Because this was all they’d ever have. He had no fucking intention of taking her virginity—and if he wanted to keep that resolution, then he had to make sure there was an insurmountable distance between their naked bodies: The phone shit was the only safe way to do this. She would still be able to be considered respectable afterward, because touching herself was a very different proposition than some Neanderthal like him penetrating her sex until he came hard a couple of dozen times—and robbed the male she was eventually going to mate of his due.

As long as he never got her alone for very long, he was going to be able to do right by her—and he wasn’t fooling himself. Their attraction was off the chain, but after the training was done? After all this was finished, assuming they both made it through?

Separate ways. Even if they ended up working together from time to time.

Bottom line, there was no domestic future for him to offer her. Especially after he began to work on his true purpose for all this training: Revenge. On the aristocrats who had allowed his father to be killed by the enemy.

He would not rest until their blood was on his hands.

“Take your fingers and bring them down your stomach,” he ordered. “What do you find?”

“The waistband of my jeans.”

“Undo the button.”

“Yes…”

There was a rustling, and then she was back talking to him. “And now?”

“The zipper.”

Another rustling. During which he imagined he was the one undoing things, spreading the fly wide, taking his mouth and pressing a kiss to the lace of her panties. Or in her case, probably the cotton.

“Take the jeans off. Leave the panties on.”

More shifting around, the speaker in his ear fuzzing out.

Under the light sheet that covered his naked body, he couldn’t help but grip himself and give a stroke or two. But as the top of his cock started to burn like it was going to blow, he had to stop.

Grinding his back teeth, he gritted out, “Put your hand between your thighs, spread those long legs … do it.”

He’d wanted to ease into it more, but he was too greedy. And so was she: The rippling moan she let out threw him right over the edge, his cock way done waiting for his palm to get with the program.

“Rub it,” he moaned as his erection kicked under the sheets, hot jets landing on his stomach as he orgasmed. “Oh, God, Paradise, stroke yourself through the cotton…” As she cried out, he could tell, even through his own release, that she was getting close. “Under—go under, feel the wet and the heat—feel it—oh, fuck … it’s so smooth…”

She was panting now, and then she said his name like it was being torn out of her throat.

“Imagine my mouth on you there.”

That was when she came. And so did he once again as he listened to her suck air in and blow it out, a really fucking delicious pleading, begging sound coming across the connection.

Just the sound of her release gave him orgasm number three. And four.

“Keep going,” he said hoarsely, “feel my tongue lapping, my lips sucking…”

Sometime later, when it was finally over, all they did was breathe together.

For some insane reason, he found himself wanting to be next to her and hold her—or some shit. He didn’t know. All he was aware of was that he had this burning drive to make sure she was all right after what had gone down.

Now, the miles that separated them seemed like a punishment of some kind.

“You okay?” he asked roughly.

“Oh … yes…”

As he heard the smile in her voice, he started to grin himself—and didn’t that make him glad he was alone and in the dark. He probably looked like a complete fucking idiot.

“You’re beautiful,” he heard himself say. “You’re amazing. You’re incredible.”

She laughed in a burst. “You’re silly.”

“Hardly. I was born without a sense of humor.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m the most unfunny male I know, and I never get jokes.”

“You know … come to think of it, I don’t believe I’ve seen you smile yet.”

“Don’t hold your breath.” He reached over to the bedside table, opened the drawer, and took out the pack of cigarettes and the Bic lighter he’d bought on the way back to the training center. “I smoke, by the way.”

Only after sex, he almost explained. But he didn’t want to underscore that he’d ever been with anyone but her for some reason.

Tilting his head to the side to hold the phone to his ear with his shoulder, he fumbled around to open the Marls and take out a cancer stick. The lighter made a shhhhht as he fired it up, and he got a close-up visual of his fist as he brought the flame closer to his face. That first inhale was enough to make him moan all over again, and he kept the cig between his teeth as he patted around in the drawer for the ashtray, which he put on his bare chest.

“It’s a bad habit,” he said by way of apology. “But at least vampires don’t get cancer.”

As soon as he’d arranged this with her, he’d started planning about how he could get a cigarette for the afterward. Not very romantic.

Not that he was interested in romance, he reminded himself.

“So why don’t you smile, Craeg.”

On its surface, the question/statement, whatever it was, could have been taken as a lighthearted, jokey kind of thing, but her serious tone cut that interpretation right off.