Drake Sisters 06 - Turbulent Sea

about what happened…' Beside her, Ilya stirred, not physically - he didn't move a muscle - but she felt the impact of his reprimand mentally. She sighed. 'To settle everyone down before the performance.'
    As if I have to explain myself to you. I don't need your approval for anything. But she had explained, and that made her angry at herself. She was getting used to his domineering ways, which meant he was wearing down her defenses.
    She sent Ilya a snippy look and turned back to the business at hand. 'These people have paid money to see us, and we need to be able to deliver a good show if we're going on tonight.'

    Ungrateful little wretch.
    He simply reached for her hand and slid his thumb across her palm. Her body nearly convulsed with pleasure.
    Shivers slid down her spine; her womb spasmed and her nipples tightened. He sent her the impression of a wicked smirk even though his expression remained absolutely impassive. And then he walked away.
    Joley lost her train of thought. She simply stood there with her mouth open and her heart pounding and her body throbbing with urgent need. Damn him. He always seemed to get in the last word. She rubbed her itching palm against her thigh. Maybe not. She lifted her hand to her mouth, rounded her lips to press them tight against her palm, took a long slow lick right over the center and followed it with a sensuous scraping of her teeth along the skin.
    Ilya stumbled. His perfectly graceful, fluid walk faltered and he nearly tripped over his own feet. He glanced over his shoulder at her, and she flashed her sweetest smile. Suddenly feeling very good about things, she turned her attention to the assembling crew and band members, leaving Ilya to think about how she could even things out.
    The little minx. Ilya walked a short distance away and draped his large body in a casual pose against the wall, crossing his arms and trying to ease the aching discomfort in the front of his jeans. He'd handed her a hell of a weapon to use against him. He was sporting the biggest hard-on he'd ever had, and he'd had a few. Back in school they'd used very talented women to train him. The idea was stay in control, and when he didn't, the consequences had been immediate, painful and dire.
    In one stroke of her tongue, Joley had wiped out years of brutal training. He'd felt her lips suddenly close over him, her tongue stroke down the hard length of him, teeth just barely scraping, and he'd nearly burst out of his jeans. The woman learned fast, and she was just mean enough to use her knowledge. Keeping the upper hand with her wasn't going to be as easy as he'd thought. He willed the blood in his veins to cool to a slow, simmering boil while he stood there watching with hawk eyes the crowd around her.
    He could handle sex. Any kind of sex with any woman, and he would stay in complete control; his years of training had seen to that. But he was finding out - much to his horror - that emotion - real emotion - changed everything and made sex something far beyond what he'd ever been shown or taught. There was no controlling his desire or his body when his heart was involved. Damn her, she'd turned his life upside down, turned the very foundations of his life from hard rock to sand. His need for Joley had turned the pleasurable act of sex into something altogether different. Now he knew why people used the phrase 'falling in love.' The drop was long and scary.
    Joley was all too aware of Ilya. He made every nerve ending in her body come alive. Her soul sang to his. It was corny, but true. And his answered. She didn't know what that meant exactly, only that she was hyperaware of him and the fact that his aura was drowning in lust - and she'd done that with one stroke of her tongue on the center of her palm.
    That palm that had plagued her for months. He had seemed stunned by her touch, even if it was through their weird connection. She turned that piece of information over in her mind, even as she addressed her crew. She wasn't exactly as powerless in her odd relationship with Ilya as she had always believed.
    Everyone was subdued, some openly distraught and afraid. All had been questioned by the police, and a few were ambivalent about going on with the show. No one seemed terribly upset about Dean's death. He'd kept to himself for the most part, and the crew seemed to want to distance themselves from him. Maybe it was the nature of the murder -
    the suspicion that it had been a mob hit, and no one wanted