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  Larkin collapsed against her with Spencer bracing her hands against his shoulders, arching her neck as the last moments of orgasm dissipated. Her head spun with thoughts, all of them erotic and wanton.

  The rumble of his chest made her lift her head from the pillow. “Find this funny, Detective?”

  “Well, your thoughts are kinda dirty,” he said against her shoulder, his lips burning a sensual path on her skin.

  Damn him. Spencer struggled to push him off of her, but he wouldn’t budge.

  He raised his head to look at her and his eyes widened. “Jesus Christ.”

  Spencer raised an eyebrow. “What?”

  “Teeth. Your—your teeth.”

  Spencer’s hand flew to her mouth, letting the tips of her fingers graze her incisors. Well, there was no hiding her virginity now or that she was a vampire. She’d heard that sometimes if you became fully aroused your incisors tended to make unwanted appearances if you weren’t practiced at controlling them.

  Oops.

  Larkin frowned, then his eyebrows met, and finally he sucked in his cheeks. “You’re a virgin?”

  Spencer heard the disbelief in his carefully spoken words. “Well, not anymore,” she offered dryly.

  His hard face grew harder still. “How the hell can that be? How old are you anyway? Thirty?”

  “Five hundred.”

  His eyes flew wide open and so did his mouth, but Spencer pushed it shut and grinned. Poor Sherlock Holmes finally had the answer to his questions and he obviously was distraught that the chase had come to the very conclusion he’d believed it would.

  He just didn’t believe it entirely…”How old are you, Detective? Do you have a problem with bedding an older woman—er, older, virginal woman?”

  Larkin’s breathing was so rapid, Spencer feared he might pass out. “Put—those—things—away—now,” he said with deadly calm.

  “What things?” Spencer was enjoying this far more than she’d expected.

  “Spencer,” he warned with menace in his tone and a hard gleam in his eyes.

  “Aw, Detective, are you freaked out?”

  “Sorta.”

  “Baby…”

  “You’re really a virgin?”

  “Yep.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “Not if you’re a vampire.”

  “You’re really a vampire?”

  “Yep.”

  “I really have been reading your mind?”

  “Yep.”

  “Explain.”

  “I can’t.”

  “You better.”

  “I said I can’t.”

  “This is crazy.”

  “So very,” she replied honestly.

  “That was the best sex I’ve ever had.”

  “Yeah, me, too.”

  Larkin frowned, obviously due to the irony of her statement. “I think I’m gonna pass out.”

  “Better not or I might bite you.” Spencer let her fingers walk up his neck to a tender spot and grinned wickedly up at him.

  Larkin’s hand flew to his neck and he rolled off her with the speed of light, landing on the other side of her bed.

  She giggled, savoring the fact that she was now officially in the driver’s seat. Larkin was looking confused and disoriented. Obviously he was overwhelmed by her admission.

  Take that, human.

  She slid off the edge of the bed and padded to her bathroom, grabbing a cloth for him to clean up with, dropping it on him as she scanned the floor and fished around for her underwear with her foot.

  “I didn’t know.” Larkin said from the bed, sounding almost a little lost.

  Spencer faked a yawn of disinterest. “Know what, Sherlock?”

  He bolted upward and swung his thickly muscled legs over the edge of the bed as she knelt and dug around on the floor to find her panties, torn. She held them up and gave him a dirty look.

  “I never would have thought you were a virgin.”

  Spencer threw her panties in the air like confetti and yelled, “Surprise!”

  He grabbed her hand and held it, his eyes full of guilt and remorse. “It’s not funny, Spencer. I didn’t know. I would never have—”

  “What? Screwed my brains out? It’s all right, Larkin. I’m only four hundred and eighty-two years over the legal age of consent.” Spencer giggled again, wanting nothing more than to take this upper hand she had and run with it.

  His hard jaw clenched, making the delicious dimple in his chin more pronounced. “Stop making damn jokes. It never occurred to me that—that you might be inexperienced.”

  “What can I tell you? I don’t get out much. I spend most of my nights talking to dead people.”

