Over Anwyn's chuckle, Daegan shot him a dark look. "More comments like that, vampire hunter, and your throat will look far more appetizing next time I need blood."

"Yeah, you and your army can try to take it, anytime." Gideon picked up the delicate winegla.s.s by the bowl, hoping he wouldn't break it, and downed a couple of swallows. "You've had a servant before you worked for the Council, right? I mean, no vampire goes seven hundred years without one."

At Daegan's silence, Gideon's brow rose. "You're s.h.i.tting me. You've never taken a servant. Ever?"

Anwyn looked between them. "I a.s.sume that's rare?"

"It's beyond rare. So it's more than the liability and hunting thing, isn't it?"

Daegan lifted a shoulder, returned his attention to the stage, clearly not caring to elaborate, but Gideon was remembering the conversation they'd had, soon after Anwyn's attack. I'd rather have spent my whole life with no one, than have given her a moment of pain I'd rather have spent my whole life with no one, than have given her a moment of pain. In that conversation, Daegan had as much as admitted he'd not given his heart to a lover in all his life. Nor had he ever chosen the closest bond a vampire could have with another, that with a servant. He'd wanted Anwyn as his servant, but had chosen to respect her wishes.

She was apparently his one and only. It was unsettling and entirely remarkable, not only for a vampire, but for anyone who lived a life long enough to yearn for companionship. No matter his antipathy toward the vampire species, Gideon knew that having a servant was more than just convenience or function. It was comfort. Like sitting down with family every night for dinner instead of strangers, having that sense of connection to another.

It was so remarkable, Gideon decided to respect Daegan's obvious desire not to pursue it more deeply. He gave an offhanded shrug. "Mind you, I'm not throwing any stones, not with the number of hookers I've chosen over an actual relationship. We've both chosen blood and s.e.x over intimacy."

He wondered how an eHarmony profile application would write that that one up. one up.

"Probably for the same reasons," Anwyn observed in a saccharine tone.

"Yep." Gideon gave her a direct, intent look. "You weren't available."

He was rewarded by a softening of her expression, a mock sniff that pretended he wasn't off the hook, and a sensuous curve of those full lips.

"Well played, hunter." Daegan smiled as well, but there were shadows in his eyes as they both touched their gla.s.ses to Anwyn's. She gave them a look torn between pleasure and exasperation.

"I think it's a matter of maturity." Reaching out, she ran her finger and thumb over Gideon's lapel, caressing the man beneath the cloth, increasing his attention on her. "I've only had a servant for a little while, but it's a lot like having a full-time sub. There's a certain level of trust, an acknowledgment of a need for others, an interdependency that goes with having a human servant. You have to reconcile it with this vampire sense of superiority, much as a person rationalizes the desire of having a dog or cat. But it goes to the deeper connective need, and you have to be mature enough to realize and handle that."

"Woof," Gideon said, covering his surprise that she'd practically regurgitated his own thoughts. It earned a laugh from her, a short chuckle from Dagean.

However, when she focused on his face with that scrutiny he found discomfiting and welcome at once, he had to ask the question that had been floating in his head since they'd left.

"So why didn't you do what you threatened . . . with the harness? I know you like that kind of thing."

She shrugged. "Being a Mistress isn't so much about what I want as what you need, Gideon. That's what gives me pleasure. Teaching you to trust yourself as much as you trust me. Everything we do up to that point is just an appetizer."

The implication and threat of that stewed in his mind, boiling uneasily. She squeezed his arm. "I'm sorry I've been too preoccupied to devote the time to it I'd like."

"I'm not a d.a.m.n client session," he muttered into his cup. "As I've said, you don't owe me anything. I'm here for you."

"We're here for each other." Seemingly unoffended, she plucked at his sleeve. "Like this. You helped make this happen, both of you, and it helps me. What's going to happen in the future is going to be bad, but I know as long as I can have moments like this, my pleasures won't change all that much. Maybe not even my worries, though they're a tad more intense and dramatic."

When he shrugged, self-conscious at her compliment, Anwyn cupped Gideon's face, her fingers tracing his jawline. "When you saw me and Daegan tonight, your first thought was you didn't belong with us. Didn't belong here, in a place like this." She frowned. "That's not your decision, Gideon. That's mine, and you fit perfectly."

Gideon lifted a shoulder, uncomfortable. "My brother's the civilized one. Took nearly a year's worth of training to know how to serve a vampire queen, but it was in him before that. He was playing Sir Galahad in the backyard when we were young, squiring around ladies, asking for their favors. Most days I don't even remember if I put on clean underwear, or any at all. I'm good at killing. That's about it."

