“Indeed. Beloved will do nicely.”

She lifted a hideous hand to her chignon, her bony, triple-jointed fingers skipping over the careful construction, her wrist thinner than a handle on a wire whisk. Her body was no different: All symphaths were built like chess players, not quarterbacks, which followed their preference to battle with the mind, not the body. In their robing, they were neither male nor female, but rather a distilled version of both sexes, and this was why the princess wanted him as she did. She liked his body, his muscle, his obvious and brutal maleness, and she usually wanted to be physically restrained during sex-something she sure as shit wasn’t getting at home. As far as he understood it, the symphath version of the act was no more than some mental posturing followed by two rubs and a gasp on the male’s part. Plus he was willing to bet their uncle was hung like a hamster, and had balls the size of pencil erasers.

Not that he’d ever checked-but come on, the guy was not exactly a paragon of testosterone.

The princess moved around the cabin as if she were showing off her grace, but there was a purpose as she went from window to window and looked out.

Damn it to hell, always with the windows.

“Where is your watchdog tonight?” she said.

“I always come alone.”

“You lie to your love.”

“Why ever would I want anyone to see this?”

“Because I am beautiful.” She stopped in front of the panes closest to the door. “He is over to the right, by the pine.”

Rehv didn’t need to lean to one side and look out to know she was right. Of course she could sense Trez; she just couldn’t be exactly sure where or what he was.

Still, he said, “There is nothing but trees.”

“Untrue.”

“Afraid of shadows, Princess?”

As she looked over her shoulder, the albino scorpion hanging from her earlobe made eye contact with him as well. “Fear is not the issue. Disloyalty is. I do not abide by disloyalty.”

“Unless you’re practicing it, of course.”

“Oh, I am quite faithful to you, my love. Except for our father’s brother, as you know.” She turned and lifted her shoulders to her full height. “My mate is the only one apart from you. And I come here alone.”

“Your virtues abound, although as I’ve said, please take more into your bed. Take a hundred other males.”

“None would compare to you.”

Rehv wanted to throw up every time she paid him a false compliment, and she knew it. Which naturally was why she insisted on saying shit like that.

“Tell me,” he said to change the subject, “since you brought up our uncle, how does the motherfucker fare?”

“He still believes you dead. So my half of our relationship remains honored.”

Rehv put his hand in the pocket of his sable coat and took out the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars in cut rubies. He tossed the happy little packy onto the floor at the hem of her robe and removed his fur. His suit jacket and his loafers were next. Then it was his silk socks and his slacks and his shirt. No boxers to take off. Why bother.

Rehvenge stood before her fully erect, feet planted, breath easing in and out of his heavy chest. “And I’m ready to complete our transaction.”

Her ruby eyes went down his body and stopped at his sex, her mouth parting, her split tongue running over her lower lip. The scorpions in her ears twirled their clawed limbs in anticipation, like they were responding to her sexual flush.

She pointed to the velvet bag. “Pick this up and give it to me properly.”

“No.”

“Pick it up.”

“You like to bend over in front of me. Why should I rob you of your favorite hobby.”

The princess tucked her hands into the long sleeves of her robe and came to him in the smooth manner of symphaths, all but floating over the wooden floor. As she approached, he held his ground, because he would be dead and decayed before he took a step back for the likes of her.

They stared at each other, and in the deep, vicious silence, he felt a terrible communion with her. They were like of like, and though he hated it, there was a relief in being his true self.

“Pick it-”

“No.”

Her crossed arms unfurled and one of her six-fingered hands came tearing through the air at his face, the slap hard and sharp as her ruby eyes. Rehv refused to let his head kick back on impact while the cracking sound reverberated loud as a plate breaking.

“I want your tithe handed to me properly. And I want to know who she is. I have sensed your interest in this one before-when you are away from me.”

Rehv kept that beach ad pinned to his frontal lobe and knew she was bluffing. “I don’t bow down to you or anybody else, bitch. So if you want that bag, you’re going to have to touch your toes. And as for what you think you know, you’re wrong. There is no one for me.”

She slapped him again, the sting flickering down his spinal cord and pulsing into the head of his cock. “You bow down to me every time you come here with your pathetic payment and your hungry sex. You need this, you need me.”

He pushed his face closer to hers. “Don’t flatter yourself, Princess. You are a chore, not a choice.”

“Wrong. You live to hate me.”

The princess took his cock in her hand, her graveyard fingers wrapping around him tightly. As he felt her grip and her stroking, he was revolted…and yet his erection wept at the attention even as he couldn’t bear it: although he didn’t find her attractive at all, his symphath side was fully engaged in the battle of wills, and that was the erotic thing.

The princess leaned into him, her forefinger rubbing over the barb at the base of his arousal. “Whoever that female is in your head, she can’t compete with what we have.”

Rehv put his hands up to the sides of his blackmailer’s neck and pressed in with his thumbs until she gasped. “I could snap your head off your spine.”

“You won’t.” She moved her red, glossy lips over his throat, the crushed-pepper lipstick she wore burning him. “Because we couldn’t do this if I were dead.”

“Don’t underestimate the appeal of necrophilia. Especially where you’re concerned.” He grabbed onto the back of her chignon and yanked hard. “Shall we get down to business?”

“After you pick up-”

“Not going to happen. I don’t bow.” With his free hand, he ripped the front of her robe open, exposing the fine mesh weave of the bodysuit she always wore. Spinning her around, he forced her face-first into the door, fishing up through the folds of red satin as she gasped. The weave she wore over herself was soaked in scorpion venom, and as he worked toward her core, the poison soaked in through his skin. Hopefully, he could fuck her for a while with her robes still on-

The princess dematerialized out of his grip and re-formed right at the window Trez could see through. In a shifting rush, her robes left her, removed by her will, her flesh revealed. She was built like the snake she was, sinewy, and altogether too thin, her shimmering bodysuit giving the impression of scales as the moonlight reflected off its interlocking threads.

Her feet were planted on either side of the bag of rubies.

“You’re going to worship me,” she said, her hand going in between her thighs and stroking her slit. “With your mouth.”

Rehv came over and got down on his knees. Looking up at her, he said with a smile, “And you will be the one who picks up that bag.”