"So decisive", he murmured in that calm tone that had adrenaline flooding her body, the primitive part of her brain conscious she was in the presence of a predator. "Got your eye on someone?" She didn‘t know what made her say it. "No. But I have no plans to die a virgin."

She was more than willing to let him walk off his temper. And the man had one, even if he wasn't willing to admit it.

he was the monster that stalked nightmare and they both knew it

Voles-tu, mon petit papillon.” Illium laughed at Galen’s instruction to “fly, little butterfly

He leaned down until his lips brushed her ear. “I told you to stop flinching.” And then he bit her. A slow, painless nip but there were definitely teeth involved.

"Make me forget." A whisper, a plea. Not giving her what she wanted wasn't even an option. He switched their positions so she was under him. "Aren't you afraid I'll take advantage?" She wiped away her tears. "Please do." "Ask nice." "Why don't I make you angry instead? That gets me kissed a lot."

While Dmitri, as the leader of Raphael’s Seven, could not accept such a weakness, the mortal he’d once been, the one who had loved a woman with a wide mouth and eyes of slanted brown . . . that man understood what it was to love so deeply it was a kind of beautiful madness.