I followed Asher down the stairs. His front room had been turned into a library, with a fireplace and a wide desk. He'd already stoked a fire. "You're the only one who lives here?" I was suddenly nervous about leaving Gina alone.

"Just me," he said, and disappeared into what I a.s.sumed was his kitchen.

I walked around, looking at the spines of all the books. Hardbacks and paperbacks, crammed together, sometimes two deep, or perpendicular to one another-I could see all the t.i.tles, or fragments thereof, peeking out. Ancient philosophy, science fiction, modern biographies, the lives of Catholic saints.

"You read?" I asked when he emerged again.

"All the time." He handed the water to me. I took it without looking and kept walking around as he sat down on a leather couch. "Stop looking at my things."

"I can't." I pulled out a hardback copy of Quo Vadis and saw two Stephen King novels stacked up behind. "It's like you're the Wizard of Oz."

"How so?"

"I'm behind the curtain now. All of this ... makes you feel more humane."

"Don't you mean human?" he corrected me.

"That too." The couch he was on was long, more than enough room for him and three of me. But I was too restless tonight to sit down. "It's been a really long day. I need to think things through."

"You mean there was more?"

"Yeah. I got jumped by two weres this afternoon." Asher moved forward on the couch, but I waved him back. "Don't worry, Dren saved me. And who would have thought that I'd ever get to say that aloud."

"What the-just what are you getting into, Edie?"

"That's the thing. I don't know." I shook my head. "It's complicated, but I don't think I've p.i.s.sed anyone off."

An eyebrow rose higher on his forehead. "Does it have to do with you being an Amba.s.sador of the Sun?"

"I don't think so. But I can't honestly say. They acted weird, Asher, the weres. When Dren arrived, it was like they woke up."

His frown grew deeper. "When do you have to go back to work?"

"Tomorrow night. Which I'm actually okay with, seeing as I at least get to have tranquilizer guns there." I stopped pacing back and forth and leaned against a desk strewn with papers.

He cleared his throat for my attention. "Can your friend in the friend zone make a friendly suggestion?"

"Certainly."

"This time. For real. Get the f.u.c.k out of town."

I bit my lip and looked at the hardwood floor. "I still need my job to protect Jake, Asher."

"He looked pretty clean to me."

"Yeah, he's good at that." I put my hands up to my head and ran them through my hair. "There's just never any guarantee it will last."

"You know, some people who knew you might say your life was worth a little more than his."

I lifted my head up and glared at him. "Asher-"

"You're a nurse, you help people, you give back to the community-you pay taxes. What does he do?"

"He's my brother-" I protested.

"A lot of people start off life with siblings. But when you die, you die alone."

I inhaled and exhaled a few times. "I'm not ready to give up on him yet."

"I bet. It's fun feeling needed, until it gets you killed."

A large log in the fireplace broke and sizzled, as fresh wood was exposed to the heat of the flames. I turned to watch it, because it was easier than looking at him. "You sound a lot like a co-worker of mine."

"Whoever they are, they must be very wise." I heard him stand, and he walked over to me, blocking my view of the fire. "I have to be what I am, Edie. I have to do what I do to survive. You-you can still get out."

"What would I be then? Who would I be?" The person I was before all this craziness started-I didn't want to go back to being her. To being like everyone else. The type of girl who'd never gotten to have any adventures or know that there were vampires, or have people count on her for life and death. As much as sometimes I hated or was scared of my current job-it made me feel alive in a way that I never had before. Leaving town wouldn't just mean giving up Jake. It would mean giving up my entire life.

"There's nothing wrong with normal," Asher continued.

I looked up at him. "Says the most abnormal man I know."

He gave me a bitter smile, then walked past me to sit at the chair behind his desk. "You're welcome to stay the night here, with your friend. I'm afraid I still have some work to do."

Despite the fact that I'd asked for it, his dismissal hurt. "Was that what you were doing earlier at the club when I called, working?" He'd met me once upon a time at a club, after all.

He tilted his head. "Does it matter if it was?"

I knew he had every excuse to be out. It wasn't like we were a thing. And for him, the more people he could touch, the more people he could be. I a.s.sumed touching people equaled power. I inhaled and shook my head. "Never mind. Thank you for your hospitality, for me and for Gina. I'll be upstairs." I started walking toward the stairs.

"Are you jealous of them? The ones that I touch just to touch, just to see?" he called after me, his voice low.

"Of course I am." I could have denied it, but why lie? Asher and I had slipped through each other's fingers before we'd even known why. And I was angry that he was still here when if the world was a fairer place, I shouldn't have to be alone.

"You can't judge me for doing what I need to, to survive. If a wolf is a wolf, and a shark is a shark, then a shapeshifter is and will always be a shapeshifter. What do you need to survive, Nurse Spence?"

I turned around and his head was resting on folded hands, his coffee-dark eyes watching me. The fire behind him cast a glow, making him look devilish. I knew this room was warm enough that once you took your clothes off, you wouldn't remember how cold it was outside.

"Don't make me have to tell you," I said. "Just guess."

Asher stood and rounded his desk. He stood in front of me for a moment, looking down, and I felt that current of electricity that you get when you're prey, yes, but prey that can still say no. All the power to make us go forward or hold back was inside my hand.

I reached up and touched his cheek.

A knowing smile crept across his face. "You're still wearing your badge."

"Of course I am. I'm h.o.r.n.y, not stupid."