  Larkin ran a hand through his hair, his brow furrowing. “I wouldn’t have been so rough, Spencer. Jesus…”

  Her shoulders lifted in a shrug, but her belly clenched. The memory of his hands holding her wrists while he drove into her made her hot all over again. “I kinda liked it. You’re a real man, McBride. Hoo Rah,” she teased, flexing a bicep at him.

  “Kinda?”

  “Do you talk to all of the women you bed as if you tainted them for life, or just the virgins?”

  He cringed and looked at her with guilty eyes.

  Spencer couldn’t hold out anymore, she began to laugh—so hard she had to lean forward to keep from pitching over.

  But Larkin scowled at her, a vein pulsing in his forehead. “This isn’t funny, God damn it. Stop laughing.”

  Spencer leaned on his thighs to support herself. Wow, he had nice thighs, lightly sprinkled with hair, thick with rippling muscle. Spencer’s fingers wandered with a life of their own over the thick bulk of them.

  Larkin grabbed them and thwarted further exploration. “Stop, Spencer, and help me understand this.”

  Spencer sighed and tilted her face to look up at him. “What is there to understand? We copulated. Schtupped. Boinked. Got jiggy.”

  “How can you be a virgin at five—five hundred years old?”

  As he stumbled over the words, Spencer realized razor-tongued Larkin was genuinely upset and it was cruel to joke at his expense.

  She let her face go serious. “Because the right opportunity never presented itself, I guess?” How could she explain the ways of her clan?

  “In five hundred damn years?” he asked incredulously, his beautiful eyes wide.

  Spencer rolled her eyes. “Look, it isn’t a big deal. Vampire virgins aren’t like your typical human virgins. Some of us don’t even have sex until we find our life mates, at least in my clan anyway. It’s frowned upon. I’ve been told all my life sex with your life mate far surpasses any dalliance along the way. Between you and me, I think it’s just a scare tactic to keep us all from staying single and to ensure there are no human hook ups. That makes the clan a little cranky. They prefer us mated to each other without outside interference, though sometimes a pesky human sneaks in. Anyway, usually, we remain celibate until the right one comes along. I just made the choice to break the rules.”

  She saw the million questions running around in his mind, but his face changed, going from hard to soft. “Did I hurt you, Spencer?”

  “Like I said, tough guy, virgin vamps are different than human virgins. No, you didn’t hurt me. It was pretty good, I suppose.”

  “You suppose?”

  “Well, how would I know? I was a virgin.” She batted her eyelashes at him. She certainly wasn’t going to tell him she hadn’t been that hot since like never.

  Larkin cringed again at her use of the word. “What’s a life mate?”

  “It’s kinda self-explanatory, don’t you think?”

  “Humor the human.”

  “A life mate is the person you hook up with for life.”

  “Yeah. I gathered as much. How do you know who your life mate is?”

  “We can smell them, or most in my family can anyway.”

  Now Larkin started to laugh, his shoulders shaking, the ripples of muscle in his ab
domen becoming more prominent. He ran a finger down her scentless nose. “Aw, tough break, huh?”

  Spencer narrowed her eyes, ignoring the turn in their conversation. “Not necessarily. Eventually he’ll just have to sniff me out.”

  Now his laughter faded, but his grin was cocky. “And no one else has turned you on enough to make you want to indulge in any sexual activity of any kind? None?”

  She saw where this was going for the stud-muffin and she was prepared to nip it in the bud. Both mentally and verbally. “Look, egomaniac, it just happened. How about we leave it at that?”

  Larkin cupped her chin and for the very first time he pressed his lips to hers. Spencer fought to keep her mind blank, not allowing the thrill the touch of his lips gave her to seep into her thoughts, but his mouth on hers was as divine as his body crushed against her.

  When he pulled away his voice was gruff. “How can I read your mind? Is it some sort of vampire thing that has its signals crossed?”

