He shrugged. “Nobody’s particularly worried about the FBI, and everyone wants the meeting, so . . . not many acceptable options on such short notice.”

“But they went to Win’s house. To his wife. I can’t believe he isn’t more upset.”

“Oh, he’s upset. He just isn’t going to show it, any more than the rest of us would. Remember who we’re dealing with.”

“Right.” Demons were very into appearances. Powerful demons, Gretnegs, were even more so, and Winston Lawden—Win—was Gretneg of House Caedes Fuiltean, the blood demons. “I don’t suppose we could just stay in here tonight? Get room service and watch pay-per-view?”

He smiled, and the golden light hitting his skin as he did made her breath catch in her throat.

He noticed. She knew he would. Reddish light that had nothing to do with the sunset flared in his eyes. “We have some time before dinner,” he said softly, drawing her close. “It would be a shame to waste it standing here, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t think I’d call it a waste,” she started, but she was only joking and they both knew it. She let him interrupt her without protest, let his kiss draw her away from any other silly ideas about talking. He was right. It would be a waste of time.

And a waste of the beautiful balcony, where the breeze lifted her hair from her shoulders and neck so his mouth could find her bare skin more easily. What the wind didn’t do his hand did, gathering the loose strands and twisting them gently at the back of her head.

Her own hands were busy as well, finding the buttons of his shirt and opening them one by one, slowly, savoring the unwrapping. The night before had, of course, been a chaste one; work had kept them apart for a few days before. It felt like longer, much longer.

Power rushed through her, smooth and warm like melted chocolate. Greyson’s power, tinged with fire and smoke, igniting her nerve endings. She let it dance along them like tiny sparks before sending it back, colored with her own power.

His sharp breath made her push harder. Made her give him more, energy she knew smelled like her, tasted like her. The demon powers that had been a dubious Christmas gift had one clear benefit, and she used it, sending the essence of herself into him and feeling him accept it. Feeling his breath grow hotter, his kisses more urgent, his body harder as he drew more of it in.

They swayed back inside, both aware that even private balconies weren’t necessarily private. He swung the French door shut behind them with his foot and pulled her hips closer, pressing her against him. Pressing more power back into her, a circuit that did not stop, until she couldn’t be entirely certain whose power was whose. They didn’t exist as separate entities anymore, not in her head or in any of her senses.

Orange with flame and dark with secrets, the energy they created together burned through her, sparked with desire. She gave herself over to it, pulled it into her the way her hands pulled at him and his at her.

Cold air played over her skin, goosebumps rising on every newly exposed inch of it. His palm slid over them, soothing them with heat, making her tingle in a different way when he pushed off her top, let her bra fall to the floor. His strong arm behind her was all that kept her from falling when he bent down to take her nipples into his mouth and his free hand slipped between her legs.

“Missed you,” he murmured into her throat.

She wanted to reply but couldn’t; she was too busy tugging down his zipper and trying to keep herself from exploding. All that energy buzzed inside her, so intense she shook from it, and when she fed it back to him, he shook too.

They shook together. Their clothes lay in heaps on the floor. His warm skin rubbed against hers, little shocks everywhere they touched. Flames glowed from the ceiling, adding their own intimacy to the blazing golden sunset light bathing the room and their bare bodies.

In the center of the bedroom stood an enormous four-poster bed, its white sheets crisp and cool. They fell onto it in a tangle of arms and legs, of searching hands and soft words.

“I missed you too,” she managed to say, but he was beyond that. His body slid into hers, his power slid into hers, stronger than before. Strong enough to make her cry out and dig her fingers into his skin, strong enough to make her fight to give it back and drive him as high as he drove her.

His soft moan, the faint buzz as he took what she gave him, told her she’d succeeded. He moved faster inside her, his back shifting under her hands, and returned it.

It was her turn to be overwhelmed. Her turn to drown in him, to turn his energy into her own and keep it. To let their passion feed her. The intimacy of it, the sense of holding him everywhere in her body and mind, made both her human and demon hearts pound.

She flipped him over, looked down at him through half-lidded eyes. Over the last eleven months she’d probably spent more time looking at him than she’d ever looked at anyone else; she’d probably spent a couple of solid weeks of her life doing nothing but looking at him. It didn’t feel long enough.

She shifted her weight, rocked back and forth. He reached out to cup the back of her neck and pull her face down to his, giving her more power, taking more. Her entire body tensed.

They rolled over again. No more playing. With a low, soft sound, a few words in the demon tongue, he sent power shooting through her body, coursing through her blood. Too much for her to handle, and that, coupled with his relentless movements inside her and his mouth on hers, sent her over the edge.

Her last coherent thought was to give it all back to him; her last willful act before her body took over was to do so. They drifted together, riding the waves until the flames in the air disappeared and the world came back into focus.

Winston Lawden—or Win, as she’d grown used to calling him—was the first person she saw when they entered the dining room an hour and a half or so later, and she was glad. She didn’t know any of the other Gretnegs very well, except for Greyson, and Win had always been kind to her. Had always seemed to be on her side.

“Seemed” being the fly in the ointment. She’d never had any reason to distrust Win. But that didn’t mean she necessarily trusted him; she liked him, but she wasn’t stupid, and in the demon world, at least, her natural skepticism stood her in good stead. If “Trust no one” was a good blanket policy for life among humans, it was doubly good when dealing with demons.

Winston greeted them with such enthusiasm Megan wondered if he’d been drinking. Or drinking more than normal, to be accurate; a roomful of demons could make liquor disappear faster than virtue.

But when he kissed her cheek, she realized he was simply happy. Perhaps a little nervous but mostly happy. His blue eyes danced in his ruddy face. “Megan, have you met Sarita?”

“No, I haven’t.” She started to smile, started to hold out her hand to the lovely dark-haired woman he clasped tightly at his side. Halfway through, she realized what she was doing, realized who Sarita was.

Too late to pull her hand back. So instead she went ahead and shook hands, smiling with as much friendliness as she could muster while her stomach churned. The woman wasn’t a fellow Gretneg. She could have been one of Win’s rubendas, members of his Meegra, sure.

But what she undoubtedly was was Winston’s girlfriend. Mistress. Whatever. She was not Winston’s wife was the point, Winston’s wife, Alvia, whom Megan knew. Whom Megan had cooked for one night when she had a little dinner party and who had cooked for Megan in her home when she did the same thing. Alvia, who knitted and made her own pasta, who had raised Winston’s four children, and who had a sweet smile and looked at her husband as though he were a god.