerous than the man I remembered, and he’d been plenty dangerous enough.

But at least I knew why I couldn’t move. Tight black jeans and a matching cashmere sweater showed off six feet of solid muscle he didn’t need. A first-level master, Louis-Cesare could have held me against the desk with a tendril of power he wouldn’t even miss.

“You haven’t been alive in four centuries,” I pointed out, as he tore off my jacket. My weapons hit the floor, followed in short order by my tank top and bra. “Hey!”

“They saw what you were wearing.”

“Pretty soon I’m not going to be wearing anything!”

“Exactly.”

He ripped my belt out of its loops and popped the line of buttons on my jeans, all in one smooth motion. I caught his arm. “This isn’t going to work. They’ll scent us!”

“No, they won’t.”

“We have a bloody head in a bag!”

“I have hidden talents.”

Not so hidden ones, too, I didn’t say, as he shoved his own jeans down. It was the only disrobing he bothered to do before pushing me onto my back. The desk was cold against my bare skin, like the steel of the knife he used to cut my thong away.

I started to ask if the vamps had seen the color of my panties, too, but he swallowed the words, kissing me as his fingers worked roughly, expertly, between my thighs. He broke the kiss after a moment, to give me time to breathe, I suppose, but air wasn’t what I needed. I knew he was just trying to fool Cheung’s boys into believing we were having an assignation, but it had been a long, dry month and, damn it, I’d missed him. My hands fisted in his shirt, giving me leverage to pull him down and kiss him back, brutally.

He tasted sweet, with a bitter edge of hard liquor, and he smelled even better. And he wasn’t wearing anything under those jeans. My hands slid down the thickly muscled back to the taut mounds below, fingernails sinking deep.

Olga had definitely been right, I thought vaguely, as a shudder went through him. He raised his head to glare. “That was completely unnecessary.”

“Oh, it was necessary,” I said, wishing it had been my teeth, but I couldn’t reach that far, and then he did something with his fingers that made the breath fracture in my throat. The best I could do was a growled command: “Faster, faster, you son of a bitch—”

He obliged, although the desk really wasn’t built for our current activity, and my head and shoulders fell off the back. Not that I was complaining. Not even when his fangs—damn him—sank into the tender flesh his fingers had been tormenting. My spine arched with a combination of pain and pleasure so intense that I didn’t even notice when the door burst open.

Until he spun, snarling.

“Sorry,” a deep voice said, and the door shut again.

He drew in air he didn’t need, his lips glossy and a little swollen. I thought of how they had gotten that way and met his eyes. “If you stop now, I will kill you,” I told him distinctly.

The threat had no apparent effect, but a shiver went through him when I suddenly grasped evidence that he hadn’t been entirely playacting, either. “Dorina…” The tone was a warning, but I was way past caring.

I tugged him a little, sending a shiver through that strong frame. “Louis-Cesare. It’s good to finally have you in hand.”

He winced, either at the pun or the sensation, and his right hand tightened on my thigh. His left was occupied with the duffel, which he’d snatched from under the desk as soon as the door closed. I found that pretty telling, considering that he hadn’t even bothered to pull his pants up first. “You don’t.”

“More or less.” He was a big boy. Everywhere. “Although I’m a little fuzzy on why you stole my duffel bag.”

“It seemed the easiest way to get you off the floor without a fight.”

I stared at him incredulously. Louis-Cesare was the dueling champion of the European Senate. He didn’t walk away from fights; he relished them. I guess it’s true what they say about only being able to think with one head at a time.

“Then why’s your hand still on it?” I asked sweetly.

“I’m not the only one who is acting possessive.” He stared down at my own hand, blue eyes gleaming. “Are you planning to do anything with that?”

“I’m debating it. Are you going to tell me what you’re doing here?”

“That is not your concern.”

I stared at him, half in awe, half in exasperation. Louis-Cesare had been born the son of a king, and none of the centuries that had passed since had diminished his arrogance one iota. I had his dick in my hand, and he was still acting like he was the one in control.

“Okay.” I gave him an experimental stroke. It was a new interrogation technique, but I thought it had possibilities. “How about a trade? Give me back my property and I’ll return yours—in good working order.”

He didn’t look too impressed. So I varied my technique and was rewarded with a shift of hips and a heavy weight pressing into my palm. His eyes squeezed shut for a moment, and when they opened again, they were darker. But he wasn’t about to admit that I was getting to him.

Stubborn vampire. The evidence was rather… outstanding… in my favor. I picked up the pace, wondering if I should gentle him along to make this last longer or stroke him harder just to see how crazy I could make him. I felt a reaction ripple through his body and heard a hiss through tightly clenched teeth.

An answer if I’d ever gotten one.

But a second later, my wrist was caught in a grip of steel. “The vampire does not belong to you.”

I shrugged. “Give me back the Senate’s property then. And while you’re at it, you could explain why everyone is suddenly so interested in a loser like Ray.”

“Hey!” A protest drifted up from the duffel.

But the only answer I got from Louis-Cesare was a callused fingertip tracing a swollen lump on my cheekbone. It was a minor wound, collected who knew where, and his touch was unexpectedly gentle. But something about it made me tremble. My skin felt too sensitive suddenly, enough that I didn’t know whether the barely there touch hurt or felt good. But it felt.

Not too long ago, I’d thought that was something I’d forgotten how to do. Lately, people kept reminding me, with Louis-Cesare’s name at the top of the list. I still wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.