He turned and kissed my palm, and then took it in his own hand. Stepping forward, he closed the s.p.a.ce between us and wrapped his arms around my waist. His hands were strong, like I knew they would be-it would have been easy to relax into him and let him take control. But now that we were here-I reached up and kissed him, hard. Angry. He slid his hands up my back and held me tight while I fought to be in charge, lips rough against his, trying to drink him in. It wasn't s.e.xy, I wasn't trying to be s.e.xy-I just wanted a chance to be fierce.

My hands clawed up his chest, started undoing b.u.t.tons, finding a thin cotton T-shirt on underneath his dress shirt-I yanked it up from his waistband, my mouth still locked on his. He was breathing harder, answering my mood, reaching his arms back to free himself of his shirt, lips only leaving mine for a second to pull his T-shirt off, coming back to my kiss like he was drowning and I was air. I ran my nails up his naked back, pressed my whole body against his, felt him hard inside his dress slacks, knew exactly what he would feel like hard in me, and then raked my nails down his back again at the thought. He shivered and reached between us to take off my foolish silver belt.

There was a retching sound from the top of the stairs. Then another. And a third.

I pulled back and thumped my head against his chest. I heard his heartbeat racing-no matter what form he was in, that was mine. I breathed in heavy, the scent of his sweat, with its undertone of vetiver.

"Let me guess," he said, after a long inhale. "The sound of retching is like a mating call to a wild nurse."

"If I leave her alone, she might puke in her hair."

"That's disgusting."

"It was supposed to be." I stepped back from him. Parts of my body ached with regret. He looked disheveled, like I'd mauled him, which I supposed I had. "I can't just leave her."

"You can't just leave anyone. It's one of your biggest virtues, and one of your worst flaws." He bent down, picked up his dress shirt from his floor, and pulled it on. "Go."

Unsure if he was mad at me, but sure I was doing the right thing regardless, I ran up the stairs before I could embarra.s.s myself or screw up anything any further.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT.

Gina had crawled out of the tub and made it to the toilet. She was laying there, her face pressed against its side. Thank G.o.d Asher's maid, or some personal OCD streak of his own, had left this bathroom spotless, almost sterile. I'd feel bad if I'd brought Gina to someplace strewn with pubic hairs to hurl. I flushed the toilet and turned on the air vents.

"Why did I do this to myself?" Gina mused aloud.

"Love?" I guessed, though I knew she was being rhetorical. I knelt beside her and stroked her hair back from her face.

"I never should have even gotten infected. I should have known better."

"Better to know now than change your mind after the moon." I got comfortable sitting on the floor, using some towels to buffer my ankles. "Let me get this straight. You were dating a were ... bear?"

She nodded sorrowfully, her face cradled against the side of the porcelain bowl.

"I have to ask. Were there any brightly colored insignias on his chest? Like a rainbow, or an ice cream cone?"

"What?" she said, peering up.

"You know. Like a Care Bear."

"f.u.c.k you, Edie." She closed her eyes, like that would make me disappear.

"I'm just saying that if I were dating a were-bear, I would carefully check him over for any lame tattoos. Like of candy canes. Or sunshine."

"f.u.c.k you and f.u.c.king were-bears." She snorted. I thought it might have become a laugh if she hadn't thrown up again.

Asher knocked politely about ten minutes later, before opening up the door. "If I've learned anything from watching p.o.r.nography, it's that women at slumber parties need blankets and pillows. And perhaps also empty garbage cans." He set everything he'd brought down on the bathroom counter. "I'll be in the bedroom down the hall. Please call me before you two start to wrestle."

"Will do," I promised as he shut the door.

"How do you know him?" Gina asked me.

"We saw each other, once or twice."

"You broke up with that?" she inferred. I was saved from explaining by her having another wave of nausea.

My phone was ringing when I woke up. I was on Asher's bathroom floor, stiff and store.

"Ugh." I pushed myself upright. Gina was still snoring, so I knew she'd survived the night. I fished for my phone-it was dark, except for a line of light coming underneath the bathroom door-and found out it was eight A.M., and it was Sike's number on the screen. "h.e.l.lo?"

"Edie-Edie, you're safe." It was Anna's voice, not an answer, a question.

"Sometimes. Yeah." I pushed myself to standing and opened the door to creep out into the hall. "Why? Is there something else trying to kill me I should know about?"

"I should hope not." Wherever Anna was, it sounded hollow in the background; her words were echoing. I thought I heard the drip of falling water. It'd be ironic if we'd both spent the night in bathrooms. "Is Gideon safe?"

"He was when I left him." I sank down onto the carpeting in Asher's hallway and put my back against the wall. I was comforted by the fact that she cared about Gideon. Most vampires wouldn't. It made me feel that I'd put my trust in the right place.

"Good. Things are more complicated than I had feared."

I wanted to say, You think? But I knew that would not be well received. "Why were those weres after me? Who were they?"

"Did Dren contact you?"

"Yes. To extort were-blood from me." That had better not have been part of the plan.

Anna made a growling sound. "He was supposed to ask you for help and offer you aid."

"You mean getting Winter's blood was your idea?"

"No. His. But he did clear it through me. He didn't say he'd threaten you for it, though."

I sighed. "I probably wouldn't have helped him otherwise. Still, he could have mentioned you."

"I'm sorry he did not. I will speak with him as soon as I'm free."

"You're trapped?"

"Being tested."

"Are you pa.s.sing?"