Author’s note: Just a disclaimer, if one is necessary: I do not own Four Seasons’ Spring and The Black Eyed Peas’ fabulous song ‘Sexy’. I love this song!

Chapter 7

The ArtDance Studio on East 57th Street was packed with laughter, music, and masks. By the time Stoker had gotten there, the ball had already begun. So had the dancing. The mini orchestra was playing Vivaldi’s Four Seasons’ Spring and everyone was in good cheer. He felt awkward under the white mask he wore, despite the fact that there were about ten more people wearing almost the same white mask as he did. He had not worn a mask to a masquerade ball before, and hell, he hated it.

He spotted a table, dressed in white and pink, and on the table were glasses of wine and several buckets of iced wine bottles. Two masked waiters silently and diligently poured white and red wine into the quaint glasses. Stoker picked up a glass of red wine and sipped it while he watched the crowd for any inkling of Kara Sarris.

Before him there was a flurry of colourful masks, ranging from ruby red to forest green and midnight black. There were too many black-and-gold masks in the room. For all he knew, she could be anyone, anywhere in the room, probably watching him from afar. But his instincts told him no, she had yet to arrive.

The masquerade ball was an almost perfect blend of modern and old. The masks were vintage and flamboyant, the outfit modern and classy. Women wore slinky evening dresses and men wore tuxedos. He realized with little humour that he was the only one sporting a tie.

Then his eyes moved to the magnificent gilded timber doors and he saw her. He knew that he couldn’t be sure, but he had the uncanny feeling that the slim, slender woman in the graceful black dress who had just entered the studio was none other than Kara Sarris aka Jane Marlow.

Plus, she was wearing a black-and-gold mask.

Kara had never felt this nerve-wracked before. She slipped gracefully with the crowd through the gilded timber doors and tried to keep her hand from adjusting her black-and-gold mask again. She wondered if she had tied it at the back of her head the right way. Her loose, dark brown curls covered the black ribbon of the mask and hung just below her shoulders. Drawing a deep breath, she tucked her hair behind an ear and moved towards the side to gather her composure.

She can do this. Meeting Dylan Stoker is no big deal. He’s just a job. Nothing more. Just a job. Just a job.

She repeated that sentence until she felt slightly better and more ready. Her gaze traveled across the dance hall and she spotted a table dressed in pink and white, holding glasses of seemingly white and red wine. A man stood by the table, tall, broad-shouldered, lean, sporting a black tie and sipping red wine. He wore a white mask, and his dangerously glittering eyes gave her instincts a good kick. It was him. She could tell from the Polaroid. And where, where had she seen those same eyes, observing her and drawing her into a swirling vortex?

Dylan Stoker moved across the floor of dancing people towards her, as if he understood the message that her gaze held. She simply stood frozen to her spot, watching him approaching her, thinking what to do, but never really giving a thought to her thoughts.

Just then, Vivaldi stopped and was replaced by The Black Eyed Peas: Sexy.

He stopped and held out his hand. “Care for a dance, Miss Marlow?” His voice was rough, coarse, husky, and sounded better than on the phone.

She hesitated at first, then her lips spread into the most appreciative smile she could manage, “Certainly, Mr. Stoker.”

He led her to the dance floor and began a slow, seductive waltz. She moved along to his rhythm and the beat of the song, swaying her hips slowly and smiling at him so alluringly, that he soon found himself drowning in the very dance he was dancing. She took his hand and placed it on her waist, then pressed her back to his chest as she let his hands caress her body.

Her perfume was soft, sweet, burning up a heady fantasy in his mind. Her body was slim, curvy and her skin like flowing water under his roaming palms. The swirling, velvet melody of the song choreographed their slow, sexy dance and he moved like never before.

He changed the pace abruptly, swinging her across the floor, then tugging her gently back to his arms. It all happened so fast that by the time she was only mere inches from his face, her breath was heavy and her eyelids heavy.

Damn, the masks were a major impediment.

In the still moment, they looked into each other, and there was a silent understanding. DEATH spelt on their masks, a slow and sensual death.

She broke the spell with another fantastic smile that made his heart beat faster. Slowly, she inched away, her fingers interloped with his, pulling him away from the centre of the dance floor. At a corner, she stopped and began the dance again. He growled and placed his hands on her hips, then smiled almost apologetically. He couldn’t help himself. Damn, this woman was hot.

They changed their pace to an elegant waltz. But even then, she drew him into a sea of desire in her deep blue eyes. He hung on to complete the dance, but the burning in her gaze made him long to snatch off her mask and give her luscious, pouty lips a good, hard kiss. Her fingertips touched the side of his face, and her touch was fire. He closed his hand on hers and pressed it close to his face while their eyes connected and spoke of passion.

Her hand slipped from his grasp and reached behind his head to remove his mask. He understood her need. He shared the same desire to touch, to see. He untied the strings to her mask, and his white mask came off the same time hers did.

Without a pause, their lips moved instinctively towards each other and pressed as hardly against each other as their bodies pressed together.

There was no need for words. All thought of murder was out of the window. They hadn’t loved like this before. The mutual attraction was fatal, but they decided silently in their passionate kiss that tonight, there was room for some loving.

