The Jackal put his lips back to hers—
The instant the contact was made, he felt as though he had kissed her for years, and more than that, his hunger resurged. He welcomed the mating instinct. Embraced it. Held on to it as if it were precious.
Because it was.
Instinctively, he closed his eyes—
And immediately reopened them. The darkness behind his lids took him back into the dream—or threatened to—and he wasn’t risking that kind of confusion.
Looking into Nyx’s face was the cure. He had to stop kissing her to do that, but as he rolled his hips and penetrated her core, the way she gasped . . . the way her head kicked back once more . . . the way one of her long canines locked down on her lower lip . . . gave him plenty to make up for the relative loss of contact.
He watched her orgasm. Felt it again, too, down below, in that part of his body that he had become separated from. She brought him back together, though, reuniting his soul with what had once been a necessary and defining part of him, but which had become nothing more than a vestigial appendage.
The alchemy she created should not have surprised him. From the moment their paths had crossed, her presence had stirred him unexpectedly. But he had never seen this deeper level coming.
He had never anticipated she would . . . heal him.
And that made her dangerous.
Are you sure I can’t get you something to eat?”
As Jack asked the question, Nyx looked over at him. They were both standing—fully clothed.
Okay, he had always been fully clothed, except where it really counted. She was the one who’d had to get dressed again.
It was almost like the sex they’d shared had never happened. Well, provided she didn’t move. Whenever she did, the internal ache reminded her of what they’d done together. Not that she needed the refresher. She remembered every kiss. Every arch. Every gasp, each grab, and all the orgasms in between. When they’d finally stopped, she had continued to lie on his chest, and that period of holding him close had struck her as risky. Then came the awkward questions about rebathing, and she’d ended up back in the pool.
After he’d given her a bar of harsh prison soap, he’d walked off down one of the tunnels.
As she’d washed her hair properly, the subtle scent of tobacco had wafted down to her, cutting into the spruce-tinted spice of the lye. Had he been smoking? Who else could it have been.
Immediately after he’d left, she’d waited for him to return and maybe join her in the warm, churning water. But after a while, she’d gotten the sense that he was waiting for her to step out and get clothed, so she had. As soon as she was back in her pants and her tops, he’d emerged from the shadows as if he’d been watching her.
And then he’d resettled on the far side of the pool once again, propped up with his legs straight out. Like maybe, in his mind, none of what had happened between them . . . had happened.
As she’d followed his lead and returned to where she’d started, she’d been of a mind to demand they talk it out. But that was a relationship move, and hello, she’d known him for less than twenty-four hours. In a hostile environment.
At least it was time to head out now. She was tired of worrying about what had been done to him and what he’d been dreaming of.
And what the hell had happened to end him up here.
“Nyx? Would you like food?”
Refocusing, she shook her head. “I’m fine. Do you want to go and get something for yourself?”
“I’m not leaving you—”
Both of them turned at the same time in the same direction, toward the tunnel on the left. Going by the scents, four males were approaching, but damned if she could hear anything over the falling water.
As she went for the gun she had tucked in her waistband, Jack said sharply, “It’s just Kane and the others.”
“Others? Plural?”
From out of the shadows, the males came one by one. She relaxed as she recognized Kane, the aristocrat, and Lucan, the one with the yellow eyes.
The next male was taller than the others, with a body that was slightly leaner, but no less hard. He had white hair that was streaked with black, although not because he was in the latter part of his life, and the stuff had been pulled back and braided as seemed to be the custom. What was odd about him, though, was that his irises had the same lack of color that that braid had. As a result, his pupils were pits that were somehow unreadable. Sure, he was smiling—nice surprise, there. But there were depths there that she couldn’t guess at, and that meant he was unnerving.