After she’d come a couple of times—he had no idea of the count, because the truth was, he didn’t really care—he got up and initiated a trade of places so he had his back to the wall. As the woman made like she was going to try to suck him off, her knees bending as her painted nails did the deed on his zipper, he stopped that bright idea by picking her up by the thighs and splitting her legs around his hips.

He didn’t want her mouth on him.

Too personal, as weird as that sounded.

Just as Ad was about to push inside her, he froze.

Jim Heron was standing opposite them, the angel’s arms crossed over his chest, his eyes narrowed and pissed off.

Nice timing. Fucking great.

But he wasn’t stopping now. His balls were tight as fists, and the top of his c**k was about to blow off.

Ad shrugged at the guy and entered the woman. If Jim wanted to watch, that was fine. Hell, if he wanted to join in, that was okay, too.

Although the latter seemed unlikely, given that I’m-going-to-kick-your-ass expression.

Whatever.

Closing his eyes, Ad gave himself over to the slick compression he’d taken solace in so many times in the past.

God, he missed Eddie so much it hurt.

Six floors up, in his room, Matthias was unleashed. Unhinged. Unraveled.

As he kissed Mels, he went to the buttons on her silk blouse and freed them one by one, the fine fabric parting to reveal even softer skin…and a pair of cotton-covered br**sts that knocked him the hell out. God, it was all too much already, the noises of their lips together, their panting breath, their clothes shifting around—the sight of her. And then there was the way she moved against him, her body undulating in waves that brought those br**sts up to his chest and then her h*ps into his.

He wanted his mouth all over her, and that was going to happen now—starting with her throat. Nipping his way down the smooth column to her collarbone, he brought his hand to just beneath her breast, brushing his thumb against the cup of her bra.

He meant to tease a little—didn’t last.

“Oh, God, yes…” she said as he felt her up.

At the sound of her groaning voice, he had to pause and collect himself, his head ducking into her hair as he struggled for control: The need to consume her was so great, he was a little shaken by it, because he didn’t know himself enough to trust that he wouldn’t hurt her.

There was no going back, though.

That bra was gone a heartbeat later: Springing the front clasp, he stared down at her pink ni**les and her pale curves.

He growled at that point. At least, he assumed that noise came from him.

Either that or a puma had somehow slipped into the room.

Matthias dipped his head and sucked one tip into his mouth, his tongue swirling around, flicking, licking. He didn’t leave the other side alone, couldn’t—his fingers pinched, then tweaked her tight little nipple, telling it to hang on; he’d be there in a second—

A sudden sting at the nape of his neck told him she had dug in, and abruptly, her thighs went wide as if her sex were dictating her movements, not her mind—and that vital core that defined her as a woman wanted what he could give her.

Or rather…wanted what he might have given her, if he could have.

Shit.

Even with her bumping and grinding against his pelvis, and in spite of the heat that was raging in his blood, his body couldn’t respond as a male’s should. There was no hard arousal to sink into her, no erection she could grab onto, no thick c**k she might wrap her lips around in payback for what was going to be done to her in another minute or two.

As a crushing sadness came over him, threatening to derail the session, a single moan from her was enough to get him back online: None of that mattered. All he wanted was to make her feel good, so when push came to shove—or rather, when she was going to want something to be pushable or shovable—he was just going to have to get creative.

Lifting his head, he stared into her flushed face and her wild eyes. That hair of hers was loose around the pillow, all wavy and spread out, and her cheeks were the color of Christmas.

Man, she was incredible.

Keeping their eyes locked, he rose up off her so that he was kneeling between her split legs. And in that pause, before things got really serious, he imagined himself as he had been, strong, powerful, his body as dominant as his will was.

As it stood now, he was glad he had the undershirt on. And he felt…really lucky.

She had everything to offer; he had nothing. And yet she wanted him anyway.

It was at that moment that he fell in love with her.

The shift in his heart and soul made no sense, and yet the emotional logic was so persuasive, the center of his chest resonated with a warmth that had never been there before: He knew without the specifics that he had spent a lifetime engaged in complicated cruelty, and yet here he was, na**d before her though he was clothed, accepted for who he was on the inside, not for what he didn’t look like and couldn’t do.

The revelation changed him internally, putting him into a gear that was slower than the mad rush that he’d all but tackled her with.

Now he moved deliberately, his hands going to the button and zipper of her slacks, and undoing things at an unhurried pace. Opening the fly wide, he curled down and pressed a kiss to her lower abdomen, halfway between her belly button and the top of her sensible, mind-blowingly erotic bikini panties.

Who needed that fussy lace and satin crap? Simple cotton did it for him, as long as she was the one wearing it.

Man, he wanted to suck on her through the damn things.

“I’m gonna get you naked,” he said in a voice warped with sex.

With another one of those holy-shit moans of hers, Mels cranked her head to the side and watched him pull off what covered her lower body, one hand drifting to her mouth and touching it.

Matthias reached up and edged her fingers between her lips. “Suck on them for me—oh, fuck, yeah…”

She did exactly what she was told, her cheeks drawing in as she complied, then her tongue parting through her fore- and middle fingers before the knuckles disappeared from sight again.

“Like this?” she said after pulling them free.

He had to close his eyes. It was either that or pass the f**k out…because all he could imagine was his c**k in that wet, warm hold, her down at his hips, her head going forward and back as that suction was all around him.

“You’re beautiful,” he growled as he tossed her pants over his shoulder.

Time to get to work.

