warm water over her breasts and thighs...warm lips on her mouth...warm steam billowing out around her.

marie-terese ran her soapy hands up the massive shoulders of her lover, marveling at the difference between their bodies. he was so hard, his muscles flexing and releasing as the two of them moved against each other, shifting, rubbing, seeking, and finding. his hot erection stroked against her upper stomach, and between her legs she was just as ready for more as he was.

vin's lips broke off from her own and nuzzled into her neck, then down to her collarbone...and he went even lower, bending to suck on her nipples before licking at the tight tips. as she sank her fingers into his slick wet hair, he knelt on the marble before her, gripping her hips and staring up at her with hot eyes. with their stares locked, his mouth went to her belly button, brushing soft as the water did before being replaced by his pink tongue.

falling back against the marble wall between two of the showerheads, marie-terese widened her stance as he kissed his way over to her hip. white teeth made a brief appearance on the bone, and then he was raking them gently across the skin of her lower belly before retracing the path with sucking lips.

lower.

to make even more way for him, she put her foot up on the marble bench that was built into the corner, and his mouth went immediately to her inner thigh. he was urgent and he was gentle at the same time as he got closer and closer to the core that throbbed between her legs. she was dying for him to go exactly where he was headed, and as he paused at the very top of her inner thigh, she could barely breathe.

"please..." she said roughly.

vin nuzzled over and licked into her with one sure stroke. as her voice keened above the sound of the falling water, his fingers sank into her thighs and he groaned against her sex. drugging laps mixed with tugging sucks until she found herself falling down onto the bench and bracing one foot against the soap shelf on the wall and throwing the other down the far side of his back.

and then he got serious. lifting his head from her and meeting her eyes, he brought up two of his fingers and drew them inside his mouth. as they came out all glossy from being between his lips, he leaned back down to her sex, leading with his pink tongue.

the thick penetration was compounded by a flicking tickle at the top of her sex.

marie-terese came hard and loud and long, and when she was finally spent, she collapsed against the hard stone, boneless as the water itself. after he slid out of her, he licked his fingers, tongue tracing in and around while he looked at her from under his brows.

he was hard. maybe even brutally so, given the straining length at his hips.

"vin..."

"yeah." his voice was nothing but gravel.

"it's really far to the bedroom, where the condoms are."

"it is."

she looked down at his erection. "i wouldn't want you to wait that long."

his smile was fierce. "what did you have in mind?"

"i want to watch."

his laugh was deep and low, and he settled back against the glass wall, his thighs opening, his massive arousal running up his ribbed stomach. god, he looked spectacular against the creamy marble. "what exactly do you want to watch?"

she blushed. god help her, she actually blushed. but then, he was sprawled out on the floor of the shower, glistening from head to toe, ready for sex...and looking for direction. "what do you want me to show you," he drawled.

"i want you...to put your hand - "

"here?" he said, laying one over his pec.

"lower," she whispered.

"hmm..." his broad palm drifted down across his ribs to the top of his six-pack. "here?"

"lower..."

he bypassed the head of his erection and went over to his hip. "lower still?"

"to your left. and higher."

"oh, you mean" - as his palm found his arousal, he arched and his eyes squeezed shut - "here?"

"god, yes..."

rolling his hips, he kept his hand still and she got exactly what she wanted: a stunning view of his blunt head piercing through his grip and disappearing, piercing through, disappearing. his heavy chest rose and fell, his lips parting as he pleasured himself.

"vin...you're so beautiful."

his lids lifted slowly and he stared up at her, his gleaming eyes pulling her into him. "i love that you're watching me..."

with that his other hand went between his thighs and captured his potent sac. as he squeezed himself, he worked his arousal in long strokes and moaned.

"i don't know how long i'm going to last..."

good...lord. the entire building could have been on fire and she would not have been able to move as he squeezed his sac again and then focused on the head of his erection. after he pinched himself with his thumb, he went two-handed, his breath coming in punches.

he stayed locked on her eyes as he worked himself.

he was so sensual, so...unfurled in front of her, hiding nothing, both vulnerable and powerful. "are you going...to make...me hold it...?" he groaned between gulping inhales. her greedy stare roamed over him, and she committed the erotic sight of him to permanent memory as surely as if she had carved the images out of stone. "i have...to..."

"come for me," she said. she wanted it to last forever, but she knew it was going to start to hurt in earnest soon.

now his chest really got to pumping and so did his hands - faster and hard enough so that the muscles in his arms strained.

when he orgasmed, he came all over his stomach and his thigh because he couldn't seem to stop. and his eyes never left hers even as his palms finally came to rest and then released and flopped to the side.

as his breathing eased, she smiled and went to him, capturing his face, kissing him softly. "thank you."

"anytime you have a hankering for that kind of show, just let me know?"