  Spencer struggled to focus on his question as she fought a new rush of good old-fashioned lust. “I really don’t have an explanation for that, Larkin. I’ve never heard of it before. Honest.” This much at least was accurate, even if he chose to test that and Vulcan mind-meld the truth of her thoughts.

  “I believe you.”

  “Well, it’s not like I can lie to you, Kreskin.”

  Larkin laughed again, flashing a glimpse of his white teeth. “I’m convinced it means something, Spencer.”

  Spencer pulled out of his reach and rose to alleviate the heat he began to arouse in her more than willing body. “Maybe so, Detective, but I can’t think of what.”

  Wandering to her closet, she dug out a bathrobe, shrugging into it, keeping her face buried in her clothes, wondering the entire time what Larkin was thinking as he sat so silently.

  Several times she caught him opening his mouth then slamming it shut. He was processing the words she’d thrown out like “clan” and “life mate” and “virgin.” The context of them all very foreign to a human like him.

  But now, as she shrugged into her robe, their encounter was sinking in. Not just the loss of virginity and the potential the Virginity Police could show up at any second and put her on lockdown, but what she’d admitted.

  Larkin knew she was a vampire, and that was dangerous—very dangerous. Fear sizzled along her spine. What if he wasn’t as much of a bad ass as he thought? What if, while he was doing all this thinking, he freaked out? He was a cop who dealt with human criminals—not the paranormal. It was a whole different ballgame when nothing, not even your gun and your badge could protect you.

  And when fear set in, things got ugly sometimes.

  Rather than pussyfoot around, Spencer decided to ask the question begging to be asked. “So now that you know I’m a vampire, what’s next? Are you going to drag me off to the pokey? Take away my sunglasses and SPF? Add garlic to my pasta when I’m not looking? Because I won’t let you hurt my family, Larkin. I’ll take you out before I’ll let that happen.”

  “Oh, really?” His response was a little too arrogant—a little too “I can take you.”

  And she didn’t like the dread it spiked in her gut.

  Spencer turned to face him with a soft hiss, revealing her fangs, sharp and glistening, knowing the moonlight slanted over them, giving them just the right hint of menace.

  Planting her hands on her hips, she gave him her best scary face. “Yes, Larkin. Really,” she challenged tersely just as Larkin keeled over backward on the bed and passed out with a whoosh of air as his solid body hit the mattress.

  All the panic whooshed out of her as her laughter rang through the air, crisp and hearty.

  Yep. Incisors.

  They did it every time.

  Chapter 6

  Spencer knelt on the bed over Larkin and chuckled again. She wouldn’t really bite him—or at least she didn’t think so. She’d never had to defend herself by way of biting anyone, but then, her family had never been threatened by a man she’d just slept with who now knew she was a vampire.

  The Polanskis didn’t feed off of humans, ever. They survived on the blood taken from the embalmed. Spencer had heard it wasn’t like fresh blood, but her father forbade it and so the blood they fed on came to them without harming anyone. Hell, her mother even had creative recipes for it. The only fresh blood they took was from their life mates and, well, she didn’t have one of those…

  Although, she had to admit, she was really getting off on freaking Larkin out with her teeth. She’d watched enough vampire movies to know how to fake it.

  Big, fat sissy, she taunted Larkin in her mind, because right now, with him passed out, she could.

  Using two fingers she pried his eye open. Oh yeah, he was out—stone cold down for the count, giving her time to take him all in.

  Her eyes devoured his nakedness. The smooth expanse of chest, hairless and rugged, his long, thick legs…his long, thick…

  Phew.

  On the wet-panties scale of good old-fashioned lust, he was a solid ten.

  In fact, he was hotter than anything she could have ever dreamt up.

  Dragging the comforter over his wickedly delicious nakedness, Spencer tucked him in before she was tempted to devour him.

  It gave her time to think—without the intrusion of his mind-probe making her feel as though she were stripped of all things private.

