The Secret Night. Rebecca York
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her closer, he moved his lips over hers, then sighed in relief as she opened for him. Her mouth was the sweetest thing he had ever tasted. And as he pressed her breasts against his chest, he felt the frantic beating of her heart. Or maybe it was his own heartbeat that he felt. He could no longer tell.
Some rational part of his mind was still issuing warnings. This must stop. He must break away from her before it was too late. But his mouth continued to devour hers, and instead of letting her go, he shifted her in his arms so that he could cup one soft breast. His fingers stroked the hardened tip, wringing a sob of pleasure from her. She pressed against him, silently demanding more, and he gladly gave it.
Picking her up in his arms, he carried her to a table that had materialized out of the mist. He lay her upon it, then began unbuttoning the front of her gown, his shaking fingers clumsy as he undid each button.
Pushing the fabric aside, he looked at her breasts. They were lovely and rounded, the nipples a soft pink and beautifully puckered for him. He slid his fingers back and forth across those tight buds, feeling his whole body go rigid.
He wanted to plunge deep inside her again and again until he found release. And he wanted more—the ultimate joining for the creature he had become. The slits at the sides of his mouth ached with an intensity he had rarely felt. Even when his fangs slid out, the pain didn’t go away.
He wanted her blood with a shattering urgency. He felt he would go mad if he didn’t taste that part of her.
Tipping her head back, he stroked his tongue against the slender column of her throat. Then he pressed his fangs against her pale skin.
“I want you inside me,” she said. “And I want the rest of it, too.”
He raised his head and stared down at her. “How do you know about the rest of it?”
She only smiled at him.
Her willingness seemed to bring him partially to his senses. “No, I can’t…”
“Do it,” she whispered.
“No.”
“Are you afraid?” she challenged.
He didn’t know the answer. And while he hesitated, the woman evaporated, leaving his arms empty—and his body hot and heavy with unfulfilled need.
Nick clawed his way out of sleep and lay panting on the bed. Bloody hell. It had all been so vivid…so real. Was the woman a fantasy—something his mind had conjured because he’d been so long abstinent?
Or was she real? And if she was…where was she?
EMMA WOKE disoriented. She had been in the arms of her fantasy lover, Nicholas Vickers. And then he had vanished into thin air. His face was so clear in her mind. Dark, brooding, his eyes deep set, his nose a Roman blade, his jaw square and firm. And his mouth…
Dear Lord, his mouth… It was positively wicked—those deliciously sensual lips tantalizing her skin, that expert tongue exploring her mouth and drawing trails down her neck and across her breasts, and those fine, white teeth, nipping and gently biting and…and something else. Something more about his teeth. Something she didn’t want to think about.
She reached out with one hand, sliding it over the cool sheet beside her. She was alone.
Well, of course she was. The man had appeared in her dreams only because she had been focused on him when she went to sleep.
She stretched, still slightly disoriented. The mattress beneath her was soft, the sheets crisp. They gave off a clean, fresh smell as she moved, rustling them. The blackout blinds at the windows kept all but a slim shaft of light around the edges from filtering through the window.
Without lifting her head from the pillow, she turned to the right and focused on the lighted face of the clock on the bedside table. Ten-thirty! She’d thought she would toss and turn all night and get up early, but she’d slept for a good ten hours.
She had work to do. Every moment she left her sister at the Refuge was a moment too long. She’d debated briefly with herself last night about calling the cops, but she’d quickly decided against it. Margaret hadn’t been kidnapped. If she were questioned, she’d say she was at the Refuge of her own free will, as would anyone else the police might ask.
Emma took a hot shower, then got dressed, glad that she’d washed her underwear the night before. It was still a little damp, so she used the hair dryer on it. Dressed in last night’s clothes, she took the elevator down to see what she could do about supplementing her wardrobe in the gift shop.
She had just purchased a Charm City T-shirt and was about to step into the lobby when she saw a man approach the front desk. Her blood ran cold when she realized who he was—Mort Frazier, one of the guys from Damien Caldwell’s inner circle.
As she stood behind a display rack of scarves near the shop entrance, she watched Frazier approach the desk, which was only a short distance away.
“Can you give me Ms. Birmingham’s room number?” he asked the desk clerk politely.
The clerk pulled an apologetic look. “I’m sorry, sir. I’m not allowed to give out that information. You can call her on the house phone.”
Frazier grimaced. “I know you’re following the rules, but I’m her brother. I don’t want to call ahead. She doesn’t know I’m in town, and I was hoping to surprise her.”
The clerk hesitated.
“Please. She’ll love opening her door and seeing me.”
Emma waited with her heart pounding.
The clerk looked over her shoulder to make sure nobody on the staff was watching her, then she leaned forward and whispered the room number.
So much for privacy rules. Emma clenched her fists, wishing she had the time to get the woman fired. But then, as Frazier strode to the elevator, she realized that the clerk might have done her a favor. Without her room number, Frazier probably would have waited in the lobby for her to appear. This way, she had a chance to escape before he figured out that she wasn’t in her room.
As soon as the elevator doors closed behind him, Emma slipped out the hotel’s front entrance and walked rapidly in the direction Alex Shane had said led toward the inner harbor.
She had followed Shane’s advice and not used her credit card when she’d booked the room the previous night, but it hadn’t occurred to her to use a false name. Had Caldwell’s men called a bunch of hotels looking for her? Or did they have some other, secret source of information?
No matter how they’d found her, she’d made a lucky escape. Still, she kept looking over her shoulder as she walked to Light Street, where she found the harbor, restaurants and all kinds of attractions for tourists. At an ATM in a shopping pavilion, she withdrew the daily maximum allowable amount from her account, then she made for the exit. Thinking hard, planning her next move, she crossed the street to the Ramada Renaissance hotel, where she booked a shuttle to BWI Airport, alternating between the lobby and the ladies’ room until it arrived.
At the airport, she went to the first rental car company she came to and used her credit card to pay for a vehicle. She had no choice; car rental companies required the use of a credit card, and she required the use of a car. Still, her nerves were jumping until she was on the road again.
She watched the rearview mirror as much as the road ahead until she was well away from BWI.
At a drugstore in a little town called Elkridge, she consulted a phone book, then called the closest gun shop and found out that, in Maryland, since she wasn’t under twenty-one or suffering from a mental disorder, she could walk in and buy a gun without a waiting period. An hour later, she had a Sig Sauer P210 tucked into the compartment of her driver’s door. Again she used her credit card. Then she cleared out of the area, heading south, toward D.C.
The risk was worth it. With the weapon beside her, she felt a lot more secure.
Her