How he longed to set free that hair and feel it sliding through his fingers and brushing against his naked chest.
He dropped his gaze down over her lush, full body and stifled his smile. Her dark blue shirt wasn't buttoned properly and her socks didn't match.
Still, she drove him crazy with desire.
She wasn't the kind of woman who normally drew his interest, and yet...
He was beguiled by her and her crystal blue gaze that glowed with warm curiosity and intelligence. He longed to sample her full, moist lips, to bury his face in the hollow of her throat where he could drink in her scent.
Gods, how he yearned for her. It was a need borne of such desperation that he wondered what kept him from taking her into his arms right now and satisfying his curiosity.
He'd never been the kind of man to deny himself carnal pleasures—especially not when the beast inside him was stirred. And this woman stirred that deadly part of him to a dangerous level.
Sebastian had only come into the museum to get the lay of it for tonight and to find out where they housed the tapestry. He hadn't been looking for a woman to pass the lonely night with until he could return home where he would be ... well, lonely again.
However, he still had hours before he could leave. Hours that he would much rather spend gazing into her eyes than waiting in his hotel room.
"Would you care to join me for a drink?" he asked.
She looked startled by his question. But then he seemed to have that effect on her. She was nervous around him, a bit jumpy, and he longed to set her at ease.
"I don't go out with men I don't know."
"How can you get to know me unless you ..."
"Really, Mr. Kat—"
"Sebastian."
She shook her head at him. "You are persistent, aren't you?"
She had no idea.
Suppressing the predator inside him, Sebastian put his hands in his pockets to keep from reaching out to her and scaring her off. "I'm afraid it's ingrained in me. When I see something I want, I go after it."
She arched a brow at that and gave him a suspicious look. "Why on earth would you want to talk to me?"
He was aghast at her question. "My lady, do you not own a mirror?"
"Yes, but it's not an enchanted one." She turned away from him and started away.
Moving with the incredible speed of his kind, Sebastian pulled her to a stop.
"Look, Channon," he said gently. "I fear I have bungled this. I just..." He stopped and tried to think of the best way to keep her with him for a while longer.
She looked to his hand, which still gripped her elbow. He reluctantly let go, even though every part of his soul screamed for him to hold her by his side, regardless of the consequences. She was a woman with her own mind. And the first law of his people ran through his head: Nothing a woman gives is worth having unless she gives it of her own free will.
It was the one law not even he would break.
"You what?" she asked softly.
Sebastian drew a deep breath as he fought down the animal part of himself that wanted her regardless of right or laws, the part of him that snarled with a need so fierce that it scared him.
He forced a charming smile to his lips. "You seem like a very nice person, and there are so few of you in this world that I would like to spend a few minutes with you. Maybe some of it might rub off."
Channon laughed in spite of herself.
"Ah," he teased, "so you can smile."
"I can smile."
"Will you join me?" he asked. "There's a restaurant on the corner. We can walk there, in plain sight of the world. I promise, I won't bite unless you ask me to."
Channon frowned lightly at him and his quirky humor. What was it about him that made him so irresistible? It was unnatural. "I don't know about this."
"Look, I promise I'm not psychotic. Eccentric and idiosyncratic, but not psychotic."
She still wasn't completely sure about that. "I'll bet the prisons are full of men who have told women that."
"I would never hurt a woman, least of all you."
There was such sincerity in his voice that she believed him. Even more convincing, she didn't feel any inner warnings, no little voice in her head telling her to run.
Instead, she was drawn to him and felt a most peculiar kind of serenity in his presence, almost as if she were supposed to be with him. "Down the street?"
"Yes." He offered her his arm. "C'mon. I promise I'll keep my fangs hidden and my mind control to myself."
Channon had never done anything like this in her life. She was a woman who had to know a guy for a long time before she'd even consider a date.
Yet she found herself pulling on her coat and placing her hand in the crook of his arm, where she felt a muscle so taut and well formed that it sent a jolt through her.
By the feel of that arm, she could tell his fashionable black suit and overcoat hid one incredible body.
"You seem so different," she said as he walked her out of the room. "Something about you is very Old World."
He opened the glass door that led to the museum's foyer. "Old being the operative word."
"And yet you're very modern."
"A Renaissance man trapped between cultures."
"Is that what you are?"
He cast a playful sideways look to her. "Honestly?"
"Yes."
"I'm a dragon slayer."
She laughed out loud.
He scoffed. "Again you don't believe me."
"Let's just say it's no wonder you said you wanted to steal the tapestry. I suppose there's not much call for slaying a mythological beast, especially in this day and age."
Those greenish-gold eyes teased her unmercifully. "You don't believe in dragons?"
"No, of course not."
He tsked at her. "You are so skeptical."
"I'm practical."
Sebastian ran his tongue over his teeth as a sly half-smile curved his lips. A practical woman who didn't believe in dragons yet studied dragon tapestries and wore a misbuttoned shirt. Surely there wasn't another soul like her in any time or place. And she had the strangest effect on his body.
He was already hard for her, and they were barely touching. Her grip on his arm was light and delicate, as if she was ready to flee him at any moment.
That was the last thing he wanted, and that surprised him most of all.
A reclusive person, he only interacted with others when his physical needs overrode his desire for solitude. Even then, those encounters were brief and limited. He took his lovers for one night, making sure they were as well sated as he, then he quickly returned to his solitary world.
He'd never dawdled with idle conversation. Never really cared to get to know more about a woman than her name and the way she liked to be touched.
But Channon was different. He liked the cadence of her voice and the way her eyes sparkled when she talked. Most of all, he liked the way her smile lit up her entire face when she looked at him.
And the sound of her laughter... He doubted if the angels in heaven could make a more precious melody.
Sebastian opened the door to the dark restaurant and held it for her while she entered. As she swept past him, he let his gaze travel down the back of her body. He hardened even more.
What he wouldn't give to have her warm and naked in his arms so that he could run his hands down her full curves, nibble the flesh of her neck, and hold her to him as he slowly slid himself deep inside her while she writhed to his touch.
Sebastian forced himself to look away from Channon and to speak to the hostess. He sent a mental command to the unknown woman to sit them in a secluded corner. He wanted privacy with Channon.
How he wished he'd met her sooner. He'd been in this cursed city for well over a week, waiting for the opportunity to go home, where if not the comfort of warmth, he at least had the comfort of familiarity. He'd spent his nights in this city alone, prowling the streets restlessly as he bided his time.