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“…to
scream
.”

His fingers closed around her clit, pinching firmly, and scream she did.

She came like lightning striking, all heat and energy and pyrotechnic glory. Her whole body clenched in a spasm of ecstasy. Her pussy closed hard around his cock, squeezing until she thought she heard him cry out himself, but then she felt the hot pulse of his release, and she lost what little awareness she’d managed to hold onto. For hours it seemed she balanced on the head of a pin, buffeted by wave after wave of pleasure. Her breath came in gasping pants, roughening a throat already raw from her hoarse cry of completion, and every inch of her trembled as if electricity really did course beneath her skin.

She finally collapsed on top of him, limp and breathless. Her hand had clenched so tightly in his hair that it took a minute to convince the fingers to stop spasming and let go. She heard him grunt and felt the whisper of his breath against her ear as he wrapped his brawny arms around her to cradle her against him. She folded her arms over his, savoring his warmth and the thick ropes of muscle that had enabled him to move her so effortlessly for his pleasure. Fighting back a shiver of remembrance, she turned her head to rest her cheek against his chest and rub kitten-like against his warm skin.

Sleep came back to claim her, and she struggled briefly to fight it off. As comfortable and sated as she felt, she had that nagging feeling in the back of her mind that told her something was out of place.

Something she needed to pay attention to…

Grunting, her lover stretched his hand over the side of the bed and returned with the forgotten blankets, pulling them up over their still-joined bodies. Danice felt her muscles relax even further and sighed.

Maybe whatever she had forgotten wasn’t all that important after all.

He turned his head, brushing soft kisses over her forehead and her closed eyelids before he pressed his lips softly to hers in a tender, almost innocent, kiss. “Go to sleep,” he murmured, shifting slightly beneath her. “We’ll both still be here in the morning.”

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Well, since he put it that way…

Danicegave one last sigh, snuggled back into his embrace, and let sleep claim her. Whatever she needed to do, she could always do it in the morning.

She woke the moment he stirred from their sleepy cuddle. Her eyes flew open and that “something” she hadn’t been able to remember last night became the only thought in her frantic mind.

Danicedidn’t have a lover, so who the hell had she been screwing last night?

Scrambling off the pile of muscle and testosterone she’d been draped over for the last God-knew-how-many hours, Danice grabbed the sheet to coverherself and turned on the strange man in her bed. He watched her through wary eyes the color of a stormy sea and sat up, bracing himself with his big hands against the cotton-covered mattress. A waterfall of thick, golden hair cascaded over his shoulders and down to the center of his back.

“Who the hell are you?”

She wasn’t sure which one of them said it, or if they both did, but it didn’t matter. Apparently they both needed the answers.“You first.”

He pushed himself all the way up and propped his back against the headboard.“Mac. McIntyre Callahan.You?”

“ DaniceCarter.” She knew she sounded snappish, but really, who could blame her? It wasn’t every day she woke up on top of a man she’d never met. “What the hell are you doing in my apartment?” He glanced around,then looked back at her with his eyebrows raised. “I don’t think this is your apartment.”

“What do you mean? Of course it’s my—” She caught sight of the door with its “Security Procedures” posting on the back, and her jaw dropped.“Oh my God. We’re in a hotel.”

“Looks like.” He bent one leg toward his chest, draping his forearm over the knee. Danice tried not to wonder if his knee was the only thing tenting the sheet that covered his lap. “What I’d like to know is, why?”

Her gaze snapped back to his face. “I want to know how. How did you get me here without my knowing what was going on? Did you drug me?”

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He snorted. “Only if you drugged me back, baby, ’cause I don’t remember a bit of it.Which leads me to believe I know the how, and brings me back to wondering about the why. ” She stared at him, thoroughly confused.“How?”

McIntyre shrugged.“Magic.”

* * * * *

Mac watched her nose wrinkle as if saying the word left a foul taste in her mouth. For all he knew, maybe it did.