"you can bet on it."

when they finally rinsed off and stepped out of the shower, they had identical ahhh-lovely smiles on their faces, and vin got her a monogrammed towel from one of the warming racks. the white terry-cloth expanse was so big it covered her from breast to ankle, and by the time she'd turbaned her hair with a second one, she felt as if she'd been slip-covered in velvety softness.

vin picked up a third, dried his hair until it sat straight in spikes, and covered his hips. "i like you in my towels."

"i like being in them."

he came over and kissed her, and in the pause that followed, her breath stopped in her throat.

she knew what he wanted to say. and agreed it was far, far, far too early for it.

"you want something to eat?" he asked.

"i...probably should head off." she had a lot of packing to do.

"okay...all right."

sadness thickened the steamy air as they slipped their arms around each other and left the bathroom -

"am i intruding?"

marie-terese froze and so did vin.

the woman he'd shown up with at the iron mask was standing just inside the bedroom, her hands hanging loosely at her sides, her long glossy hair down over her shoulders, her black coat belted tight around her tiny waist.

in her resonant stillness, she looked exactly as any model-chic female would on the surface, but there was something way off about her. way. off.

first of all, if she'd been badly beaten the night before, her face wasn't showing any signs of it; her features and skin were as smooth and pristine as fresh-cut marble. second, she looked perfectly capable of killing someone as she stared at the two of them.

oh...god. her eyes. there wasn't a white rim around her black iris, her glaring gaze nothing but a pair of pits that were as dark and bottomless as sinkholes.

could that be right, though?

as the skin across the back of marie-terese's neck tightened, the woman focused on her and smiled like an axe murderer who was looking at his next victim. "i saw your purse down on the dining room table, darling. given how much money was next to it, i'd say your prices have gone through the roof. congratulations."

vin's hard voice sliced through the air. "how did you get in. i locked everything - "

"don't you get it, vincent. your door is always open to me."

vin put his body in front, shielding marie-terese. "leave. now."

the laughter that sounded out was all nails-on-a-blackboard, high and cringe-worthy. "ever since we first met, things have been on my terms, vin, and that isn't going to change now. i've invested a lot in you, and i do believe it's time to call you home."

"fuckyou, devina."

"you certainly did," the woman drawled. "and very well, i might add. but you weren't the only one. your friend jim also did right by me, and i think i liked him better than you. with him, i didn't need someone else."

"yeah, i had to have more than you gave me as well," vin snapped.

a wave of coldness rippled out from the woman, and her eyes, those awful black holes, shifted to marie-terese and locked on. "you've met jim, haven't you. you ever been alone with him? maybe...in a car? maybe when you were taking him back home yesterday?"

how the hell did she know that? marie-terese wondered.

as vin's body stiffened, the woman continued. "when you took him back to that shitty studio of his over the garage, you liked the taste of his cock, didn't you - but you would have blown him even if you hadn't. you need all the money you can get, and he was willing to pay for it."

marie-terese glared across the room. "that never happened. never. i didn't go to his place."

"so you say."

"no, so you say. i know what i did and didn't do and with whom. you, on the other hand, are a desperate bitch who's trying to hold on to someone who doesn't want her."

the woman recoiled a little, and marie-terese had to admit there was some satisfaction to be had with that.

but then vin stepped away, and one look in his pale face made her realize that trez had been tragically right. a past like hers had a long reach, and vin and she hadn't known each other long enough for even rudimentary trust to have developed - much less the kind of faith required for a man to believe that a prostitute wouldn't be doing her "job" with his friend.

thank god for all the towels she had on, she thought.

because she suddenly felt as though she were out in the frigid wind.

"jim."

standing in front of devina's bathroom door, jim measured the expression on eddie's face: dead serious. more to the point, that big-ass body was going to be in the way if jim made any move for the doorknob.

releasing his tight muscles, jim eased up his body and looked over his shoulder at the bureaus. adrian was pulling open drawers in a methodical manner and rifling through whatever was in them - and there evidently was a lot given all the rattling.

"fine," jim murmured. "guess we should join in the easter-egg hunt?"

"i know it's hard," eddie said. "but you have to trust me."

eddie clapped him on the back and together they turned to head over to his buddy. jim followed one footstep -

and wheeled around for the doorknob. as the fallen angel barked out a curse, jim yanked open the slab of wood and jerked to a halt.

a young woman was hanging naked and upside down over the porcelain tub, her legs open in a v, her ankles bound with black rope to the circular rod that should have held a shower curtain. her hands were tied together with the same black rope and pulled tautly up her body so that her fingers just barely touched the top of her sex. all around her belly there were deep cuts, arranged in a pattern of some kind, and red blood covered her white skin, running down her torso before splitting around the jut of her chin and jaw and flowing through her blond hair.

the tub was plugged and full.

oh, lord...about two inches above the pool she hung. her eyes were open and fixed straight ahead, but her mouth was working ever so slightly..."she's alive!" jim called out as he leaped forward.

eddie caught him and yanked him back. "no, she's not. and we've got to get out of here now, thanks to you."

jim thrashed free of the hold and rushed forward, raising his hands, ready to start on the complex series of knots -

a hard, heavy palm locked onto his shoulder. "she's fucking dead, man, and we've got a problem now." when jim shook his head roughly and fought against the hold, eddie's voice rose. "she's dead - those are autonomic spasms, not signs of life. see the cuts on either side of her throat?"

jim's eyes careened around her body, desperately looking for a shallow draw of breath or recognition in her face that she was going to be saved...something...anything...

