Cold as Ice (Ice 2)

“And you’ve assured me that your body is simply a well-trained machine, able to function regardless of the circumstances. How would that help me?”

“Don’t be so unimaginative, Genevieve. Do you really think everything I tell you is the truth? Lying is one of the three things I’m best at. And you know the other two.”

She looked down at her uneaten meal. “Cooking?” she said hopefully.

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“Killing. And sex.”

“But if you’re such a good liar, how do I know it’s true?”

“You aren’t going to know about the killing part until it’s too late, and I’m hoping you won’t even be aware of what’s going on. As for the sex…” He stretched out his hands. “That’s up to you.”

“I’m going to bed. Without you.” But she didn’t, couldn’t move.

“That’s what you said before, and you’re still here. I don’t think that’s what you want. If you can’t soften my heart, you could always try to overpower me when my attention is otherwise engaged. I might even fall asleep afterward—don’t men often do that?”

“Not my men,” she said loftily.

He smiled. “You don’t have a man, Genevieve. And you haven’t in more than three years, not since you moved to New York. Do you think I don’t have complete files on you? I know where you went to school, how you lost your virginity, what you eat for breakfast. I know you have a weakness for Hong Kong action movies, and French rock ’n’ roll. You graduated third in your class at Harvard Law and it drove you crazy that you weren’t first. I know you like it missionary style, don’t want to go down on anyone, and you seldom come. And you’re lactose intolerant. Come on, Ms. Spenser. I bet I can make you scream with pleasure.”

She felt hot and cold at the same time. His intimate knowledge of her was horrifying and inexplicable. His resources extended past the simple procurement of a rare soda pop on a Caribbean island. If he’d already committed that much about her to memory, was there anything left to hide?

“No, you can’t,” she said, her voice shaky.

He rose, a mistake on his part. When he lounged in a chair he might almost look harmless, but when he rose to his full height she knew just how little she had to fight him with.

“You can always take that butcher knife you hid under your mattress and stab me midorgasm. Then you could find out for yourself how arousing it is.”

“Killing you wouldn’t be very arousing,” she said. “Satisfying, maybe, but arousing…no.” He knew about the knife, even where she hid it. Was there nothing he didn’t know?

“If you’d rather use my bedroom I’ll get another knife for you,” he offered. “I’m trying my best to be helpful here.”

He came up to her, and she told herself it was too late. Maybe it had been too late from the moment she saw him. He put his hands on her shoulders, sliding them behind her thick hair to meet at the back of the caftan.

“Come on, Ms. Spenser,” he whispered, mocking. “I can give you the best orgasm you’ve ever had. Prove me wrong.”

She lifted her face to kiss him because she knew it was going to happen. This was to save her life, she told herself, closing her eyes. This was her only chance to save herself and Harry. Virgin sacrifice to the god of death.

But she was no virgin, and this was no sacrifice. She felt his hands catch the back of the caftan and rip, and she heard a shower of tiny buttons scatter over the tile floor as the fabric parted, exposing her back to the cool night air.

His hands covered her shoulders, pushing the caftan down her arms, so that she stood there, dressed only in the tiny scraps of lingerie she’d been forced to choose.

His blue eyes swept down her body, and his wicked mouth curved in a smile. “I was hoping you chose those,” he murmured. “Much more fun than nothing at all.”

He wasn’t even breathing deeply. She reached out and put her hand against his chest, where, if he had a heart, she would feel it beating. Her own was racing. His was slow and steady, like a machine. If machines had hearts.

“Yes, I have a heart,” he said, his hand covering hers and moving it inside the unbuttoned linen shirt, so that she could feel his smooth skin against her palm, her fingertips. She half expected him to feel cool to the touch, but he was warm, almost hot.

“You have a heart,” she agreed.

He put his hand on her breast, and she flinched, holding still. “But yours is racing. Why, Genevieve? Are you afraid of me?”

“Shouldn’t I be?”

“Yes. But that’s not why your heart is racing.” “You think I’m all aflutter with desire?” she said, fighting. “I’m not that easy.”

“You’re child’s play,” he whispered against her mouth, a feather-soft touch that wasn’t quite a kiss. “All I have to do is touch you and you melt.”