"Thank you," the big man said, stepping closer to the bed.

He was tall, with thin scars on his face and a prominent nose that looked like it had been broken two or fifteen times. He had fresh wounds on his face, too-gashes down his right cheek and a partially healed laceration across his forehead. His skin had a gray, waxy pallor. His blue eyes, though, were bright and clear.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

Rafael didn't feel like answering the question. "Who the hell are you?"

"Lucien."

"Where am I?"

"New York City. Sort of."

Rafael took a minute to absorb that. The last thing he remembered, he'd been standing in front of a cave in Romania. Guarding the cave, technically, though he'd done a piss-poor job of it. There'd been that girl, the one with the breasts "How long have I been unconscious?"

"About three days." The guy, Lucien, was standing next to the bed now, towering over him, arms crossed over his broad chest. "Sorry about that, but I had to keep you under for a while. We had too much shit going down to worry about what you were up to."

"You kept me under? How does that work?"

"Quite well, apparently." He gestured toward the IV tube. "That going down okay?"

"Fine." The efficiency of the method surprised him. His hunger had faded almost immediately. He was used to having to fight horrible, raging hunger as long as possible, before it drove him to feed. A few times, he'd gone days without feeding at all, finding it easier to go off in a blinding rage than to be aware of what he was doing.

"You're lucky you're here," Lucien said, a wry grin on his mouth.

"You're pretty screwed up in the head."

"You're pretty damned nosy." Rafael's reaction came more from indignation than fear.

"Don't worry. You're safe here. Definitely safer than you were in Romania. So what's your name?"

"Rafael."

Lucien nodded. "Your given name, or one you picked later?"

"Does it matter?"

"No."

"Then I picked it later. I didn't care for my given name."

"Which was?"

"None of your damned business."

Lucien laughed. "That's an odd name."

Rafael was starting to get tired of this nonsense. "So do I get to leave at some point, or are you planning to kill me, or what?"

"That's up to you." Lucien looked toward the door. "Here comes the doctor."

The door opened, and another man entered. This one was a mor- tal-Rafael could tell from the smell. He wore a white lab coat and carried a clipboard. He had brown, slightly receding hair and wire- rimmed glasses, as well as a set of prominent, fairly fresh teeth marks on his neck.

"You're awake," he said. "Good."

"Who's been chomping on you?" Rafael said, not sure what inspired this brashness. Maybe just the knowledge that he didn't have to kill anyone today, and that no one was, apparently, planning on killing him, either.

The man grinned. "My girlfriend." He held out a hand. "I'm Dr.

Greene."

"Rafael." Grudgingly, he shook the offered hand.

"Hmm. How long have you been a vampire?"

"About four years."

The doctor jotted notes in his chart. "How old were you when you were Turned?"

"Is that your business?"

Dr. Greene smiled patiently. "I'm your doctor, as of now. Vampires don't have blood pressure, not much of a heart rate most of the time, and forget about trying to figure out anything based on blood sugar levels. So, yes, it's my business."

Rafael frowned. "I was seventeen."

"Ah. That explains a lot."

Rafael wondered what, exactly, it explained, but decided he'd rather not know. "Anything else?"

"That's it for now. I'll get back to you if I have any more questions."

With a polite smile, he turned his attention to the chart, setting it down on the counter by the wall and making notes.

"He's awake. Cool." A new voice had joined the fray in the small room, which was quickly becoming crowded. Rafael looked toward the door to see a pretty, buxom young woman with wide, uptilted green eyes and black hair. She smiled brightly. "Hey."

"Hey," he answered. "I know you. You're the bitch who knocked me out."

Her smile widened. "I'll do it again, too, if you keep calling me a bitch."

"You knocked me unconscious and dragged me across the ocean,"

he said, but he really wasn't sure he was all that upset about it.

She sauntered across the room to stand next to him. The slinky walk didn't seem to be put-on at all-rather it seemed to be her natural way of moving, as if it had something to do with the way her joints were put together.

