Katie MacAlister: Much Ado About Vampires

“—and you’re not even listening to me!” the goddess yelled, drawing his attention from his contemplation of laying her down on his bed and burying himself in her glorious body. She gave him a particularly hard jab in the chest, and he captured her hand without thinking, idly rubbing his thumb over her fingers.

“Of course I’m not,” he said, dismissively. “There’s nothing further to discuss. The woman pursued Theo, not the other way around. She is not injured, despite her claims to the contrary.”

She stared at him with stunned surprise for a moment or two, thick black lashes blinking over eyes he had first thought were gray, but now he could see were more hazel, the irises seeming to darken slightly as she looked at his hand. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to point out the obvious,” he responded, his eyes on her lips, wondering if she tasted of the sea. She certainly looked like some goddess who had risen from the sea in vengeance, a tempest in human form.

“No, your hand. Your thumb. It’s . . .”

Her gaze lifted to his, and he watched with primal satisfaction as her pupils dilated in sudden awareness of him as a man. How easy it would be to arouse her, this tempest. “What is your name?”

“Harry,” she said, suddenly giving a little shiver as she pulled her fingers from his.

He frowned. That was not at all fitting for a goddess from the sea. “You have a man’s name?”

“It’s a nickname, actually,” she said with a rueful smile.

His gaze moved instantly to her lips, a drawing in his groin warning that if he continued contemplation of her mouth, what he’d like to do to it, and what he’d like it to do to him, he would end up carrying her off to his bed. While that idea seemed just fine to him, there were other things to attend to . . . at least while Elena’s party was under way.

“My name is actually Eglantine, but no one but my mother calls me that. It’s just such a mouthful that everyone calls me Harry. What’s your name?”

“Iakovos Panagiotis Okeanos Papaioannou,” he said with a slight frown, as if he was surprised she didn’t know it.

That floored her. She grabbed onto the first part. “Yackydos? ”

“Iakovos. It’s Greek for ‘Jacob.’ ” When she gawked at him, he continued. “My name is quite a bit more than a mouthful, yes. I would suggest that since you are this young woman’s manager, you escort her back to her proper lodgings. I will attend to my brother.”

“I’m hurt! I want to go to the hospital!” Cyndi cried.

“Don’t be ridiculous. You don’t need a doctor’s care,” Iakovos told her.

“I’m their acting manager, and if she wants to go to the hospital, then I’ll take her to the hospital.” Harry poked him in the chest again, not, she told herself, because she wanted to feel his fingers on hers again. Oh, sure, he was the walking epitome of sex on two legs, your standard gorgeous hunk, but he was also an extremely obtuse hunk—one who had a very large surprise coming if he thought he could just brush away Cyndi’s (albeit minor) injuries.

“May I remind you that you are in my house,” Iakovos said, his voice low and incredibly arousing. “On my private island.”

Harry never really thought of voices as being sinfully sexy before, but the way this man’s rumbled around in his chest made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. It was like he was a god, a Greek god come to life, standing right there in front of her, doing all sorts of things to personal, intimate parts of her that she didn’t want to think about. He was a drunkard’s brother, for heaven’s sake! How could she find his voice arousing? “Look, Yacky—”

“Iakovos!”

“We may be in your house on your precious island, but we’re also in a country that I’m willing to bet doesn’t tolerate abuse to women, especially to American citizens, and double especially when the American citizen in question is just barely eighteen.” Harry took a deep breath and leveled the Greek god a look that should have felled him. “I’m assuming that since we had to take a boat to get out to Smut Island, we’re going to need one to get Cyndi to the hospital on the mainland. And since I also assume you own all the boats here, I’d appreciate if you could have one of your lackies fire one up for us.”

“And if I don’t?” Iakovos asked, his black eyes damn near spitting fire at her.

“You’re going to be one sad little panda,” she snarled.

“Are you threatening me?” He looked completely outraged at such a thing.

“You bet your incredibly attractive and probably hardenough-to-bounce-a-quarter-off-of ass!” she snapped back.

An indescribable look flitted across his face. “You are the most irreverent woman I’ve ever met.”

“And you’re the handsomest man I’ve ever seen in my life, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to lick you!” she yelled.

He stared at her in outright surprise.

“Sorry. That came out wrong.” Color warmed her face as she mentally damned that odd twist in her mind that led her to speak without thinking. “Sometimes, the dialogue I write in my head comes out of my mouth instead of staying where it belongs.”

“You wish to . . . lick ?” he asked, the same odd expression on his face.

“Not all of you!” she said with dignity, straightening her shoulders. “Just that spot there, where your neck meets your collarbone. Where that little indentation is . . .” Her voice trailed off as he continued to look at her as if dancing boobs had just appeared on the top of her head. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

He opened his mouth to say something, shook his head, and, with a dismissive glance at Cyndi and the others still clustered together in silent shock, pulled out a cell phone, speaking rapidly in Greek into it. “A boat will be waiting for you at the east dock.” His lips tightened as he looked at his brother before jerking him upright. “I trust that a visit to the hospital will reassure you that your charge has no injury beyond that done to her pride.”

“Pride?” Harry grabbed his arm as he was about to leave. He spun around and pinned her back with an outraged glare, which she more than met with one of her own. “She’s battered to hell and back again.”

His black gaze flickered over Cyndi, who thrust out her chest and gave him an outraged look. “I see no signs of battery.”

“She has red marks all over her chest and neck!” Harry said, pointing at Cyndi.

He looked at her steadily for a moment, and she could have sworn that one side of his mouth twitched. “Have you never had a lover who had heavy whisker growth?”

“Huh?”

“It is common among Greek men to have to shave more than once a day, and my brother and I are no exception to that fact.”

She eyed his jaw, squinting slightly. He did have a slight darkness on his lower face, as if he was about to sport some manly stubble. He also had extremely attractive lips, the lower one in particular, with its sweet, oh so very sweet curve, and the upper with a deep indentation up to a long, straight nose. Like with the spot on his neck, she had the worst urge to taste that upper lip dip. She actually licked her own lips thinking about it before she remembered that ogling a drunk’s brother, especially one who should have been on the cover of GQ , really wasn’t the thing. “Er . . . what was the question?”

He sighed. “Whisker burn. That is all the red marks are.”

“They are?” She turned to Cyndi. “Cyn?”

“He hurt me,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “Even if it was just his rough cheeks, I need to see a doctor.”

Amy, Derek’s girlfriend and the other singer in the group, immediately hugged her, her blue eyes worried. Even Terry—bright, cheerful Terry, who always had a joke on his lips—looked somber as he moved closer to the two women. All four sets of eyes watched Harry with an obvious plea in them.