There was indeed physical loving that night. Hebecame the tiger, and shewashis tigress. She had never been as overwhelmed by a man this way before, and she let him take her to a stage of delirium she’d never experienced before. His breath was hot on her skin, his touch tingled her senses and aroused her to ecstacy. And when they climaxed together, they felt nothing but bliss and satiated hunger.

Later, they lay fast asleep against each other, Kara with her back pressed against his chest and his hand over her waist. She awoke suddenly in the middle of the night, feeling very much alarmed but strangely comforted by his presence. The wind that blew through the window was chill to the skin, but thank goodness for the radiator in the small motel room, as trembling and shaky as it sounded.

She turned onto her back and stared at the ceiling before her, still dazed by sleep and the throbbing sensation of their lovemaking. Was it love? No, it was probably only baseless physical, sexual attraction. Nothing more. She laughed to herself. She hadn’t even had a full-fledged conversation with this man to be this intimate with him. But why didn’t it bother her?

Kara had gone for dinner-dates when she wasn’t assassinating, in hopes of finding a good replacement. She’d dated good, nerdy men; boyishly adorable men, and serious, ambitious men. But they didn’t help her forget him, and overly-envious men like Bernardo tired her out. Nick Hedsy . . . at first she truly thought he cared for her, because he knew James . . . because . . .

She shut her eyes to avoid the tears from falling. James. His name rang out like the heavy ring of a brass bell, numbing the wound of her heartache. The one who had showered her with endless love, whose promises she could believe, and whose passion she can totally sink into. James. Now she knew why she had allowed Dylan Stoker to overpower her.

He was as dangerous as James, and as exciting, yet safe. She remembered the look in James’s eyes when she first met him: lethal, yet intense and shamelessly forbidding. That look was what that had drawn her to him, full of promise of the unknown. She saw the same look in Dylan Stoker’s eyes. The same watchful and deceiving ones.

She laughed silently again despite the tears that threatened to pour. Was James the reason why she had yet to kill Dylan Stoker? He’s just a job.

What she really needed was not a man that resembled James to ravage her body, but a cold, cruel shower to snap her back to her senses.

With excruciating care not to wake Dylan Stoker up, she moved out of his arms and tiptoed to the bathroom. She let herself drown in the hard torrent of freezing water slamming onto her face. After two minutes, she tore her face away from the cold water and shook her head to clear her eyes and ears.

Now that was a mean wake-up call.

He heard the faint sound of running water in the distance, and instantly his eyes snapped open. He sat up and rubbed his eyes. Then he opened them and looked around the motel room. He saw the empty space on the bed beside him, then his eyes traveled to the messy heap of clothes by the bed, and he rested his gaze on a black, lacy bra on the edge of the bed.

And he smiled.

Kara Sarris, or Jane Marlow, whoever she was, the woman was hot. And great.

Then he shook his head and cursed himself inwardly for letting his guard down. Hell, he was supposed to kill her, not have sex with her! She was a job, not a whore.

But Kara Sarris had let hers down as well. She wasn’t just any woman, she was an assassin. The fact that she had killed Frank Derry’s wife, a Senator, at that, proved that she was as careful as she was professional. So was he. So why, why had he chose to let her overpower him?

Even as his cold, hard killer instincts went on screaming at his stupid decision, Stoker couldn’t help but recall, with a guilty feeling, how wild and amazing their lovemaking was. That it was the single most enjoyable thing he had ever done with a woman. If there were any enjoyable moments like these before Dylan Stoker became him, he could not remember.

Time to get to work.

He knelt by the bed and searched for his clothes, resisting a smile when his hand accidentally fingered her black panties. So much for being professional.

When he had dressed, he went to her handbag, which he had managed to let her drop by the door once they stepped into the room. You can never tell what a woman keeps in her handbag. Overturned it he did, and the contents of the handbag that came spilling out stopped him for a moment.

A Motorola cellphone, a compact powder case, a pack of tissues, a black leather purse, a pair of keys, and a silver revolver.

He picked up the revolver and studied it. It had a silencer attached to it, making it the most efficient and discreet killing machine.

She was out to kill him.

This was not a defensive. Women carried pepper spray for protection, not revolvers. Suddenly, the danger Kara Sarris carried with her at the beginning of the night, which had faded when they had danced and tumbled on the bed, returned and hit him hard, with a vengeance.

Kara Sarris was not just any lethal, gun-wielding woman. She was an assassin. And as determined as he was to kill her, she was just as persistent on seeing him to his grave.

Think, Stoker, think! He cursed himself, urging his mind to do something smart before she came out of the shower.

Suddenly the steady stream of water stopped with a distinctive squeak. It was a do-or-die decision. If he stayed there, rooted to the spot with her revolver in his hand, he could forget about remaining furious at himself for not seeing this coming.

He pocketed the cellphone, keys and the revolver, and bolted out the door. As he sped down the narrow stairway to the motel lounge, he couldn’t help but smile, not out of amusement, but of enlightening realization. Without her cellphone, Kara Sarris was at her most vulnerable.

And, oh boy, once she found out that he had taken her valuables, she would not be pleased. Fine with him. If she wanted to play hardball, then he was game.

The chase was on, and he was satisfied that he had the upper hand first.