His lips lingered along the top edge of the panties, tracing the way to one hip while his fingers trailed his mouth, touching lightly, caressing. When he got to the side, he took the cotton off her body, slipping it down her long legs.

He made love to her with his mouth.

It was the best sexual experience of his life. Everything was about her: how she felt, what she liked, how far he could push her before he had to let her climax…and it was amazing. He also had no intention of stopping anytime soon. Cupping her with his palms, he lifted up her h*ps and tilted them as he stretched out, ready to stay forever.

And it wasn’t like he couldn’t get inside her.

Straightening his tongue, he penetrated her core rhythmically, alternating the surges with great laps that tickled the top of her sex. Quicker. Deeper. Harder. He wanted her to fall apart on him over and over again, to keep coming against his lips, to burst free and twinkle back down to earth for the rest of their natural lives.

“Give me what I want,” he said. “Give me what I need….”

Putting his fingers in his mouth, he slicked them up and sank them in, and oh, man, it was good. Especially as she orgasmed, the pulsing clenches something that seemed to flood through him as if he were releasing along with her.

When it was over, he paused to catch his breath, and she lay there in glorious abandon, her br**sts heaving, her body loose all over, her skin flushed.

It took her a while to recover. She even tried to speak a couple of times, but couldn’t follow through.

Kinda made a guy feel like a man.

“That was…unbelievable.”

Her words were more purr than voice, and wasn’t that just f**king great.

As Matthias smiled, he felt just a little evil—not in a bad way, but in the masculine way—like when you had the woman you wanted naked, on her back, on your bed, and you had every intention of showing her some more attention.

“Would you like me to keep going?” he said on a dark drawl.

30

As Jim stood in that underground hallway, he was ready to rip his wingman a new one.

Of course, to do that, he’d have to peel that waitress off the bastard—and as much as he was a hands-on kind of guy, he wasn’t prepared to get that close to the Saran Wrap situation.

Fucker.

Literally.

And, yup, this happy little bump and grind put him in an even worse frame of mind: He’d come down to the Marriott ready to rip Adrian a new one over those photographs of that prostitute—and instead of finding the angel on the job, outside Matthias’s room? The SOB was nailing this chick in the same hallway where that operative had been killed by Devina the night before.

Like Jim didn’t already have a hair across his ass.

Those photographs, those goddamn photographs…

Adrian had said he’d been to a murder scene with Mels—and now the woman was showing up with pictures of a female victim whose hair had been dyed blond, and whose throat had been slit wide, talking about a pattern of runes that had been in the skin of the abdomen, but was now—gasp!—not there anymore?

That angel had to be the “why” behind the disappearance.

So it was time to have a come to Jesus with Mr. Eraser.

Meeting Adrian’s stare, he dared the guy to keep up with the fucking, and—shocker—the son of a bitch did.

The waitress was having a great time—at least, going from what Jim could see from the rear, her head thrashing, that hair flying, those arms contracting around Ad’s neck. For a moment, Jim thought back to some of his own sexual exploits—but then he settled on memories that weren’t relevant in the slightest:

Him with Devina. Used and abused by her and her minions in her Well of Souls.

He had no idea why he’d dwell on the shit. That hadn’t been about sex; it had been torture, plain and simple, and God knew he’d been trained for that.

Still, the images stayed with him, lingering in the background like a stink.

Made no sense. He’d had bones broken before—on purpose, by an enemy. He’d been cut in the past, too—strung up by his feet and beaten like a punching bag…oh, yeah, and that time in Budapest when he’d been packed into that car, driven out to the country, and left for dead after getting worked over with a claw hammer—

Abruptly, the waitress moaned the way women did when they weren’t faking it: this was not a contrived, pretty little sound engineered to make a guy think he was a sex god. This was the real kind, when the female was coming so hard she wasn’t even aware of the animal grunts she was throwing out.

As she thrashed, Adrian supported her up off the floor with barely any effort—then again, the chick was synched up hard, locked on him tighter than a coat of paint. And, shit, their movements were so universal, him pumping in an ever-increasing rhythm, her getting tossed around as those penetrations were received, absorbed, enjoyed. Watching it all, Jim probably should have been aroused. Should have wanted in.

At the very least, he should have stayed pissed off.

Instead, panic tingled on the fringes of his mind, memories of his arms pinned down and his own legs spread putting a fine sheen of sweat above his upper lip.

He turned away, not because he was so angry he was going to kill Adrian, and not because he was disgusted or too modest for the show.

His stomach churned.

The hands that took out his cigarettes shook ever so slightly, and the sounds as Adrian orgasmed made him shut his eyes for a second.

Naturally, the horny bastard went for a twofer with no recovery time.

And Jim couldn’t actually start smoking until the woman was gone.

Great.

When the pneumatics were finally over, Jim glanced across his shoulder. Adrian had slid the girl down to the ground and was letting her rest her head against his pecs. As he stroked her hair, he seemed utterly detached from her, to the point where he might as well have been in another zip code. Matter of fact, except for the instants when he’d shot his load, he appeared to have been on some kind of erotic autopilot the entire time.

Why the hell did he bother?

The waitress checked her watch, pulled herself together, and kissed Ad on the lips. Just before she left, she took a pen out and grabbed for Ad’s hand. With big strokes, she inked a number into his palm, and then curled his fingers up like she’d given him some sort of gift. Then on a twirl of her hair, she was off, all but skipping down the corridor in the direction that would take her to the restaurant’s kitchen.