Who or even what she herself was.

“Wipe me clean,” she heard herself say against his mouth. “Take everything away for me until I know only you. Make everything disappear … but you.”

She had been stewing for two years in pain, isolation and disillusionment, stagnating and tied to a past that her present wouldn’t release her from and her future couldn’t uphold. And then there was what she had found out about that lab, and the boy, and the rabbit hole she had gone down to be here, in this strange place with Murhder, with his people.

She was exhausted with feeling lost. And questioning herself over Gerry. And wondering where to go in a world full of opportunities that had once been exciting, but now seemed consolations to a death she was not over.

This man—this vampire—could make all that go away. Even if it was only for a brief spell, she wanted the weight lifted, the toxic swill pushed back, the path cleared of debris.

Her soul, buried under damp blankets of grief she could not seem to shed, needed to breathe.

“Why do you cry?” he whispered.

“Am I?”

His thumb stroked over her cheek and he turned it toward her, the gleam of her tear on the pad catching the light.

“I don’t want to think,” she told him. Begged him.

After a moment, he nodded gravely, as if they had forged some kind of pact. “Then I shall make you feel …”

Murhder told himself he should hate the pain inside of this human woman who stood, trusting and aroused, before him. He told himself that he should vanquish whoever had caused her the marrow-splitting grief that he had not, until this moment, sensed within her. He told himself that her tears meant that she was not ready for what they were about to do.

And all of that was true.

But there was another layer to it.

As he stared down at her face, he felt like he was looking into a mirror at himself. She was where he had been—and still was. He knew exactly the agony of the burden of loss she carried—sure, not the particulars of what had caused it, not the descriptions or details, but certainly the crushing sadness and confusion that came when your world was turned upside down and you had no idea where you could safely land.

They were separated by a species divide.

Identical in destiny.

This time, when he kissed her, he knew they were not going to stop because what she wanted from him was the very thing she represented to him. He wanted to be wiped clean as well. He needed a break from the past that haunted him, too. He was as exhausted with grief and regrets as she was.

And dearest Virgin Scribe, the feel of her: Her mouth moved against his like they had been made to fit together, and then her body was flush to his own, her curves accommodating his straightaways, her much smaller stature belying all the power she had over him.

Murhder drew her over to a couch in the corner, and the idea that they were going to make love in this cafeteria, with a TV on mute, and a bank of soft drinks in a cooler, and an industrial dishwasher quietly humming across the way, made him pray that this would not be the only time.

Not that he wouldn’t have asked for that anyway: He hadn’t even had her yet and he was desperate to take her again.

They sat down together at one end of the sofa, all tangled legs and arms, and to cure the contortion, he rolled back and pulled her on top of him—oh, yeeees. His hips arched up, his erection seeking the pressure of her weight and wanting more of the friction as they shifted against each other. And then his hands learned her body, stroking her back and cupping her hips … before slipping onto her thighs.

When he eased under her shirt, finding warm, smooth skin, he groaned and she backed off from the kisses.

“I haven’t done this in a while,” she said.

“It’s the same for me.”

They both smiled. And then it was back to the lips and the tongues, the surging of hips, the twining of legs. She was the one who swept her fleece and her shirt off—

“Sarah,” he breathed.

She sat up on his hips, her legs splayed over him, her bra hinting at what was underneath. With hands that shook, he stroked up her ribs and drifted his fingertips over her breasts. Just as he was ready to beg to see her, her eyes bored into his own and she sprang the clasp, removing the barrier.

Groaning, Murhder took things from there, rising up, holding her against his hungry mouth, teasing and taking one nipple in to suck and then the other.

“Let me see you, too,” she said.

No asking twice on that. He ditched his borrowed shirt so fast, he ripped one of the sleeves. And they enjoyed the exploration part of things for a little longer, her hands branding his chest muscles and stomach as she touched him—but as good as the preamble was, his blood had a roar in it, anticipation morphing into hard-edged desperation.

She clearly felt the same way as she backed off of him, stood up and went for the waistband of her pants and underwear. Inch by inch, she took them both down her legs, kicking them away and peeling off her socks.

“You’re beautiful.” He rubbed his eyes. “Good God …”

Except when she went to straddle him, she stopped abruptly. “Shoot.”

