And suddenly, stupidly, I felt a sharp stab of jealousy for a dead woman.

And okaaaay. That was enough for one day.

I scraped the last of the guac out of the little plastic cup. “I’m think I’m gonna turn in,” I told Marco. “What was it you wanted to ask me?”

The dark head tilted inquiringly.

“Fred said there was something?” I prompted.

He grinned. “Oh yeah. I wanted to know what you did to those witches.”

“Why?” I asked warily.

“’Cause they just called asking for an appointment tomorrow.”

“Um.”

Dark eyes narrowed. “Is there a problem?”

“Better make it the day after. I’m . . . planning to sleep in.”

He still didn’t ask. “Get a bath,” he told me, tapping the side of his nose.

And then he ruined it by stealing the rest of my nachos.

Bastard.

I was washing out the damned T-shirt when I got a text message. I grabbed my phone off the nightstand before it vibrated off the edge and saw a big black question mark staring at me. I stared back at it for a moment, and then texted 2moro.

I waited to make sure it went through.

Shit.

Yeah. It went through.

I left the tee to soak and got my weary butt in the shower. After washing an acre of Tony’s back forty down the drain, I leaned my head against the water-slick tile, wrapped a hand around my neck, and tried to relax. It didn’t work. I was tired, really, bone-achingly tired, to the point that I was surprised I didn’t just fall asleep right there.

But I wasn’t tired enough.

Not to relax, not to forget, not to just let it all go for a while and stop the whirlwind in my head. Lately, it had felt like one of those carnival games with the big spinning wheel and the barkers telling you to pay your money and take your chances. Only with my wheel, there was no point. Since every damned segment just held another problem.

And the space the little clicker landed on this time was labeled Mircea.

God, Mircea. No wonder Marco was being nice to me. He probably figured I was in for it already.

I kind of figured that, too. Vampires think differently than humans about a lot of things, but I didn’t think seeing your girlfriend making out with another guy on your lawn was one of them. Not when it had been caught by some of the cameras on-site to record my big moment, which had ended up being different than expected.

Not that that had stopped them from broadcasting it to the whole freaking world.

I’d been expecting to hear about that—it was one reason the breakneck pace of the last week hadn’t bothered me. I preferred being somewhere else. But sooner or later, Mircea and I were going to have to talk, and wasn’t that going to be fun? When I couldn’t even tell him what had been going on, because that would out Pritkin as part incubus? And that so-sharp intellect wouldn’t take long to put two and two together, not when there’d only ever been one incubus-human hybrid in all history.

I wondered which would bother Mircea more, me making out with a war mage or with the guy the world remembered as Merlin?

Of course, I wasn’t the only one with secrets. Like that whole thing with the Pythias I’d half overheard. What the hell did Mircea want with a Pythia so badly?

I knew what the senate wanted: having the Pythia in their corner gave them power in the supernatural community to rival that of the mages, something they’d never really had. And it didn’t hurt their efforts in the war, either. But this hadn’t been about the senate, had it? This had been about Mircea personally.

So what had he wanted?

Maybe it was only what I already knew—his brother Radu had been imprisoned by the Inquisition and tortured into madness. Going back in time to save him had been almost the first thing Mircea asked of me once we met again as adults. And it was certain that he loved his brother. He talked about him all the time. . .

But he didn’t talk about that. He didn’t talk about the centuries-long campaign he’d waged to save him. I could understand not telling me before I did what he wanted, in case I figured out that changing time was usually a major no-no for Pythias. But he hadn’t said anything afterward, either. And after he had Radu back, what was the harm in telling me?

Maybe it just hadn’t come up. But that was the thing with Mircea—a lot of things just never came up. And whenever I tried to ask about anything beyond the superficial, the conversation got sidetracked fast. Real fast.

So what didn’t he want me to know?

Maybe it was nothing, just the old habit of someone who had learned long ago to keep things to himself. But I wasn’t a rival master. And we were dating. We should be talking more than this—shouldn’t we?

I didn’t know. It wasn’t like I’d had a boyfriend before. Thanks to growing up at Tony’s, it wasn’t like I’d had any relationship that could, strictly speaking, be called normal. And Mircea could talk circles around ages-old vamps; he probably wouldn’t even have to break a sweat to keep me in the dark.

But was he?

My brain didn’t know, but my gut . . . my gut had other ideas. It had, for instance, vetoed the idea that I ask Rafe, Tony’s old court painter and my childhood friend, about my parents. It would have been easier than running Laura down—a lot easier. And alone among Tony’s old court, Rafe wouldn’t lie to me.