“Yeah.Magic,” he repeated. He hated having to be the one to shatter the illusions of humans, but in this case, it didn’t look like he had much choice. “It’s real. So are all sorts of things you’ve always thought only existed in fairy tales and badmovies. I hate to break it to you, butManhattan is full of vampires and werewolves and things that go bump in the night.”

He waited for her eyes to widen, for shock to make her pale under that lickably dusky skin, but she just watched him through her exotic, almond-shaped brown eyes. “I know,” she said.

All of a sudden, his eyes were the ones widening. “You know?”

“About the vampires and werewolves.About the whole Council of Others,” she said, kicking the foundation out from under his planned approach to handling this situation. “My two best friends just married a couple of them, a vamp and a Lupine. But no one said anything about magic.” That surprised a laugh from him. “You don’t think that’s magic?” She shook her head. “No. Magic is spells and incantations and wands and pixie dust, right? I just figured theOthers were a different branch on the ol ’ evolutionary tree.” Mac stared at her, absolutely fascinated. Not only did this woman have a body that drove him insane and a pussy he’d be dreaming about for the rest of his life, but she knew all about the other side of reality. It almost left him speechless, but since she stared at him, obviously expecting an answer, he dredged up the power somewhere to refute her supposition. “Well, they are, sort of, but that doesn’t mean magic doesn’t exist. I don’t know what your friends and their…spouses have been telling you, but there are a lot more things in this world than just vamps and shapeshifters . In fact, there are more worlds than just this one. And even in this one, there are certain…people with the power to do magic.” Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Are you one of them? Did you magic us here somehow?” He shook his head.“No way. I mean, I’ve got some talents, but this is beyond me. Teleportation is reserved for those of pure blood, not mutts like me.” Her gaze raked over him—from the top of his head, over his bare, hairless chest, to the sheet that covered his lower body. “You don’t look like any of the Lupines I’ve met.”
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His mouth quirked in a half-smile.“Not that kind of mutt. I don’t mean I’m a werewolf. Mutt is a way of referring to someone who is part human andpart something else.”

“What else?”

“ Fae.”

He saw her frown, watched her chew over that thought until she found a bone.“ Fae.As in fairy?The little people?”

“The fair folk,” he corrected quickly, casting a nervous glance around the room. “But yeah, like them.”

“You don’t look like any fairy I’ve ever heard of.”

“Faerie,” he said, changing her pronunciation slightly. “And how many have you seen?”

“None that I know of.”

“Most likely none.The fae don’t spend much time in Ithir .The human world. They think most humans are a bit simple.”

“Then how did you end up being half-human?”

He gave her a wry look. “I said most.”

“So one of your parents was… fae.”

He nodded.

“Then that makes you…”

“A changeling.”

“But you’re not powerful enough to have teleported me here from my apartment and yourself from wherever you were?”

She had a quick mind, which he liked.Almost as much as he liked her sweet scent and the silky texture of her skin.“Right. Only a pure blooded fae could manage that.Or an extremely powerful witch. Run into either of those lately?”

Danicesnorted. “Like I’d know if I had. I didn’t even know either of them existed until you told me.” Mac sighed. “Then we’re back to square one. Trying to figure out what the hell is going on.” He watched while her spine straightened and her chin tilted a few inches higher. “That might be your square one,” she said, wrapping the sheet she wore more snugly around her, “but my square one is to get dressed, get back to my apartment and forget this ever happened.” Her words delivered a surprising sting, making Mac frown and shake his head. He might never have seen this woman before tonight, but the idea of her leaving made him realize he wanted to see her again.

Preferably naked.In good lighting. He definitely did
not
want her leaving him, let alone forgetting about
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him. He looked around the room while he tried to think of a way to stop her, and he found it. He felt the grin spread across his face like sunrise.

“Um, that might be a little tough,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back against the headboard with a deep sense of satisfaction.

She scowled. “Why?”

“Neither of us seems to have any clothes.”