"I see." Leaning forward, she met him eye to eye. He was vaguely aware of Daegan's attentiveness, their conversation taking a more intent turn. "What do you see in my mind, Gideon?"

Since the injections, she'd gotten better at using the curtain screen between them when she was calm. While he was glad for what it meant to her, it had given him a peculiar sense of loss. He knew it was a necessary thing for her, to learn that control. To learn what she did and didn't need. One day soon, the moments he could just reach into her mind would be a rare flower, offered only when she desired it.

She'd learned something new, though, because not only did her mind open to him; it pulled him in, as if he were in her arms. He saw her reaction to him back at the apartment, when he'd been standing in his tux, looking at her as if she was the most important thing in his world. From there, she turned the wheels of her mind back and he saw her in her bed during the late-afternoon hours. The way she'd woken several times, restless, but once she'd reached out with her mind and found where he and Daegan were, she'd been able to go back to sleep, rea.s.sured by their presence. She liked the way he and Daegan bantered, how it surrounded her and made her feel even more coc.o.o.ned and protected. And now, in this present moment, as he held her one hand and Daegan the other, she felt content. More at peace, despite her unsettled mind, than she had at any other time in her life.

He raised his stunned gaze to her face. "As I said," she said softly, "surrender is something different for everyone. The problem is not whether or not I need you, or the feelings I'm willing to explore with you. The problem is your boundaries, your shields. You keep trying to run away before we can throw you out. You've belonged nowhere for so long, you believe that's the truth. The simple fact is you've been searching for your home all along. With us."

"You don't know that. You can't even predict that." Desperate, feeling like he was on quicksand, he went for the low blow of reminding her how precarious her state of mind was, how new this was to her, too new for any of them to make any kind of permanent decisions.

"That may be true." She nodded, though he hated himself for the frisson of hurt and doubt that crossed her features. "But before I became this, there was something between us. I wanted to explore it. Eventually, you will lose me, Gideon." His heart clutched, his hand tightening in reflex, but before he could respond, she continued. "Because, in the end, we always lose everyone. Isn't that all the more reason to enjoy every moment, no matter how many days, years or decades it lasts?"

A waiter brought a new sample tray then, rescuing him from a reply. She and Daegan took their time, examining the choices critically. Daegan had already given her direction on how best to enjoy and yet not overindulge in the food they couldn't really digest.

As Gideon watched the two of them, their heads bent over the tray, he felt a warring of hope and despair in him. He was accustomed to the despair only, the dull throb of it. Always before, it had been made tolerable by action, violence. In suggesting this evening for Anwyn, he hadn't counted on how it would affect him, being in such normal surroundings, doing what people normally did on a special Sat.u.r.day-night date. Or the antic.i.p.ation and affection, companionship and laughter. For a moment, he wasn't sure he could breathe, and he had a strange desire to bolt back to the shadows, run back to that empty existence he'd turned into his purpose. All because he wasn't sure he could handle the threat of happiness.

Her hand slid across the chair arm and closed on his wrist. She stroked the bones there, her fingers a caress he would have crawled through the desert to feel. Turning now, she brought a morsel to his mouth that looked like it had tomato and cheese on it. He opened for her, and she fed it to him, teasing him with her fingers on his lips as he tried to swallow it.

Anwyn . . .

Be still in heart, dear love / And give each beat to me. I will care for it / For I care for thee. She tilted her head, the rich brown of her hair catching the torchlight. She tilted her head, the rich brown of her hair catching the torchlight. A simple poem from long ago. A child's lullaby. A simple poem from long ago. A child's lullaby.

"I'm afraid to believe in this. And if I do, then what does that make me?" The vampire hunter who finds a home with two vampires. It sounds like a bad sitcom idea, one that won't sell. The vampire hunter who finds a home with two vampires. It sounds like a bad sitcom idea, one that won't sell.

His voice had cracked, and so he'd finished the thought in his mind, but he wondered if Anwyn shared it with Daegan. Because as her hand closed over his again, lacing with his fingers, Daegan's stretched out along the back of her chair and gave his sleeve a brief, absent stroke, the man's dark eyes finding his over Anwyn's intent face.

"It means the world is a strange, terrible and wonderful place," she murmured. "What did you think of that one? The bread?"

Gideon gave a harsh half laugh. "It's a microwave pizza bite, pretending to be fancy, overly priced food."

She snorted. "That's a gourmet red sauce and breaded, excellent gouda cheese."

"Red sauce, bread, cheese. Sounds like pizza to me."

"The world's most perfect food," Daegan commented, earning her exasperated look. The vampire leaned back in his chair, one ankle brought to the opposite knee, but the casual pose was deceptive. Gideon could tell he was keeping a constant surveillance on their surroundings, just as he was. Unfortunately, Anwyn could tell as well.

