"But you would be upset," he said.

"I don't know, I . . . we do Asher together. We've all been in the bed together, the five of us, in various ways. I mean . . . I honestly thought you were saving the more intimate stuff for when I wasn't there."

"You have taught me to fear your moral compa.s.s, ma pet.i.te ma pet.i.te. I never wish to be on the wrong side of it again."

"But it's Asher, it's him, you love him, you have loved him for centuries."

"He loves you more," Asher said. "He loves you enough to have refused me again and again, to have stopped my touch, my body, and if you attract one more mostly heteros.e.xual man to our little group I am going to do something violent," Asher said. Then he laughed again, and it held sorrow and something bitter in it. "But wait, I've decided to do something violent tonight." He looked at the guards who were frozen by the curtains trying to pretend they weren't listening. "Perses, Dares, come stand by me."

The two werehyenas looked at each other, and then the blond said, "We'd rather just leave you two to discuss things. This sounds more personal than bodyguard."

"I don't want you to leave. I want to make my point and the two of you will help me do that." He held out his arm and called them to him. He called them the way Jean-Claude could call wolves and I could call so many animals. He opened up his power and it filled the room like something cool and thick. I felt it touch me as it flowed by, almost like I should have been able to wrap it in my hands. He called the werehyenas and they simply turned and went to him. They took up posts behind the loveseat, at Asher's back. They faced the room like that, and it was very clear that the two werehyenas were with Asher, and not us.

"Don't do this," Micah said.

"There are no leopards here to help you, little king. There are no wolves to aid Jean-Claude, and the rats belong to no one. I am the only master in this room who has help at hand."

"Not true," Micah said.

"Do you mean our kitten? I don't think you want to risk him against me."

"I'm not talking about me at all," Micah said. He looked at me.

I shook my head. "Don't make me do this."

"He's setting up the rules, not me," Micah said.

"If you mean Anita, then save your breath, leopard. She and I established that she'd bow to me long ago."

I looked at the vampire. "What does that mean exactly?"

"You let me dominate you in the bedroom along with our kitten."

"In the bedroom is different."

"You once let me feed until I almost drained you dry. You and I both know that I stopped myself from killing you; you would have let me do it, and enjoyed it right up until the moment you died."

He was talking about the last time we'd been alone and he'd fed from me. His vampire power was to make his bite o.r.g.a.s.mic, and it was, and what he'd just said was absolutely right. In that one moment I wouldn't have fought to live; it had felt too good to stop. He and I had never told anyone the entire truth of it before. We'd simply avoided being alone together for feedings.

"Don't push me, Asher."

"Or what? You'll kill me? I don't think so."

"Just as you won't kill us," Jean-Claude said, softly, "and if death is off the table, then what is left to prove?"

"That I have grown too powerful to be your second. I need a territory of my own and lovers who aren't ashamed of me."

"We aren't ashamed of you."

"The men are, and he"-he pointed at Jean-Claude-"says he refuses my body because you would reject him if you saw us together. I told him you were with him and Augustine, Master of Chicago, and you did not turn from what happened, or from Jean-Claude. But it was when I saw your cats kissing in public that I knew that Jean-Claude had lied. You have no problem sharing yourself with men who are sharing each other; it is Jean-Claude who doesn't want to be with me again. You are his excuse to keep me from that last part of him."

"I don't know what you thought you saw at the recital," Micah said.

"I saw two men who love each other and aren't afraid to show it in public. Don't deny it."

"I had no intention of denying how I feel about Nathaniel." Nathaniel laid his head on Micah's shoulder, and Micah reached a hand up to touch the taller man's face. It always seemed odd that Nathaniel was taller than Micah, but dominance isn't always about height.

"Please, can the guards go for the rest of this discussion?" I asked.

"See, you are embarra.s.sed by me."

"I'm embarra.s.sed in general."

"I am not."

I met his too-calm, too-arrogant face, and said, "Fine, f.u.c.king fine, let's do this." I turned to Jean-Claude. "Are you telling me that you haven't been his lover because you thought I'd leave you?"

"You've gone away for months for much lesser offenses of your small-town morality."

"That was a while ago, Jean-Claude, give me some credit here. If you and Asher want to be together . . ."

"Be lovers," Asher said.

I gave him an unfriendly look, but turned back to Jean-Claude. "Fine, if you and Asher want to be lovers when I'm not in the bed, that's okay with me."

"Non, ma pet.i.te, non."

"It is you who is afraid of being with me," Asher said. "I cannot live like this, and eventually I will give in to Narcissus if I have no one else to turn to."

"If I say I'm fine with it, then why not?" I asked.

"Asher a.s.sumes that Micah and Nathaniel are doing what I will not; are they lovers?"

I wanted to squirm and fought not to. "Why don't you ask them-they're standing right here."

He looked at the men. "Are you lovers?"

Nathaniel said yes, and Micah said no, at the same time. Asher laughed, and this laugh held humor. "How can you not know?"

"Micah loves me. He takes care of me. We sleep nude in the bed even if Anita is out of town. I clean his house, I fix his meals. We touch each other in private. We just don't do certain things."

"You don't sodomize each other," Asher offered.

"Yeah," Nathaniel said, and he almost smiled, but not like he was happy. "We don't do that."

"It's not to every man's taste. Even those who like men are not always sodomites," Jean-Claude said.