"Tell the truth," she said. "You wanted me to."

"Maybe."

She leaned a little closer, giving him an intriguing view of her cleavage. His body responded, twitching and hardening in all the right places. He had the sex drive of a seventeen-year-old, and he wasn't afraid to use it.

Her gaze locked with his. "I'm Sasha."

"Rafael." She was definitely an older woman. At least a century older. "Thanks for not killing me."

Lucien cleared his throat. Rafael looked up to see him and the doctor watching with interest.

"Shall we leave you kids alone?" Lucien asked.

"Absolutely," said Sasha.

"Let me get that IV out," said the doctor. Rafael watched as Dr.

Greene deftly pulled the IV from his arm and rolled the rack against the wall. With a small smile, the doctor gave Rafael a quick salute and departed. Lucien followed.

"Don't cause him too much damage," said Lucien to Sasha, closing the door behind him.

Rafael looked at her. "Do you have plans to damage me?"

"No, not really." She bent over him, looking into his eyes from the uncomfortable distance of two or three inches. "How do you feel?"

"Fine, I guess." He craned his neck away from her. Her green eyes had merged into a single, Cyclopsean eyeball in his vision. He found the image disturbing. "Did you know you're quite a pain in the ass?"

She leaned back, grinning. "It's what I'm best at."

"Then you don't need any more practice." He let his gaze slide down her body, resting finally on the cleavage trying to burst out of her blouse. "Are you good at anything else?"

Her smile went hot. His body followed suit, but he had other plans.

Sasha bent close again, her breasts mounding against his chest, her lips fluttering millimeters from his own.

He grabbed the lamp from the bedside table and whacked her over the head with it. She slumped.

"That's for Romania, you annoying little bitch."

He crawled out from under her unconscious body, arranged her comfortably on the bed, and slipped out into the hallway.

He didn't get far. Before he'd walked three yards down the corridor, Lucien appeared in front of him. "Where do you think you're going?"

"Somewhere that girl isn't," Rafael shot back.

To his surprise, Lucien smiled. "Sorry. I thought you liked her.

C'mon. I think it's time you met Julian."

The quick briefing Lucien gave him on the way to Julian's office came as a surprise.

"You mean you're not the Senior at this enclave?" Rafael asked.

"No. Julian was already established when I arrived."

"Why didn't you kill him and take over? You're, like, what, a thousand years old?"

"Twelve, but who's counting?"

Rafael stopped abruptly. "You're Ialdaboth's brother."

"Half-brother."

"Belial?"

"That's correct."

Rafael shook his head. "You should be the Senior here."

"That's not the way I work."

They walked a little further along the corridor before Lucien stopped and knocked on one of the doors. At the muffled "Come in," they entered.

Meeting Julian, Rafael almost understood. Julian was quite old- not nearly as old as Lucien, but still old-and a strange aura surrounded him. He was also, Rafael noticed when they shook hands, vaguely warm.

"Have a seat," he said. Rafael sat on the couch, Lucien settling next to him. "I need to ask you some questions," Julian went on.

"Ask away."

"First, let me apologize for the way we kidnapped you. Sasha had no permission to do what she did."

Rafael shrugged. "No problem. I was about five minutes away from getting killed over there, anyway."

Julian cocked an eyebrow. "Really. Why?"

"I'm really not a very good vampire. Much less a nasty, evil one."

"So what was keeping you alive?"

"Sex, mostly."

Lucien was laughing behind his hand. Julian gave him a cold look.

"I have a feeling this story might not be all that amusing, Lucien."

Julian's apparent concern for him caught Rafael by surprise. "I guess it depends on how you look at it," he said. He cleared his throat.

He didn't really want to go into this right now, not when it had just occurred to him that he might be lucky enough never to see Brigitte again. "So what did you want to ask me?"

Julian's demeanor went abruptly businesslike. "What can you tell us about the cave you were guarding?"

"Not much. There was something important in there, that's all I know."