Danicelooked at Mac, looked at the bare floor, the empty chairs, the sterile bathroom and back at Mac.

Her eyes narrowed. “So make me some.”

He shook his head. “I can’t do that.”

“You said you could do magic. Is this suddenly too complex for you?”

“Okay, let me rephrase. I won’t do that.”

Danicestifled the urge to smother him with a feather pillow and took a deep breath. Contrary to her outspoken demeanor and forward reputation, she was
not
the sort of woman who woke up next to strange men on a regular basis. Men, yes, but she usually at least knew their names. Since this particular experience counted as a first for her, she figured the universe owed her a little leeway.

“Look,” she said, using her most reasonable, court-is-in-session tone, “I realize that what happened between us might have given you the wrong impression about me, but I’m not playing games here, and I want to go home.Now.”

Those blue-grey eyes had the nerve to look sympathetic. “Trustme, I know this isn’t a game. No matter what you might like to believe, I didn’t get us into this situation, and I have a sinking suspicion that I’m not going to be able to get us out of it, either.” He rose from the bed and headed toward the hotel room door.

Danicesquealed. “What the hell are you doing? You’re naked!” He grinned. “If you’re embarrassed, cover your eyes.” And miss the sight of the finest male butt that had ever blessed her field of vision? She didn’t think so.

But she still offered a protest when he threw back the security latch and pulled the door open onto nothingness.

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Literally.There was nothing on the other side of the door, not a hallway, not a sidewalk, not a parking lot.Nothing. Not even sky.Just a great, blank grey space without a cloud to fill it.

Daniceblinked and stared. “What is that?”

“Nothing.”

“Well, I can see that. I meant, what—”

“No, really,” Mac interrupted, gesturing to the grey space. “It’s literally nothing. As I suspected, we’re in limbo.”

“Limbo is a mid-priced hotel room?”

Mac shut the door and turned back to face Danice , who had to struggle with every instinct and hormone in her body not to stare straight at his crotch. But she still noticed he had an erection. At that size, it became a little hard to miss.

“Not exactly.”He waved away the bedspread she held out to him and stretched, gloriously nude, across the end of the bed where he could watch her. “If I’m right, we’re not really in a hotel room. This is just a spell.An illusion to make us feel more comfortable while we’re floating around in the grey stuff out there.” Dear Lord. Her head started to throb. “Then none of this exists? You’re saying that we’re really just floating around outside, and I’m not actually even wearing this sheet.” Mac grinned.“Exactly.”

“Then you’d better damned well close your eyes, buddy, until we find a way back!” He laughed and reached out to tug the sheet. “Relax. That’s the theoretical part, but the reality is that our minds are both too human to not see all the things the spell wants us to see. For all intents and purposes, you’re fully covered.”

She sighed in relief. “Good.”

“We could change that.”

She should have smacked him for that, but he said the words so hopefully that she couldn’t bring herself to do it. He was too charming forher own good. She forced herself to give him The Look. “Or we could not.”

He pouted, and damned if it wasn’t cute, too. “Well, what else do you suggest we do? I doubt we’re going anywhere else anytime soon.”

“How can you say that like it’s no big deal? Aren’t you the least bit curious to find out why we’re here and who sent us here? I mean, I assume this wasn’t some sort of spontaneous blip in my reality, because I’m pretty sure it’s never happened before. So what the hell is going on?” She batted his hand away from the hem of her sheet. “And will you cut that out? I’m surprisingly unaroused by your insistence on using sex with me as a way to kill time!”

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That was probably the last thing she should have said. His eyebrows lifted and an expression of surprised comprehension gave him a wicked look before it settled into a grin that was positively devilish.

“Is that was this is about? You think I only want to have sex with you because I have nothing better to do?” he purred, grabbing two handfuls of sheet and using it to pull her closer, close enough to grab and tumble onto the bed with him. “Because I’d be more than glad to show you how wrong you are about that.”