“Tell me what you need, female,” he said, his hands shaking from resisting what he truly wanted: to touch her. He wanted to pull her back into his body and run his hands underneath the silk of her dress. He wanted to strip her bare and feel the heat of her against him.
Desire was dangerous, he realized. It had the potential to undo him, to make him lose control, when all of the Krave needed to be in control, no matter the situation. If Madame Allegria learned that he’d acted on his instinct, or that he was on the verge of losing that control…she would punish him.
“Or tell me what you want,” he added softly. “Want and need are very different,pax?”
“Pax,” she whispered, meeting his eyes again in the reflection of the glass before turning to face him. She had to tilt her head all the way back to regard him. “Is that your language?”
“Pax,” he said again. That lightness in his chest grew. “It means ‘yes’ in yours.”
Evelyn’s smile started small, but grew. Then she became shy again and looked down at her feet, breaking his gaze. Khiva had the strongest urge to reach out and lift her chin so he could see her dark eyes. Again, he didn’t act on his instinct.
“I tried to research the Krave on my Nu device,” she admitted, finally lifting her eyes, “before I came here. I couldn’t find much, not even a picture, which I thought was strange.”
“Perhaps because my race is called the Keriv’i,” he murmured gently. “Not the Krave.”
Some of her nerves left her, perhaps without her even realizing it, and she blinked, a curious expression enveloping her pleasing features.
“It is?”
“Madame Allegria gave us that name…the Krave,” Khiva told her and he didn’t know why. “It is more fitting for what we do, I suppose.”
Khiva could’ve cursed himself for saying that because Evelyn suddenly lost some of her ease with him and bit her lip, as if remembering where she was, as if remembering whohewas.
Which only puzzled him further. Unable to help himself, he commented, “You say you are surprised you came here. Will you tell me why?”
She swallowed, her eyes darting to the door and a flash of panic went through him. He didn’t want her to leave, even though he’d be free the remainder of the night. Hewantedto be with her, to talk with her, to touch her. He wanted to figure her out because she intrigued him.
“Forgive me,” he said swiftly. “It is none of my business why you came.”
“Isn’t it though?” Evelyn asked softly, meeting his gaze.
Khiva looked past her out the window. The room was on the third floor, so beyond the stretch of buildings just outside the circular courtyard below, he could see the Lake District, with its towering trees. His gaze returned to hers.
“Females come to me for one reason only,” he said.
Those same females kept returning to him because he could give them unfathomable, pure, lasting pleasure. He’d felt panic when Evelyn had looked at the door and he realized that if he wanted her to stay that night, if he wanted her toreturnas a regular client, then he needed to give her reason to.
For some reason, though they had just met, he wanted her to return. Again and again.
Shifting slightly, he held her gaze, tilting his body towards her. He didn’t touch her, not without her permission, but he came as physically close as possible. Her breath hitched softly, her lips parted. When he saw her pupils dilate, he knew that signaled her attraction, despite her shyness.
The body didn’t lie.
He was just about to ask her permission to touch her, desperate to get his hands on her and begin their night, when she whispered, “Wait.”
Khiva immediately stilled.
She looked up at him and even Khiva recognized the vulnerability in her eyes. It made him feel even more protective of her. He wanted to take that fear away. He wanted her to find comfort in him, in his body.
He could give that to her.
Hewould.
Khivaneverwould’ve guessed, in a million years, what she said next, however.
“I’m a virgin,” Evelyn said quietly, a light flush blooming underneath her softened cheekbones. “I thought it only right that you know.”
Forgetting himself, he asked, “Kruvu?” When he saw her confusion through the baffled haze in his mind, he repeated, “What?”
