jaw.
âSlowly,â I said.
She did what I asked. She stood in front of me with her long-fingered hands clasped across her head. I stepped away from her, gun still pointed at her chest.
âNow what?â Yasmeen asked. A smile still curled her lips. Her dark eyes were amused. I didnât like being laughed at, but when tangling with master vampires you let some things slide.
âYou can put your hands down,â I said.
Yasmeen did, but she continued to stare at me as if Iâd sprouted a second head. âWhere did you find her, Jean-Claude? The kitten has teeth.â
âTell Yasmeen what the vampires call you, Anita.â
It sounded too much like an order, but this didnât seem the time to bitch at him. âThe Executioner.â
Yasmeenâs eyes widened; then she smiled, flashing a lot of fang. âI thought youâd be taller.â
âIt disappoints me, too, sometimes,â I said.
Yasmeen threw back her head and laughed, wild and brittle, with an edge of hysteria. âI like her, Jean-Claude. Sheâs dangerous, like sleeping with a lion.â
She glided towards me. I had the gun up and pointed at her. It didnât even slow her down.
âJean-Claude, tell her I will shoot her if she doesnât back off.â
âI promise not to hurt you, Anita. I will be oh so gentle.â She swayedover to me, and I wasnât sure what to do. She was playing with me, sadistic but probably not deadly. Could I shoot her for being a pain in the ass? I didnât think so.
âI can taste the heat of your blood, the warmth of your skin on the air like perfume.â Her gliding, hip-swinging walk brought her right in front of me. I pointed the gun at her, and she laughed. She pressed her chest against the tip of my gun.
âSo soft, wet, but strong.â I wasnât sure who she was talking about, her or me. Neither option sounded pleasant. She rubbed her small breasts against the gun, her nipples caressing the gun barrel. âDainty, but dangerous.â The last word was a whispered hiss that flowed over my skin like ice water. She was the first master Iâd ever met who had some of Jean-Claudeâs voice tricks.
I could see her nipples hardening through the thin material of her shirt. Yikes. I pointed the gun at the floor and stepped away from her. âJesus, are all vampires over two hundred perverts?â
âI am over two hundred,â Jean-Claude said.
âI rest my case.â
Yasmeen let a warm trickle of laughter spill out of her mouth. The sound caressed my skin like a warm wind. She stalked towards me. I backed up until I hit the wall. She put a hand on either side of the wall near my shoulders and began to lean in like she was doing a pushup. âIâd like to taste her myself.â
I shoved the gun into her ribs, too low for her to rub herself against it. âNobody lays a fang on me,â I said.
âTough girl.â She leaned her face over me, lips brushing my forehead. âI like tough girls.â
âJean-Claude, do something with her before one of us gets killed.â
Yasmeen pushed away from me, elbows locked, as far away as she could get without moving her hands. Her tongue flicked over her lips, a hint of fang, but mostly wet lips. She leaned back into me, lips half-parted, but she wasnât going for my neck. She was definitely going for my mouth. She didnât want to taste me, she wanted to taste me. I couldnât shoot her, not if she just wanted to kiss me. If sheâd been a man, I wouldnât have shot her.
Her hair fell forward over my hands, soft like thick silk. Her facewas all I could see. Her eyes were a perfect blackness. Her lips hovered just above my mouth. Her breath was warm, and smelled of breath mints, but under the modern smell was something older: the sweet foulness of blood.
âYour breath smells like old blood,â I whispered into her mouth.
She whispered