"Would the two of you stop scoping the area like you're expecting an invasion? No one is looking for me, no one knows who Daegan is, and do you really think someone with a vendetta against Gideon is going to look for him at a Gourmet Taste Fest? Only if they've never met him."

"Did she just insult me?" Gideon asked.

Daegan's lips quirked. "You yourself said you have no culture and cla.s.s. She was simply supporting your opinion." However, his gaze sobered, the vampire sliding a knuckle across her fair cheek. "I have no intentions of ruining the evening for you, cher cher, but another lesson you must learn is that vampires sense one another. Like all territorial predators, they will check each other out to make sure the vampire is one they know, or one who is permitted in the territory. The Council knows I am bringing you to them, but, by necessity, the territory overlord knows nothing of you yet. If you were thought to be a loner without protection, others might take advantage."

"So you're both armed."

"To the teeth." Gideon gave her a disarming wink as he signaled to the waiter. "Do you have beer?"

"No, sir," the waiter said politely, though his expression held a mildly sardonic cast. "However, there is a convenience store four blocks from here with twenty-four-ounce Icehouse and prepackaged nachos."

"He'd be perfect target practice," Gideon noted as the waiter moved off. He narrowed his gaze at the laughing Anwyn and grinning Daegan.

"No sport in that," said the vampire. "You're lying to us, by the way. Or yourself. You are are good at things other than killing." His gaze pa.s.sed over Gideon's shoulders. "You played football in high school. Varsity." good at things other than killing." His gaze pa.s.sed over Gideon's shoulders. "You played football in high school. Varsity."

"I can think of many things he's good at, other than killing." Anwyn gave him a heated lingering glance. Gideon tried to ignore the feeling that she'd closed her clever, smooth fingers on his c.o.c.k and scowled at Daegan instead.

"Do you ever forget anything? Keys? Credit cards?"

"Was she beautiful?"

Anwyn's question, spoken now with quiet seriousness, brought his attention back to her. The fairy lights of the surrounding area gave a soft shine to her lips, her eyes. Her hand rested on his thigh, Daegan's arm still across the back of her chair, linking the three of them together amid the murmur of conversation, muted laughter, piano jazz.

"Yeah." He knew he shouldn't be surprised that their dinner conversation would possess a little more gravity than most, or that he'd feel oddly comfortable speaking the otherwise painful words about Laura, his dead high school sweetheart. "She was a kid, like me at the time. With blond hair, blue eyes, and a beautiful smile. It was wide-open, you know, taking everyone into it. She was a cheerleader, so we were the cliche, but she wasn't. She was down to earth, nice to everyone. She was my first s.e.x, in the back of my old car."

He shrugged, stared down in his wine to recall words he'd rarely spoken, except maybe to Jacob, years ago. Before he'd walled himself off. "I was h.o.r.n.y as any kid, but I was really gentle the whole time, you know?"

"I know. I'd expect nothing less of you," she responded, her voice laden with compa.s.sion. It didn't drive him back into himself, like it normally would. Maybe because he knew Anwyn was already there.

"Jesus, I was shaking. Scared I'd do something to hurt her. But she smiled so sweet when I finally got inside her, held my shoulders, and told me she'd never felt more complete. She was . . . When I finally cried about losing my parents, she was the one that held me. I told her I'd always take care of her, keep her safe, love her. And-"

"No, stop there." Anwyn's voice was so inexorably tender, he had to stop. Her hand tightened on his thigh. "The rest doesn't matter. What you just said, that's what matters to her."

He nodded, his jaw tightening. "Don't know why I said all that. Jesus, I-"

Anwyn put a hand to his face, and with the pad of her forefinger, she pressed on the corner of his eye, absorbing the tear that had gathered there, no matter how hard he'd fought it. As she did, Daegan made a gesture. The waiter came back to his shoulder.

"Yes, sir?" he said. His voice held an obsequiousness that told Gideon the fact he and Daegan both wore tuxedos couldn't disguise the truth. They were from two very different cla.s.ses.

Daegan held up a folded bill, dropped it on the man's tray. "You have a fully stocked bar in the kitchen. Bring my friend a beer, now. Whenever he gets close to empty, I expect another to appear. Without the sarcasm."

Gideon thought the look in Daegan's eye was enough to send the waiter scampering to do his bidding, even without the C-note. Clearing his throat, he shrugged off the moment, gave Anwyn a forced comic look. "That's enough about me. It's way past time to include Daegan in our game of Twenty Questions."

