Page 70 of Kiss of Wrath

“Or the snake.” He reclaimed her lips then, molding her mouth to his this way and that in changing patterns ’til he got the exact position he wanted. Then he proved that he was the master in this game of sex play, kissing her so expertly and thoroughly that her toes literally curled in her high-heeled sandals. Ribbons of molten heat unfurled throughout her body causing her to feel his lips in places he wasn’t even touching. Like her breasts, the arches of her feet, the backs of her knees, the tips of her fingers, her inner elbow, and definitely at the juncture of her thighs, where the sweet burn of desire was a throbbing beat. She had never become so instantly aroused by a man in all her life. For that matter, she’d never been so aroused, period.

Who knew what would have happened next, how far they would have gone, if there hadn’t been a sharp rapping on the window. Mordr jolted back to the driver’s seat and she straightened from the puddle of hormones she’d melted to in her seat. With mortification, she realized it was a policeman who’d tapped on her passenger window and was motioning for her to open the window.

Mordr opened it electronically from his side.

The cop, whose name badge read Officer John Berry, leaned in. “Aren’t you folks a little old for this?”

“Is a man ever too old for this?” Mordr replied, clearly unhappy at having been interrupted.

“What . . . what did he say?” Officer Berry asked her.

“Shh!” She motioned to Mordr, then told the cop, “Sorry, Officer. My . . . uh, boyfriend just got home from military leave and we haven’t seen each other for . . . a long time.”

“Oh.” Addressing Mordr now, the policeman said, “Afghanistan, huh?”

Mordr, thankfully, caught her warning scowl, and nodded.

“My son is over there now.” He cleared his throat and added, “Anyhow, kids. Time to get a room, okay?”

She and Mordr agreed quickly, she because she was glad to escape a ticket for public licentiousness or something, and Mordr probably because he feared all his weapons being discovered under that cloak. And, by the way, what kind of law enforcement person was he to not think it strange that a soldier would be wearing a cloak. On the other hand, it was Las Vegas. He no doubt saw stranger things.

Actually, that wasn’t what Mordr was thinking, she soon realized, as he put the car in gear and began to drive away from the curb. He muttered to himself, “I cannot believe I allowed her to entice me so. I cannot believe that I am suddenly so weak I cannot control my urges. I cannot believe after all these centuries my sap rises instantly like an untried youthling. I cannot believe Mike is inflicting this new torture on me. I cannot believe—”

“Believe this,” she said, and punched him in the arm. It was like hitting concrete, but she didn’t want to rub her sore knuckles and give him any satisfaction. “You are the one who enticed me. You turn me on just by looking at me, and I am not easily turned on. Having five kids, a job, and not enough time in the day to take a breath kind of dampens the libido, you know. Furthermore, I haven’t made out in a car since I was a teenager and I let Billy Jordan cop a feel after the junior prom.”

He slanted her a quick sideways glance as he maneuvered through traffic. “I turn you on?” he asked, and she could swear that Mr. Grim almost grinned.

“Like a faucet.” She folded her arms over her chest, then dropped them to her sides, when she realized that her breasts were still full and achy. If she didn’t know better, she would wonder if he had dropped some kind of drug in her drink, except that she hadn’t drunk anything. Truthfully, she had only herself to blame. “It’s probably just sex deprivation that made me act so out-of-character.”

“Right,” he said, not believing it any more than she did.

“Where are we going?” she asked then as he turned into an underground parking garage of a hotel on the Strip.

“I promised to show you some demon vampires, and that is what I will do,” he said.

Oh crap! They were back to that nonsense. She glanced up at the hotel sign and laughed, “At Valhalla?” It was the new themed casino hotel. She’d never been there, but she’d heard it had a lot of hokey Viking decor.

He shrugged. “It’s as good a place as any.”

“Isn’t Valhalla a kind of Viking heaven?”

“You could say that.”

“Been there. Not interested in a repeat.”

As he pulled into a parking slot and turned off the engine, he looked at her with a frown of confusion. When he finally realized that she was referring to their making out a short time ago as a bit of Viking heaven, he did something he hadn’t done since she’d met him.

He smiled.

Twelve

Tears of a Viking . . .

Mordr laced his fingers with Miranda’s as they walked toward the elevator in the parking garage.

When was the last time I held a woman’s hand? Did I ever?

He continued to hold her hand, the pulse at their joined wrists seeming to offer a point/counterpoint of erotic rhythm, as they stood in silence in the intimate confines of the box as they rose to the lobby level.