"But Micah doesn't think you are lovers, do you, Micah?" Asher asked. I realized that Asher wasn't just going to try to tear down what he and Jean-Claude and I had; he was going to try to tear down everyone.

Micah took a deep breath and let it out in a loud rush. "I guess I thought that if we weren't f.u.c.king each other, we weren't lovers."

"So Nathaniel is trapped as I am trapped, wanting, but never having."

Nathaniel said, "I think I like girls a little better than you do, so it's not as big an issue for me."

"If Micah would f.u.c.k you in the a.s.s, would you say no?"

I so wanted out of this conversation, but it was like a car accident: Once you started spinning you could only wait and see what you hit.

"No," Nathaniel said.

"Liar," Asher said.

Nathaniel started to smile, fought it off, and said, "You've seen him nude. I've never had anyone that large do a.n.a.l s.e.x on me. I think it might hurt."

"You are a pain s.l.u.t. You like hurt," Asher said.

"In most ways, yes, but I was raped as a kid, so I like a.n.a.l sometimes and I miss it, but I don't like it to hurt. Hurting like that is a trigger event. It throws me back into being raped." He shook his head, a little too rapidly. "I think if I'd been treated better, then I probably would like it, but I wasn't, and we do together almost everything that I want to do."

Asher said, "I am sorry, Nathaniel; in my own hurt feelings I forgot that other people have been hurt, too. But I will not let even your sad story stop this conversation. We will have it out, and then when I am rejected one last time I will go and stay with Narcissus until arrangements can be made for us to leave."

"The werehyenas are a third, or more, of the security for Jean-Claude," Micah said.

"Not my problem," Asher said.

"You'd really cut our manpower that badly, knowing that there are masters out there who would see that as weakness and try to kill us?" I asked.

"I cannot stay here and have my heart broken over and over, Anita. I will go mad. Either I must be someone's lover, or I must go."

"Wait," I said, "you're my lover. You're my lover in every way that any other man has been. I haven't denied you any part of me."

He looked at me, and I gave him a look back. "Oh, come on, just because I don't like a.n.a.l. No one else gets to do that, either."

"It's not you he wants," Micah said.

Asher looked at him. "Are you saying it's you I'm pining over?"

"You said that Jean-Claude loved Anita better than you; well, don't you love Jean-Claude better than you love Anita?"

Asher looked at Micah, and finally he nodded. "Touche, Nimir-Raj. I have loved Jean-Claude for centuries, so yes. Did you know that I chose Julianna as my human servant because I feared I was losing Jean-Claude's love?"

Jean-Claude said something rapid in French. He was sitting forward and looked startled at last.

Asher went on. "I never told you because it was too pathetic. You know I like women, but I like men more. Didn't you ever puzzle at why I chose to tie myself to a woman as my human servant?"

"You loved her," Jean-Claude said.

"Eventually, but I chose her for you. I knew what you liked and I shopped with an eye for keeping you, not for satisfying myself, and it worked. It worked better than I could have dreamed. I should have realized that I had set myself up for the two people I loved most in the world to love each other more than they loved me."

Jean-Claude made as if to reach out to the other man, and then let his hand fall back. "We did not mean to hurt you."

"You never mean to hurt me, Jean-Claude, but you do seem to keep doing it." He turned back to us. "What does Micah deny you, Nathaniel? What do you want him to do that he will not?"

Nathaniel looked at Micah, who just nodded. No one looked at me; in that moment it was just the men. "I'd like him to go down on me and do me by hand."

"You are denied everything I am denied; how can you be happy?"

"I just am," Nathaniel said.

"He's not denied everything," Micah said.

"I have heard the truth," Asher said.

That first roll of power trickled off of Micah's skin. His beast peeking out with his anger. "He said he wanted me to go down on him and do him by hand."

"Exactement."

"You only hear what you want to hear tonight, Asher. Let's just say I can prove that Nathaniel really does have absolutely no gag reflex."

There was a moment of thunderous silence. Micah glared at Asher. Nathaniel looked pleased and tried not to. I had no safe place to look and no idea what expression to wear.

"Was Anita with you?" Jean-Claude asked.

"Yes," Micah said.

"Ma pet.i.te."

I didn't want to look at him.

"Ma pet.i.te, look at me."

I've turned and faced men with guns when it took less courage than to meet Jean-Claude's eyes in that moment. "This is a recent change?"

I nodded.

"What did you think? How did you feel about it?"

I so did not want to discuss this in front of people, but d.a.m.n it, if I was really all right with it, why was it embarra.s.sing? d.a.m.n it. "Without the ardeur ardeur I have a gag reflex, and Micah . . ." I have a gag reflex, and Micah . . ."

"Is bien outille bien outille, well hung, oui oui," Jean-Claude said.

"Yes, so one afternoon we took turns going down on Micah." I said it fast as if that made it sound more ladylike, but some things just aren't ladylike and sucking a man's d.i.c.k is one of them. I loved doing it, but . . . Oh, h.e.l.l. I was blushing so hard I was light-headed. I thought I'd stopped blushing like that, d.a.m.n it.

Micah and Nathaniel each touched an arm, which meant I looked as shaky as I felt.

"And have you done it since?" Jean-Claude asked.

I swallowed and concentrated. I would not faint. I never fainted. f.u.c.k. I kept a good hold on both their arms and said, "Not the taking turns part, but Nathaniel going down on Micah, yes."