Poisoned Kisses. Stephanie Draven

how Marco parted from his ex-lover. “Like what?”

      “Don’t do that,” he said, shaking his head. “I know you remember what I called you. And I’m sorry. You were lonely when I went overseas and you were inexperienced. He took advantage of that. You were an innocent and I blame him not you.”

      An innocent? Kyra made a mental note never again to impersonate someone like Ashlynn Brown.

      She couldn’t pull it off. In fact, she’d better cut off this conversation quickly. Any trip down memory lane was likely to mess her up. She didn’t share his memories and she wasn’t the woman he was reminiscing about, but she wasn’t sure she could bear for him to realize it so soon after the tender intimacies between them. “Well, we’re different people now.”

      “We are. And though I’m sure you don’t like to think of yourself as the kind of girl who gets down and dirty in the middle of the living room…if you ask me, a little naughtiness suits you.”

      “So you’re saying that you like me better now than the way I was?”

      If only he hadn’t paused to think about it. If only he’d given her any real answer at all. But what he said was, “I’m not sure my opinion matters. I’m hungry. Are you hungry?”

      “Charming.” Kyra tried, and failed, to keep the acid from her tongue. “Is that how you are with your other women? ‘Hey, thanks for last night. Let’s order some pizza!’”

      Marco arched a brow. “My other women?“

      “Weren’t you just bragging about all your one-night stands?”

      His brow arched even higher. “Are you jealous?”

      “Should I be?”

      “I just take fleeting pleasure where I find it. I don’t deserve much more than that.”

      “That’s not true.” Now she knew that he wasn’t an arms dealer for the cash or for the power. He was a crusader; he had the idiotic notion that what he was doing would help people.

      She ached a little at the break in contact as he withdrew from the tangle of limbs and couch cushions, but she liked looking at his body in the firelight. He was as hard and scarred as an ancient legionary, with dark hair that trailed down his chest and thinned out on his belly. She wanted to rub her face against it, and her arousal frustrated her. Meanwhile, he found his towel, wrapped it around his waist and padded barefoot, apparently intent on foraging for food. “I’ll cook us something.”

      She opened her mouth to stop him, tried to spin some quick lie to explain why the fridge was empty, but she was too late. He threw open the door, then looked at her from across the countertop that divided the living room from the kitchen, incredulous. “Don’t you eat?”

      “I told you—I just moved in.”

      His eyes narrowed. “You keep saying that, but I don’t see any boxes.”

      “They’re still back at my old place,” Kyra quickly lied.

      That’s when he flung open the freezer and found the food rations she’d stored when she’d planned to lock him in the dungeon. She hadn’t planned to starve him, after all. “What the hell?”

      “Doesn’t everybody love Salisbury steak?” But she couldn’t keep the guilt off her face, and she pulled the blanket tighter around her, anticipating a truly horrible confrontation.

      To her surprise, he laughed. And it wasn’t one of his dark bitter laughs, either. This one was rich and warm and it made her fingertips tingle. “Ashlynn, you have about twenty trays in here. It’s bad enough that you’re subsisting off craptastic frozen dinners, but every single one of these is the same!”

      So she wasn’t caught, after all. “Variety makes me nervous,” she chirped in relief.

      “I remember that about you.” He pulled two boxed dinners out of the freezer and tossed them on the countertop. “This is all congealed gravy and high sodium—you keep eating this stuff, and it’s going to kill you.”

      No, she thought. There was only one thing in this world that could kill her and that was him. “Marco…I’ll take care of dinner if you want to clean up. Your bandage—”

      It was the wrong thing to say. His hand quickly went to his cheek as awareness dawned in his eyes. For a few moments he’d given pleasure, taken pleasure and laughed. For just a little while, he’d forgotten he was a monster.

      Now, she’d reminded him again and it seemed to turn him to stone.