  So now Larkin’s suspicions were confirmed. Courtesy of her libido and her hot head. What was next? Would he rat them out? Why should he? The Polanskis were peaceful. They worked for an honest living just like anyone else who was human, but if the people in Easton found out they were vampires…If Larkin found out Alan and Brian were bitten by vampires…

  She was at a loss as to what to do. She couldn’t tell her family—not yet. They’d worked so hard to establish themselves in the community. Her mother loved Easton. It wasn’t fair to yank that out from under them if Larkin would just go away quietly.

  Hah!

  As if he did anything quietly. But what would he gain by hurting her? They hadn’t broken any laws, so he had no grounds to justify making trouble. At least as long as he didn’t find out about those bites.

  Larkin’s deep breathing turned to a snore. It made her nipples do a three-sixty. Jesus, he was even sexy snoring.

  And what would she do about that little tidbit? Not a single man in her three hundred years or so of dating had made her panties wad like Larkin McBride did. She’d told him the truth about her sexual experience. She’d never had sex and it wasn’t only because she was waiting on her special hunk o’ burnin’ love—it was because no one made her body turn to tapioca like Larkin did.

  What if her true life mate didn’t do the same thing for her? To make matters worse, she’d broken a serious clan rule. Sure, it had been broken in the past. Who was any vampire in her clan kidding if they seriously fell for the notion no one ever broke that rule—especially the male vampires.

  But this wasn’t like her. She’d stuck to the rules all her life, and now she’d broken one of the biggest ones of all.

  This was a dilemma of epic proportions.

  Sex was opening up a whole new can of worms for her she would have preferred remain Tupperware tight. It really didn’t have to be a big deal. Cathy had sex with a human. He was now her husband. She’d had sex before Joel, too.

  So why did the thought of any other man never cross her mind until this one? Surely that had to say something.

  It said she was horny, Spencer decided, nothing more.

  Horny is as horny does. Spencer stretched out next to Larkin’s long frame and rested her chin on his shoulder. And if this just had to do with lust, why was simply lying near him making her stomach tight and her throat feel as though it were closing up?

  Maybe horny did that?

  Oh, God.

  It was time to give her overworked brain a rest. Spencer emptied her mind—it wasn’t like that was terribly hard to do. She’d become rathe
r practiced at it as of late.

  Drifting off to sleep, she vaguely felt Larkin’s arm move around her to pull her close and the clench in her stomach eased—replaced with the satisfying warmth of contentment.

  * * * *

  Spencer woke to the late afternoon sun setting against her dark curtains and a hard body pressed to her ass.

  A large hand roamed the slope of her hip, caressing her with persistent strokes.

  “I see you’re awake, Detective. How do we feel about the big, scary, virgin vampire today?”

  Larkin hauled her to him and pressed the lower half of her body to his. “Does that give you any clue?”

  His hot length slid between the cheeks of her ass, making her muscles quiver with anticipation. “It’s a rather large hint, I suppose.”

  He growled in her ear, nipping it before he said, “I don’t get this, Spencer. I can’t seem to stop myself from wanting you, even knowing what I do, and I do believe you. That’s what’s really screwing me up. Somehow, instinctively I know you’re telling the truth and I have a million questions that need answering.”

  Spencer sighed as his hand slid between the flesh of her thighs to thumb her clit. “And knowing what you do is what? A bad thing? We’re not so different, Larkin.”

  Spreading her flesh he slid through her folds with ease, and a hunger low and sweet spread over her. “You do some freaky shit, lady. For starters, you drink blood.”

  “Then I guess the blood bank is out for our first date?”

  Larkin’s chest rumbled against her back in laughter. “You can’t go out in daylight.”

  “Oh, I can, too. I told you, I use a heavy SPF,” she teased.

  Larkin lifted her thigh over his hip and inserted a thick finger inside her, pressing a spot that made her hips jolt against it, gliding on it as it became slick with her desire for him. “You make my cock burn like no other woman I’ve ever been with.”

  Spencer’s nipples were tight with need and Larkin seemed to sense that as he cupped a breast with his other hand, twisted the tender flesh between his fingers gently. “I’d say ditto, but, well, you know the score,” she said, hissing as he removed his finger, making her whimper.