Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 90897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 454(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 90897 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 454(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
His tight expression relaxed as his gaze dragged down her body and back up to her face.
“You’re really here.”
She tried and failed to ignore the shiver his deep voice elicited. He had an unusual East London accent. Not quite fully Cockney. As if he’d sought to refine it over the years, but the Cockney slipped through.
“Did you expect to find someone else?”
“I wasn’t sure. This is all very cloak-and-dagger.” He closed the door behind him, and his eyes dropped to her legs and heated before they returned to meet hers again. “You look incredible.”
Her heart raced, and she willed it to slow. If he was fae, he could probably hear it.
Come to think of it … Echo could hear Elijah’s.
Fast and pounding.
Huh.
His excitement? Nervousness?
A little surer now, Echo took a step toward him. “You look far too good for a man who’s been on an exhaustive world tour for nine months.”
He did look far too good.
Which made no sense to Echo.
He wasn’t even her type.
Although she’d never been with a man for more than two nights, they all pretty much had one thing in common. They were reserved, sometimes even shy, and monosyllabic. Never too good-looking that they knew it. She didn’t like cocky, arrogant, or pretty boys. Echo wanted to be the one controlling the situation, always.
However, Elijah Webb was none of the above. He was gorgeous and exuded sex, and he knew it. He was tall, but not too tall. Six feet according to the many fan sites dedicated to him. Broad-shouldered, lean, and muscular. Other than the chin-length, wavy dark blond hair he wore tied in a knot at the back of his head, the tattoos his shirt concealed, and his pierced ears, there was nothing rock star about Elijah’s style. Not even onstage. He always wore some form of a suit. Sometimes a three-piece, or sometimes just a dress shirt and suit pants.
He wore that now. A blue dress shirt, too many buttons undone at the collar, with navy suit pants.
Together, they kind of matched.
Elijah’s mouth, surrounded by a well-maintained, dark blond beard, curled at the ends.
His most attractive feature lit up. Mossy, golden-green irises, beautiful eyes she’d found almost impossible to look away from at the club in Vienna. And again now.
They both had green eyes. The rarest color. But his were warm while hers were icy.
“You’re staring,” he said in that rumbly, too-sexy voice that lent itself well to the growling vocals of a rock singer.
“So are you.”
He smirked, and then his attention moved away from her to take in the champagne and strawberries. “For me?”
She nodded, her pulse increasing with her growing nervousness. It took all of her famed control to not glower at him for making her feel this way. “If you want.” Or we could just get straight to the point.
Elijah chuckled and stepped forward. “I appreciate the effort, but you didn’t need to go to the trouble, love. Even shitty hotels charge a fortune for this stuff.” He frowned, his gaze dropping, and Echo sensed his energy change, like it was weighted with fatigue.
Bingo.
“Fine. Then let’s get to it, shall we?” Before Elijah could respond, she sped across the room, grabbed him by the shirt front, and brought him down on the bed. Her dress refused to budge so she could straddle him. Echo held him down with one hand while she pulled her dress up her thighs so she could clamp them tight against his hips to hold him still.
All of this at vamp speed.
Elijah blinked up at her in shock, his features strained. “Love, I hate to tell you this because I am enjoying your aggressive seduction more than I thought possible … but I suddenly feel bloody hellish.”
Echo could feel his energy flicker, dimming. It wasn’t significant. It wouldn’t be significant until she snapped the iron around his wrists.
“Don’t worry. You’ll feel better once you understand.”
He frowned up at her. “What?”
With a practiced move, Echo used her vamp speed to handcuff each of his wrists to the bed frame. He hissed in pain and bucked under her before she’d even snapped the first one closed. The strength of that buck almost threw her off the bed, but Echo kept her cool and handcuffed the other.
“What the fuck?” Elijah’s face was contorted in agony as he slumped helplessly. He glared at her through narrowed eyes. “What the fuck … ahh! What have you done?”
Echo winced, sensing his torment and hating every second of it. She hadn’t known the iron would hurt him this much. “I’m sorry.” Her cool facade cracked. “Let me explain everything to you quickly with no interruption, and I’ll let you go.”
“Why do I feel like I have rings of fucking … fucking FIRE around my wrists?”
“Shh.” She hurried back toward the bed. “Don’t shout.”
Sweat slid down his temple, surprising her. She hadn’t known a fae could sweat. “Is this some kind of spell, you treacherous … fuck!” Elijah yanked weakly on the handcuffs, trying to break them. “I have no strength. What the hell is this?”