One thing I've always wondered—why did you enter that bikini contest when you were a teenager?” Her face flushed with a mixture of anger and embarrassment. “How far back did you trace me?” “Far enough.” A pause. “You didn't answer my question.” “And you didn't turn into a puff of smoke and disappear. The world is full of disappointments.

Mercy laughed. “You have to excuse them—boys suffer from an incurable disability.” “What?” “Testosterone.

Do tell. It might be entertaining to see who gets to you first.” “Excuse me if entertaining you isn’t at the top of my agenda.

Bluebell,” she said, remembering from Erotique. “Pretty name.” “I call Dmitri Dark Overlord.” “Shae,” Dmitri said and the female vampire rose at once to walk quickly into the house. “Now, pretty Bluebell” another languid stroke across her skin “tell the Overlord what you discovered.

Maybe, just maybe, two broken people could manage to create something whole.

But you, you’ve always been the rain, the wind, inside my mind. I taste you when I sleep, when I wake, when I breathe.

We're all as susceptible to the lure of power.