"no!" he pointed to her fingers as they twitched ever so slightly. "she's alive!"

as he strained until he roared, the scene changed before his eyes, flipping from current horror to remembered tragedy. he saw his mother surrounded by blood, her eyes blinking slowly, her mouth working to form the words necessary to get him to leave her.

eddie's calm voice came right into his ear, as if the guy weren't so much speaking, but implanting the words: "jim, we've got to get the fuck out of here."

"we can't leave her." was that his voice? that reedy croak?

"she's gone. she's not here anymore."

"we can't leave her...she's..."

"she's not with us, jim. and we have to go. to save vin, we have to get you the fuck out of here."

adrian's voice exploded from the doorway, "what the fuck is wrong with you - "

"shut the hell up, ad." eddie's words cut through the interruption. "he doesn't need you busting his balls right now. jim...i want you to back out of the room."

jim knew the guy was right. the girl was dead, bled out like nothing but an animal, and that wasn't the worst of it. her frozen death mask was one of horror, as if her suffering had been great. "come on, jim."

so help him god, he knew he had to listen to the angel and force himself to accept that there was no battle to be fought here: the time for conflict and the possibility of victory had come and gone without his even being aware it existed. and he believed eddie about the taking off part. at this moment, risking an altercation with devina would not have been good.

right now one-third of the team was a total head case.

jim went to turn around, but got slapped from behind, eddie's huge hand catching his face and holding it where it had been.

"keep your eyes straight ahead and back out with me. do not move your head. do you understand? i want you to step back with me and keep your head where it is. we're going to back away

"i don't want to leave her," he moaned. "oh, shit..."

such suffering, the terror etched into the soft, pale planes of her lovely face. where were her parents? who was she? as he stared at the young woman's corpse, he memorized everything about her, from the mole she had on her thigh, to the light blue of her lifeless eyes, to the pattern that had been cut into her stomach.

"she's gone," eddie said softly. "her body's just a leftover - her soul's not here anymore. you can't do anything for her, and we are in a dangerous situation right now. we need to get you out of here."

the more he looked at her though, the more his insides started screaming again and he couldn't - all at once, he heard a rush of noise that sounded like the feet of rodents in a sewer. it wasn't hundreds of rats, however. the clocks had started up, every single one of them energized at precisely the same moment, the chaotic ticking of countless second hands rising up in the loft, filling the air. abruptly, adrian's voice was grim instead of angry. "we have to leave - "

his words were cut off by a rumbling and then a vibration that emanated from the floor, one so great it rattled the smoky window over the toilet and created waves on top of the blood in the tub. "like exactly now."

"i don't want to leave her - "

eddie's voice turned into a growl. "she's gone. and we need to - "

"fuck you!" jim lunged forward.

eddie's massive arms were iron bars. even as jim fought the hold, and went animal on the guy, clawing and ripping to get free, he got nowhere.

voices rang out - his and adrian's. but eddie was silent as he started to pull jim from the room.

then eddie cut through the vocal chaos and the flapping of clothes: "knock him the fuck out! i can't keep him from seeing the mirror!"

adrian stepped in, rolled up a fist, and cocked his arm back. the strike was hard and fast, the crack cutting through everything...and stunning jim into compliance.

he was dragged out in a daze, the heels of his timberlands streaking across the hard floor, his head ringing like a bell. once his boots were past the bathroom door, adrian slammed the thing shut, and eddie flipped jim up off the floor and into a firemen's hold.

dizzy and disoriented, jim tried to place a new fleet of strange sounds that came from a vast distance. glancing over at the counter in the kitchen, he saw that the knives were moving around, arranging themselves, making order out of the mess they'd been in. and it was the same with the dressers - which explained the reverberations: the chests of drawers were trembling on their feet, finding positions like soldiers called for a lineup.

he barely remembered leaving the loft and he didn't register much of the trip down the stairs...but the cold air outside did revive him enough so that he was able to push himself free of eddie's hold and make it to the truck on his own two feet.

as adrian drove them away from the warehouse, all jim could see was the girl's face.

there was no singing as they went off this time.

no talking, either.