Without a word, he walked to the raised tub and sat upon the marble ledge. The scents of lilac and magnolia rose with the steam from the warm, clear water. She let him touch her, allowed his fingers to slide up the length of one thigh, but when he tried to explore further, to enter her most private of spaces, she snapped her legs shut and brushed his hand away. “Ah-ah-ah,” she said in that throaty voice he found so wickedly intriguing. “Not yet.” But he knew that she was as ready as he was, that her blood ran hot and wild within her.

“Not yet,” she insisted, as if to convince herself that it was not yet time, a time she dictated. “You brought more, didn’t you? From your hunt?”

He stared at her. Surprised at her nearly ESP like qualities.

“You think I don’t know about the stripper?” Sighing, she clucked her tongue.

“You set the rules,” he reminded her, surprised that she had read his mind, had known whom he’d taken.

Her face drew into a little pout. “But a stripper? Really?” She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t think so. No.” She touched her pointed chin with one wet hand. “I know we are getting low, that we need a refill, but a stripper? Remember, this is an intellectual, as well as a physical experience.”

That, he doubted. She could rationalize all she wanted, come up with lofty excuses, even reasons, but he’d faced the truth: they both enjoyed the search, the hunt, the kill. It was simple. She was into torture more than he; he was into pure, primal, sexual pleasure. Hurting and wounding wasn’t necessary for him. Her sadism wasn’t infectious; he had no real use for it unless it heightened his sexual experience. He got his thrills in the lovemaking and the death.

He wanted to argue that “Blood is blood,” but knew better, so he held his tongue as she deliberated, obviously tempted.

“Use what’s left of the others,” she finally said.

“Then we’ll be out. You’ll have to wait for your next fix.”

“You think this is a drug, that I’m an addict?” A smile curved her perfect lips and it was all he could do to restrain himself from taking her now, before they went through their ritual. But he would wait.

“Do I think you’re an addict?” he asked. “Absolutely.”

She didn’t disagree, just cocked her head, exposing the long length of her neck, the curve of her throat. “Maybe so, but I don’t want my addiction to be tainted, now, do I? Bad blood? I think not. I’ll wait.” She was toying with him now, amused that he was challenging her. “What is it they say? ‘Patience is a virtue’?”

“I think it’s ‘All good things come to he who waits.’”

She corrected, “Or she who waits.”

“Or she.”