a fucking grip, Steele. This is unacceptable.
His face looked hard used for a rich business consultant. There were bumps on his slightly crooked nose, a white diagonal scar sliced through one thick, slashing eyebrow, and subtler scars that only a trained eye accustomed to evaluating the effects of cosmetic surgery could catch. And the hands, of course. He’d fought in his life. Fought hard. Won, more often than not, judging from his vibe.
And what a vibe. It blasted out of him, full force. It was out of human range, a frequency that only a fucked-up freakoid with a weird, checkered past like hers could perceive. But so different from the danger waves that had throbbed out of the sicko madmen she’d had the misfortune to get close to before, like Novak, Georg, Drago Stengl. Their vibration had made her recoil.
Not so with Janos. In him, the danger was blended like a cocktail with seductive, predatory male sexual energy that assaulted her at every level. It silently said, beneath the smooth veneer of perfect gentlemanly courtesy, that he wanted to fuck her, left, right, up, down and sideways. And that it would be well worth her while.
She didn’t doubt it. But she wasn’t going to listen, not even with her nerves jangling, her skin prickling, her heart thudding. Back off, boyo. This was business, and that was how it was going to stay.
“You’re not what you try to appear,” she said. “You are charming and flirtatious and inscrutable, Mr. Janos, but tiny details betray you. Your hands should be soft from handling nothing heavier than a pen and a computer mouse, but yours are scarred and callused. And your face. Your nose has been broken. Several times it wasn’t set. You can’t blame the martial arts club. If it happened during sparring, why would a rich, image-conscious businessman neglect to get his nose set? Of course he would not.”
“I did not see the point of—”
“So it happened when you were a boy,” she went on smoothly. “No one set your nose then, either, which implies poverty, neglect, or both. I’m thinking an urban environment, judging from your basic vibe. And those scars on your face, the tiny one above your lip, the one cutting through your eyebrow, the one on your forehead that you almost hide with your hair, it makes me wonder what other scars you hide with the beautiful six-thousand-euro suit you’re wearing. You’ve had laser treatments, dermabrasion, but the ghosts always remain.”
“I’m glad you like the suit,” he said blandly.
“You’re no country boy,” she went on. “But you’re not from Rome. You don’t have the accent of the Roman periphery. Your Italian has a Roman cadence, but to my ear, it is a studied one, not a native one. You grew up somewhere else, speaking something else, and learned your perfect Italian later. And you grew up rough. Very rough.”
He stared back at her, frozen into stillness. His eyes were chips of black, opaque glass. “Go on,” he said.
She set down the teacup, threaded her fingers together, and rode the swirling current deeper into wild speculation. She felt like she was drifting on a boat into a night-dark cave of mysteries, and only the currents of air, the echoes, the flutter of distant bats’ wings could hint at its true vastness. It was dangerous. And…exciting.
She pondered his stark face for a moment, and went on. “You are a ladies’ man, and your charm is practiced. You are accustomed to controlling women with sex, but unlike other men with that ability, your ego doesn’t rest on it—although your looks and your body would entitle you to—”
“Thank you,” he murmured.
“I’m not complimenting you,” she said, her voice impatient. “This is an analysis, Janos. Not flattery. Not flirting.”
“My error,” he said, after a brief, startled pause.
She did not acknowledge his sarcasm. “Sex is a tool for you,” she said. “But when seduction does not achieve its goal, you just change tactics without getting your pride hurt and try again, and again, and again. This suggests a lack of machismo not normal in a man from any culture I know—particularly not one who professes to have grown up in Italy. Italian men aren’t known for their humility, or their self-control. This coolness, this calculation regarding sex is a trait I associate with high-end sex professionals.”
His gaze flickered.
She pounced. “Ah. I’ve hit a sore spot,” she murmured. “Have you ever been a gigolo, Mr. Janos? Do you have a more colorful past than you lead people to believe? Some dirty, dangerous secrets of your own?”
He stared at her. His eyes burned.
“Tell me something, Janos,” she whispered. “Can you make your cock hard on command?”
His mouth was a hard, flat line. “Yes,” he said. “But in your vicinity, no effort is necessary.”
“What a lovely compliment. Should I be gratified?”
“Reach under the table, and take the measure of your future gratification right now,” he said.
“Oh, my.” She pretended to be shocked. “The veneer of the perfect gentleman is cracking.”
“You should not wonder at it since you shattered it yourself with an ice pick. See what lurks beneath the veneer. Go on, feel it. It’s yours for the asking. I do not think you will be disappointed.”
She stared at him, her heart pumping. The game had slipped out of her control and taken on its own life. She realized that she was tempted to do exactly as he invited. To grasp his cock, test his heat, the hardness. Feel the vital energy of him pulsing against her hand.
Currents of silent communication swirled between them, dangerous eddies of challenge. She dragged herself back from the brink.
“No,” she said. “I’m not finished yet.”
“On the contrary, Ms. Steele. You are. The subject is closed.” He rose to his feet. The hard tone of his voice and the coiled tension in his body suggested that he was reaching the end of his self-control.
Good. Exactly where she wanted him. Adrenaline pumped through her. She got up and moved in behind him. “Everything you told me is a lie,” she challenged him. “Capriccio Consulting is a lie, your smooth style, your ego-stroking offers. I can’t see inside you, Janos. All I see are smoke and mirrors. Which makes me think that perhaps there is no one inside at all. Just a gutted, blackened hole. Which means…”
She seized him from behind, pressing the tip of the tiny dagger from the ruby-studded horn necklace against the throbbing pulse point in his throat in one swift lunge. “Who the fuck are you, Janos?” she asked softly. “Who sent you?”
His throat worked. “I will warn you only once,” he forced out. “Release me. Now.”
“I’m warning you, too,” she said. “This blade is coated with a poison that works with incredible speed. If the dagger breaks the skin, within seconds your convulsions will be so violent, they will probably snap your spine.”
His larynx moved beneath the blade. “Cut me then.”
That was so unexpected her brain wouldn’t process it for a second.
“Go on,” he prompted. “Why should I fear death? I am a gutted, empty hole, no? Death holds no terrors for me. So cut me.”
She
