Unless, was he asking me on a date?

A heady lightness filled me, only to deflate like a pricked balloon. Hell, even if it was a date, why ask me to go somewhere I couldn’t be seen? I might not need the Witches’ Council’s protection any more, but I was the boss of Spellcrackers: it’s a witch company, and I needed my witch employees. If I started publicly hanging out with vamps when I was off-duty, the Council would forbid them to work for me. No employees. No Spellcrackers. Malik knew that—

‘Genevieve?’

I shot him a narrow look. ‘Are you asking me on a date?’

‘I believe that is the current term, yes.’ Amusement twitched his mouth.

I blinked. He thought this was funny? It was more like inviting a starving woman to a banquet then telling her she couldn’t eat. ‘Then why invite me to a vamp club? You know I won’t visit one unless it’s on witch-authorised business.’

His amusement died; replaced by . . . regret? Sorrow? ‘That you even think to ask that question, Genevieve, is the reason I ask.’

Damn. Now he was doing the cryptic thing. I hate that. ‘I’m asking because I want to know the answer, Malik. So explain it to me.’

‘It is not only yourself you hurt,’ he said softly, ‘when you deny who you are and refuse to embrace your true heritage.’ Then he was gone, leaving me frowning up at the ceiling. I sat up to see him lift a shirt from the table nearest the door and slip it on.

What the— ‘You’re leaving?’ I said, stupidly, as that was obviously what he was doing.

‘There are clothes here to replace the ones I damaged.’ He indicated a suit carrier on the table.

When the hell had he organised them? Not to mention why was he running off in the middle of . . . asking me on a date? And how the hell had we got here from his asking permission to kiss me to check out my memories of the tarot card? Damn it! I was missing something here, something important, only I couldn’t work out what past the confused whirl in my mind. And judging by the way he was leaving— Crap. Had left! He wasn’t prepared to stick around long enough for me to sort things out.

I scrambled off the table and ran to the door. The corridor outside was empty.

Fuck. ‘Malik?’ I called, hoping he’d come back. ‘What about the Emperor?’

I will look into it.His voice sounded distant in my head. If you wish to accept my invitation, leave a message with my answering service.Then there was nothing but silence.

Angry and confused, I grabbed the suit carrier and headed for the en suite restroom to find myself surrounded by more bland beige luxury: marble sinks topped with well-lit mirrors that flattered, expensive toiletries that smelled of lilies, and towels rolled and tucked into wicker baskets. The replacement clothes – black trousers, silky cream T-shirt and a dark lilac linen jacket that wasn’t a colour I’d have chosen, but looked surprisingly great with my hair – were from a local 24/7 chain store. Whoever Malik had got to shop for me had good taste. Briefly I wondered who, and if they’d seen me unconscious and naked on the table . . . which was kind of creepy . . . then decided that wasn’t worth worrying about. There was underwear too. The cream lace would look good against my honey-coloured skin, or it would have if not for the rose-coloured bruises marking me.

He’d said they weren’t permanent. Not that I cared one way or the other right now. I yanked the labels off the underwear. Damn it! The beautiful vamp had reached whole new levels of annoying. He’d told me he wasn’t willing. Then asked me on a date. To a vamp club. Then spouted some cryptic crap about hurting myself, and him, by denying who I was and not embracing my heritage.

Only I wasn’t denying anything. Everyone knew my father was a vamp, but I was sidhe like my mother. And while I might want to embrace Malik, no way was I going to rock the boat by going on a public date with him, not when I didn’t know what the hell he was playing at. And not when he was making iffy comments about knowing what my answers to his questions would be. Almost as if the irritating vamp was testing me . . . I tugged on the briefs, following that thought . . . As if he wasn’t willing to have sex with me unless I made some sort of grand gesture or declaration that he meant something to me.

Damn. Didn’t he know that he did? Hell, I’d already forgiven the idiotic vamp for doing his mind-meld on my memories, for ordering me about as if I were a blood-slave, and for killing me more than once – not that I’m masochistic, and the circumstances were extenuating; I’d even asked him to, that last time – but hey, how much more of a declaration did he want? A date. In public. In a place you wouldn’t normally go. For no other reason than to be with him.And my knee-jerk reaction had been: no way. Crap. I’d failed his test. He was right. Why the hell should he want sex or anything else with me when I wouldn’t even be seen with him in public?

I jerked the bra’s straps to adjust them, and slipped it on.

Except, by that same standard Malik was wrong too.

If he was going to play stupid games with me, instead of talking things through, then why the hell should Iwant sex or anything more with him?

Only I did want more. My heart thudded erratically as the trembling, indefinable emotion I felt for Malik crystallised into something steady and tangible in my heart.

‘So I should probably go on this date and sort things out,’ I told my reflection, then scowled as my mind threw a huge curve ball at me.

The Autarch.

The psychotic prick had been pulling Malik’s strings with the Jellyfish spell, trying to stop me removing it. And then there was Malik’s answers about the Emperor. Or rather his non-answers, seeing as he’d started prevaricating as soon as I’d mentioned the tarot card. How far could I trust that whatever game Malik was playing was down to him and not the Autarch?

And if it was the Autarch speaking through Malik’s mouth, then the Blue Heart date scenario made more sense. It was vamp territory, I’d be more vulnerable, and so would Malik. Damn. I needed to talk to him; without the Autarch’s interference. I touched the rose-shaped bruises on my wrist that hid my bracelet; I could use Malik’s ring and contact him through the Dreamscape: that might work. And the best place to do that was— well, not here; it wasn’t safe.

Last time we’d met in the Dreamscape, he’d used Tower Bridge as a backdrop, but really it could be any place we were both familiar with, like oh, say, my bedroom? After all, I couldn’t get much safer than my own bed . . . My pulse raced as my Malik fantasies roared back to life, fuelled by our recent near miss. We’d been a breath away from sex. Lust and longing twisted low inside me. And, boy, was I missing sex after nearly a year of no touch but my own. Sighing, I traced the bruises on my breasts, following them down my body to the last mark, which disappeared beneath the lacy briefs, remembering the glorious feel of his hands on me—

Sudden excruciating arousal made my legs buckle. I fell to my knees and, desperate for release, shoved a hand into my briefs. As soon as I touched myself, an orgasm rocked through me, more pain than pleasure. Panting, I collapsed against the mirror. My reflection stared back at me with molten-copper eyes wide with shock. Magic wreathed me in a swirling golden haze, and Malik’s marks suddenly gleamed like blood-tinted silver pennies.

The mark on my wrist had never done that – I looked – was still not doing that. Arousal flamed through me again, making me feel I’d perish in agony if I didn’t come. This time it took much more than a touch to get me off as I crumpled over on the floor, forehead on the cold marble, arse in the air, my fingers working feverishly, unable to stop – what the fuck was wrong with me?– until finally the orgasm ripped through me as if the pain/pleasure were trying to tear me apart. I screamed my release, the sound reverberating like a banshee’s screech in the small room.