Talk about giving him a heart attack. “What is it? Are you okay? Did I do something—”

“I don’t have a condom. Do you?”

“I …” He shook his head. “I can’t … you’re not fertile. So I can’t get you pregnant—I also can’t give you … you know, anything.”

Well, wasn’t he Mr. Smooth with the STD talk.

Her head tilted to the side. “Really? So is virus transmission impossible between us or are the two species susceptible to different things? I wonder if we could study—”

Capturing her face in his palms, he licked his way back into her mouth, refocusing her.

Laughing in a husky way, she murmured, “Not the time for science talk, huh.”

“How about after we’re through?”

“It’s a date.”

That was the last thing they said to each other. Her hands found the fly of his borrowed combats and she released his erection. By the way her eyes peeled, she was surprised by his size, and he tried not to take too much satisfaction in that.

“I want to taste you,” she moaned.

Well, didn’t that just about send him over the edge.

But he pulled her back onto his hips. “Yes. Later, though—”

“No, now.”

As her hand circled his shaft, he nearly snapped his spine as he jerked back into the sofa. Then she was between his knees on the floor, her open mouth going down to his head.

“Now is also good,” he mumbled as he watched her swallow him deep. “Oh, shit, now is so good.”

His hand clenched onto the arm of the couch as she retracted back up his shaft and then her pink tongue extended and did a dance around the most sensitive place on his entire body. After that heady show, she took him in again, swallowing him whole, everything warm and slippery and—

In the back of his mind, he was aware of a creaking sound that seemed ominous. Worried for her safety, even as he didn’t want her to stop EVER—

Great. He was about to snap the arm off the sofa.

Releasing his iron grip, he arched back and his hips worked with her to find a rhythm. Everything about her was the most erotic thing he could imagine, from the way her lips stretched to accommodate his girth, to her hair falling on his lower belly, to her gleaming stare.

Murhder started to breathe heavily, and then he was purring deep in his throat. When there was a pause mid-stroke, she seemed curious about the sound he was making, although she soon returned to her efforts.

Fuuuuuck, he couldn’t let her go on much longer …

… but maybe just a little more.

Sarah’s vampire was completely undone.

His tremendous body was sprawled awkwardly on a sofa that should have fit three people, but barely held one of him. His red-and-black hair was loose and wild over his bare shoulders. His rock-hard abs were clenched like they had been carved out of stone.

And his pants were wide open, the biggest erection she had ever seen standing up straight at his hips.

His eyes burned as he watched her.

And it was about that purring sound.

As she licked her way up his shaft again, he hissed, his upper lip peeling back. Fangs. He had real, live honest-to-goodness fangs. And as she got a close look at them, so sharp, so white, she wondered what he was going to do with them—and had no fear. She wanted to know everything, feel it all, be a part of him, and not just for research purposes.

Because it was him.

God, the idea that he hadn’t been with anyone for a while made her feel again like they were connected. More similar than dissimilar. In spite of the obvious differences.

“Enough,” he groaned as he sat up in a rush and pulled her on top of him. “I need in you.”

The next thing she knew she was on her back on the couch and he was on top of her, his great weight bearing down, her thighs split wide around his pelvis, that sex of his a firebrand at her core. With some trick of the hips, he angled himself properly, and she braced herself for a powerful penetration.

No regrets, she thought.

She had no regrets about any of this. If anything, he was a blessing she never would have had the guts to pray for.

“I’m ready,” she told him as he hesitated.

“I just don’t want this to be over.”

Funny, she knew exactly what he meant.

With a groan, he dropped his mouth to hers and kissed her as he slid inside, inch by slow, delicious inch. No pounding after he’d filled her, either. Just a retreat and re-advance, gentle … sweet. And she was glad. As much as she wanted the raw passion, he was very large and it had been a long time.

The self-control cost him, however. Sweat broke out across his shoulders, and the muscles in his arms tightened up until they spasmed, the veins in his neck looking like ropes.

It was incredible, though. The in and the out, the friction, the heat—

Pleasure, already at a stinging level, grew inside of her and snapped free in a glorious release, the waves of sensation radiating outward from her core, sure as if her body were a vessel catching golden rays.