My body cheerfully informed me that he felt really good pressed against me like that, all hard muscles and smooth contours and ominous bulges. My body liked the air of barely leashed strength and caged mayhem he was giving off. My body thought he smelled really good, like heat and coffee and electricity. My body was going to get me killed.

They always assumed that I did not speak. That I could not. So many had plotted my death, discussed it, laughed about it, even while I was in the same room, because they assumed I was mindless. Like one of the failures of their kind, born mad. But I was not a failure. I was what I was supposed to be. I was dhampir. And they never lived to tell anyone they were wrong.

It's about time! It's supposed to be a ritual, not a marathon.

Take them off!” I told him, grabbing the front of his jeans. “Take everything off!” “I’m trying!” “Try harder!

You could say I'm on the troubleshooting squad." "Troubleshooting?" He put a hand on the back of his waistband. "I see trouble and I shoot it.

You are nothing like Christine!" he said, in my face. "She was a responsibility, a mistake I made when young and foolish, and from whom I came to believe I would never be free!" "Then what am I?" I challenged, staring up into blazing sapphire eyes. "A joy.

The Lord Protector and his hair got off the elevator.