She giggled. Claude chuckled.

“I once knew a little boy like you. He possessed great power, but when he was your age, he couldn’t control his powers any more than his father could control him.”

Eve giggled again. “That was my daddy, wasn’t it?” She looked at Judah with pure adoration in her eyes.

Damn those green Raintree eyes!

So like Mercy’s.

“Say goodbye to Cousin Claude,” Judah said.

“Goodbye, Cousin Claude. I’ll see you very soon.”

She handed Judah the phone, then snuggled up against him as he held the sheet in place over his lower body and put in a telepathic SOS to Mercy.

“Your little Eve is quite a charmer,” Claude said to Judah. “Like father, like daughter, huh?”

“Could be.”

“Why does she think she’ll see me very soon?” Claude asked. “Have you told her that you’re bringing her to Terrebonne?”

“No. The subject hasn’t come up.”

Eve tapped Judah on the shoulder. Turning his head to face her, he asked, “What?”

“Tell Cousin Claude I said that I’d see him very soon because he’s coming here to the sanctuary.”

Judah stared at his daughter.

“Why does she think-” Claude began.

“Eve Raintree, come here right this minute!” Mercy stood in the doorway, hands on hips, a parental scowl on her face.

Eve popped off the bed and raced over to her mother. “I got to talk to Cousin Claude. He’s coming to the sanctuary very soon, and we’ll get to meet him.”

Mercy’s gaze met Judah’s, the concern and puzzlement in her eyes matching his.

“We’ll talk later,” Judah told Claude. “Keep me posted on that matter we discussed.”

He didn’t wait for a reply before ending the conversation and tossing his cell phone onto the nightstand. “Eve, why don’t you go with your mother while I grab a shower and get dressed?”

Mercy’s glance skimmed over Judah’s naked chest and shoulders, appreciating his lean body, although she wasn’t consciously aware of what she was doing. He returned the admiring glance. Mercy was certainly easy on the eye. The first moment he’d seen her seven years ago, he’d been struck by how beautiful she was. Even before he looked into her striking green eyes and realized she was Raintree, he had wanted her.

Clearing her throat, Mercy clasped Eve’s hand. “It isn’t polite to barge into someone’s room without being invited.” She looked at Judah. “I’m sorry she bothered you. It won’t happen again.” When she pulled on Eve’s hand, Eve balked.

Judah grinned.

Eve yanked on Mercy’s hand and motioned for her to bend down, which Mercy did. Eve whispered loudly, “I’ll go to my room and play for a while. You and Daddy need to talk about me some more.”

Mercy didn’t have a chance to respond before Eve scurried out of the room, lightning fast, and closed the door behind her.

“She’s quite a little bossy-butt, isn’t she?” Judah said.

“She’s a Raintree princess. Giving orders comes naturally to her, as it should. Unfortunately, she hasn’t learned the art of diplomacy yet.”

“Diplomacy is an overrated art. I prefer action to talk, and I expect my daughter is the same.”

“Eve does like to have her own way. But she’s young, and she’ll learn that she can’t always have everything she wants.”

Judah whipped back the sheet that covered his naked body and rose from the bed. Mercy gasped. He grinned.

“If you see anything you like, you can have it. Right now.”

Mercy stared at him, drinking him in, her gaze lingering over his erection. Then she looked him square in the eyes. “Sometimes what we want is very bad for us, and we learn from experience to avoid danger.”

Judah moved toward her, one slow, provocative step at a time. She stood her ground, not backing away, keeping her eyes glued to his face.

When he reached out and caressed her cheek with the back of his hand, she closed her eyes. “You still want me.”

She said nothing.

From that one brief touch, he sensed her desire. “I want you, too.” He slipped his hand around her neck and lowered his head. She sighed. His breath mingled with hers. She opened her eyes, and for just an instant, unaware of her vulnerability, she let the barrier protecting her thoughts weaken.

My God!

He yanked her to him, pressing his sex intimately against her. If she were as naked as he was…“There hasn’t been anyone else, has there? You’re as much mine now as you were that night.”

When he kissed her hungrily, she stood there rigid and unresponsive. But when he gentled the kiss, she whimpered. As he ravaged her mouth with tender passion, she pressed both hands against his chest and tried to shove him away.

Judah grabbed her and pulled her with him as he backed up against the bed. Taking her now would be almost like taking her for the first time. She was untouched by any other man, untutored, practically a virgin.

He toppled her into the bed and came down over her, holding her lifted arms out to either side as she struggled against his superior strength. Straddling her, his knees holding her hips in place, he stared down at her flushed face, and saw both desire and anger in her expression.

“Do you think I’ll let you rape me?” she spat the words at him.

“It wouldn’t be rape, and we both know it. You want me.”

Breathing hard, Mercy narrowed her gaze and focused on him.

He bellowed in pain, and rolled off her and onto his side. Damn her! She’d sent a psychic punch straight to the most vulnerable area of his anatomy, the equivalent of kneeing him in the groin. While he caught his breath and mumbled curses, she got out of bed and walked to the door. Pausing, she glanced over her shoulder.

“I allow you to live only because of Eve,” she said.

He shot a spray of fire arrows at her, their glowing tips outlining the space around her body. She extinguished them before they singed the door behind her.

“You may wish me dead, but you won’t kill me.” His cold stare pinned her to the spot. “And I won’t kill you. Not until I’ve fucked you again.”

Judah had spent the entire morning with Eve. Under Mercy’s supervision, of course. She had tried to stay in the background, at least part of the time, but she didn’t trust Judah enough to leave her daughter alone with him. Watching father and daughter together exposed her to a side of Judah that she hated to admit existed. In his fascination with and adoration of his child, Judah seemed no different than any Raintree father. He played games with Eve, read to her, ate a mid-morning snack of fruit, cheese and crackers with her, and watched as she tested several of her powers. He instructed her on how to channel her abilities and use them properly. He praised her when she succeeded, and when she failed, he told her that she simply needed more practice.

Kindness, patience and the ability to love were not traits she would ever have associated with Judah Ansara. Since she had fled from his bed that morning seven years ago, she had thought of him as a charmer, a seducer, an uncaring, unfeeling son of a bitch. She had hated him for being an Ansara, a clan she had been taught from childhood were the spawn of the devil.

“Let’s go on a picnic,” Eve insisted when Sidonia had inquired if “that man” would be staying for lunch.

“Eve, honey, I don’t think-” Mercy tried to object.

“A picnic is a great idea.” Judah winked at Eve. “Why don’t you and I raid the kitchen and put our picnic lunch together while your mother changes clothes.”

Mercy glanced down at her attire: neat navy gabardine trousers, a tan cotton sweater, and sensible navy loafers. What was wrong with what she was wearing?

As if reading her mind-God, had he?-Judah said, “Wouldn’t you be more comfortable in jeans or shorts?”

“Yeah, Mommy. Put on shorts like I’ve got on.”

“I’ll change before we leave.” Mercy recognized defeat and accepted it, at least on this one issue. “For now, I’ll go with y’all to kitchen and help fix our picnic lunch.” In her peripheral vision, she caught a glimpse of Sidonia shaking her head disapprovingly.