"You stayed with me," he said, awed by her compassion. "You helped me, Tess. Thank you."
She could have drawn her hand out of his easy hold at any moment, but she hesitated there, a question in her blue-green gaze. "I think... Since you seem to be all right now, I think it's time to call it a night. It's late, and I should go home."
Dante resisted the urge to point out that she was trying to run again. He didn't want to scare her off, so he slowly got up from the sofa and stood near her. He looked at their fingers, still touching at the tips, neither one of them willing to break the unexpected contact.
"I have to... go," she said quietly. "I don't think this--whatever this is that's happening between us--is a good idea. I'm not looking to get involved with you."
"And yet you've been sitting here taking care of me for the past four-plus hours."
She frowned. "I couldn't have left you alone. You needed help."
"What do you need, Tess?"
He curled his fingers, capturing hers in a firmer hold now. The air in the small office seemed to constrict and throb with awareness. Dante could feel Tess's pulse kickstart into a faster beat, a vibration he picked up through her fingertips. He could read her interest, the desire that had been there when he'd kissed her at the art exhibit and been sorely tempted to seduce her in front of a few hundred witnesses. She had wanted him then, maybe even last night too. The delectable, trace scent coming off her skin as she held his meaningful stare told him plainly enough that she wanted him now.
Dante smiled, desire flaring in him for the woman whose blood was a part of him.
The woman who just might be in league with his enemies, if Tess had any hand at all in her onetime boyfriend's pharmaceutical ventures.
She wasn't thinking of the human now, that was for sure. Tess's eyes darkened, and her breathing picked up speed, rushing shallowly from between her parted lips. Dante flexed his biceps, just the slightest pull of his arm to bring her closer. She came toward him without resistance.
"I want to kiss you again, Tess."
"Why?"
He chuckled, low under his breath. "Why? Because you're beautiful, and because I want you. And I think you want me too." Dante brought his free hand up to her face and gently stroked the line of her jaw. She felt like silk against his fingertips, as delicate as glass. He brushed his thumb across the dusky swell of her lips.
"God, Tess. I'm dying to taste you right now."
She closed her eyes, exhaling a sigh. "This is crazy," she whispered. "I don't... this isn't... something that I normally--"
Dante lifted her chin and bent to press his lips to hers. He'd meant only to sample the feel of her mouth on his, an urge he'd been harboring since those few heated moments they'd shared at the museum reception. Then he'd been something of a ghost to her, stealing a taste of her passion, then slipping away before she could know if he was real or imagined. Now, for a reason he could hardly comprehend, he wanted her to know he was flesh and bone.
He was, evidently, a goddamn idiot.
Because right now he wanted her to feel him--all of him--and understand that she was his.
He'd meant only to taste, but she was too sweet on his tongue. She was so responsive, her hands coming up around his neck to hold him closer as their mouths crushed together in a deep, prolonged joining. Seconds melted into a minute, then minutes more. A mad, timeless oblivion.
As he kissed her, Dante buried his hands in the luxurious mass of her hair, reveling in the softness of her, the heat of her. He wanted her undressed. He wanted her na**d beneath him, screaming his name as he pushed inside her.
God, how he wanted.
His blood was pounding, hot and furious, through his body. His sex was stiff with need, the hard length of him fully aroused, and he was only just getting started with Tess.
The way he felt now, he hoped this was only the start.
Before Dante could stop himself, he was guiding her around to the sofa, easing her down onto the cushions.
She fell back, looking up at him from under those thick-fringed lashes, the aqua color of her eyes gone dark like stormy azure. Her mouth was glistening and swollen from his kiss, her lips blushing a deep, dark rose. The front of her neck was pink with the flush of her desire, color that fanned down into the V of her clingy shirt. Her ni**les were hard little buds, straining against the fabric with each rise of her breath. She was ripe with want, and he had never seen anything more exquisite.
"You're mine, Tess." Dante moved over her, kissing a path from her lips to her chin, then along her throat, to the soft skin below her ear. She smelled so good. Felt so good against him.
Dante groaned, his nostrils picking up the sweet perfume of her arousal. Lust made his gums ache with the stretching of his fangs. He could feel the sharp points coming down, throbbing with the steady beat of his pulse. "You are mine. And you know that, don't you?"
Although her voice was small, little more than a breath of air rushing out of her lungs, Dante heard her plainly, and the word went through him like fire.
She said yes. God, what was she saying?
What was she doing, letting herself be kissed and touched--seduced--like this?
It was reckless and so unlike her at all. Probably dangerous too, for a dozen reasons she couldn't quite bring herself to care about right now.
She'd never been easy--far from it, given her general distrust of the male gender--but something about this man made fear and inhibition fly right out the window. She felt linked to him somehow, a connection that went deeper than anything she knew, into uncharted territory that made her think of fairy-tale concepts like fate and destiny. Those things weren't part of her normal lexicon, but she couldn't deny that despite all she should be feeling about this moment, it just felt... right.