But then, he wouldn’t be able to lie to Mircea, either, if he was asked point-blank what I was up to. So I’d gone with Laura, even if maybe I hadn’t had to. Even if maybe these doubts were all in my head. Even if . .

For the tenth time I told myself to stop this and just wind down already. I had a full day tomorrow. I needed to clear my head. I needed some sleep. I needed—

Hell, I knew what I needed.

I also knew I wasn’t going to get it.

It was one of the problems of living with creatures with supernatural senses. They were with me all the time. Even when they weren’t right by my side, they might as well have been. And it wasn’t just their noses I had to worry about. Vampire hearing meant every breath was noted, every word, every sigh—

My fingers curled against the warm, wet tile, but it didn’t help. I needed some alone time. I needed some space. The most I’d been by myself lately had been that short time in Pritkin’s room, and then I’d mostly been asleep. Not that it mattered, since a war zone wasn’t conducive to certain things, although if I’d thought about it, I might have been desperate enough . .

I glanced at the shower door, which was all fogged up. That and the heavy fall of warm water made it feel almost like I was somewhere else. I could close my eyes and imagine a waterfall or a rain forest or . . . or a shower with no vampires around. I wasn’t real picky right now.

I stood there for a moment, wondering how a person got to the point where she actually had to have an internal debate over whether or not to masturbate. I felt a half-hysterical giggle rise to my lips at the sheer absurdity of it, which, of course, I also had to swallow back down. The great Pythia, demigoddess and heir to the throne of Artemis . .

Couldn’t even get herself off.

Only I could. I absolutely could. It felt like I wanted it so badly, was so close to the edge, that I might not have to do that much at all. I could just let my hand smooth over my breasts, slide over my stomach, and then just follow the trails of water a little . . . bit . . . lower. . .

And feel the sudden shock of hands on my body, a tongue sliding up my naked spine.

I should have jumped; I almost did jump. But I knew that tongue. I knew those hands. I knew . . . oh God.

The palms were warm, in defiance of the legend. The fingers were roughened by calluses formed hundreds of years ago, in wars most people had forgotten. And the touch . . . was masterful.

That’s what five hundred years of experience does for you, I thought wildly, as a water-slick body pressed against mine.

I didn’t turn around. I didn’t move. I hadn’t expected to see Mircea tonight, had been psyching myself up for even a phone call, and now . .

I wanted to speak, to tell him I was sorry, to tell him it hadn’t been how it looked. But my throat had closed up, and nothing came out. Except a groan, as wet, naked skin slid against me, with an almost electric frisson.

Mircea didn’t say anything, either, not in words. But I knew the tense and flex of that lean body, and it didn’t need words. The hands that had been gentle a moment before gripped my hips, fingers digging into my naked flesh. And pulled me roughly back against him, abruptly enough to wrest another gasp from my lips.

Or maybe that was the image that flashed across my vision, of a powerful body standing under the spray, one arm braced against the wall, tight jaw beaded with water, and eyes half-lidded as he . . . pleasured himself?

It didn’t make sense, any more than the fact that the tiles he was leaning against were a different color from mine. Or that the shower he was standing in was configured in a different direction, making my brain hurt. But I didn’t have time to process it, because the visuals were a little . . . overwhelming.

Wet dark hair streaming over his shoulders, free as few ever saw it. Chest running with rivulets, stomach and buttocks tight with effort, biceps hard and bunching on the arm that he was braced with, and the one he was using to hold himself. Only hold wasn’t the right word.

He was pulling out of the cage of his palm in long, slow strokes and then surging in hard, letting me feel the power behind each thrust. There was none of the butterfly touch he often used with me, which I’d mistaken for his preference. But which I now realized was the result of a vampire overcompensating for the fragility of a human, so afraid he might hurt her that he was overgentle, overcautious.

He wasn’t being cautious now. And it was beautiful, he was beautiful, in his casual brutality. Someone who couldn’t hurt himself and knew he couldn’t, pushing his limits, reaching for a climax that—

Suddenly included me?

Those incredible eyes closed, sharp teeth buried in his lower lip, and a frown of intense concentration came over his face. A hand pushed my wet curls to the side, the tongue found the indentations on my neck he’d left there as a mark of his possession. And something like an electric shock reverberated through me. Hands slid over my body, furling my nipples, tightening my skin, even before an unmistakable thickness slid against me.