It was the game they'd used early on to pa.s.s the time, right before or after her initial seizures. Not only had it helped her center herself, it had become a way to learn more about each other as well. Or defuse difficult moments, like this one. "You know he's got to have an embarra.s.sing potty-training story in there somewhere over seven hundred freaking years."

"This is the thanks I get, after I secured you an endless supply of beer?"

"In this place? That will get me three, maybe. Two, if the waiter takes his twenty percent out." Gideon snorted, but when he shifted his legs, he managed to shove at Daegan's shiny dress shoe with his own, a grudging thanks.

"I think Gideon has an excellent idea." Anwyn took them past the awkward male bonding moment, thank G.o.d. Daegan appeared amused and faintly alarmed at her piercing regard. "You've told me why you work for the Council, but how did you end up working for them?"

Gideon wondered that anyone could resist her, the long lashes and straight, slim nose, that combination of imperious and completely female curiosity. Daegan confirmed it with the warm resignation that suffused his features. "My mother was on the Council."

"So that's how come you have the lordship t.i.tle. You're a born vampire." Gideon had guessed as much, and he knew Anwyn was already aware of the keen disparity of rank between born and made vampires. "How come you don't want us to call you Lord Daegan? Not that I would, but I know it's not because you're all that egalitarian."

Daegan gave him a derisive look, but answered the question straight enough. "Everything about who and what I am is a Council secret. I had an unremarkable childhood, as vampires go, at least to outside appearances. However, I have certain abilities that set me apart. One is the speed. The other is my inability to be detected by another vampire. I don't carry that scent or aura."

"And your immunity to the Delilah virus." It was something that had impacted Lady Lyssa, arguably the most powerful vampire in their world, so that in itself was a curiosity. "Was your father your mother's human servant? It seems like most of the born vampires come from that vampire-servant pairing."

"No. My mother told me her encounter with my father was brief, and that he was not a part of her life. He is unaware of my existence, as far as I know." Daegan took a sip of his wine. "After the Territory Wars, a discreet, non-politic way was needed to eliminate vampires and others who threatened exposure of our kind. My mother proposed me for the role. I'd lived my life separate from the vampire world, so it made it easier." He glanced toward Gideon. "You're familiar with vampire tolerance for differences, I'm sure."

"Oh yeah." They'd tried to execute Lyssa when they found out about her Fey background, leading to the uneasy relationship the Council had with her and Jacob now.

"I'm indifferent to their politics and world. It was my mother I served, but since her death, the Council and I have not disagreed. I do not have a problem taking out unstable made vampires who are overindulging their natural brutality. It is something worthwhile that must be done."

Gideon took a swallow of the beer the waiter had brought, putting it at his elbow with silent efficiency. He read Anwyn's tense expression easily enough, as did Daegan, for he covered her hand with his. "You do not have anything to worry about, cher cher. Though made vampires are not as highly regarded as born ones, they are accepted as part of the structure."

"Unless they have crazy, uncontrollable fits."

"Hey." Gideon drew her gaze to him. "We're out tonight, and you haven't foamed at the mouth once."

"Don't go weepy on me now, Mistress Anwyn." Daegan stroked a lock of her hair from her cheek. "I rely on your unflinching courage."

"You both suck," she said, giving a halfhearted chuckle. "A woman deserves a weak Victorian swooning moment now and then."

"We get past this Council meeting, and I promise you may whine when you need a new pair of shoes, or cry if your hair doesn't curl correctly. You can even ask Gideon to remove any spiders you find in the apartment."

"I think I'll just ask him to stake you in your sleep," she responded, teeth bared.

Gideon approved of Daegan's approach to lighten her load of worries. He only hoped he could bury his own trepidation below where Anwyn might stumble over it. He wasn't the world's most positive thinker, and yet, with her in his mind, he was going to have to become Mr. Freaking Rogers.

Anwyn snorted out a surprised laugh, and turned an amused eye to him. "I'm not really seeing you in pastel sweaters."

"You'd be surprised, cher cher. Every man can change. He can choose to lay down the sword and become something else."

As Anwyn turned her attention back to Daegan, Gideon furrowed his brow. "We're not talking about me anymore, are we?"

"Not everything is about you, vampire hunter." Daegan sent an arch look at Gideon's sneer, but then sobered again, put down his gla.s.s. "I've been giving it a bit of thought. This betrayal by the Council tells me it's possibly time for my role to end. Region Masters and territory lords can handle violations locally, no matter the politics. They can make application to the Council for the termination and handle it themselves. I will make sure you are acknowledged, that Gideon is accepted as your servant, and then I can tell them I am done. I have served them long enough."

Gideon stared at him. "You're just going to walk away?"

Daegan kept his gaze on Anwyn's face. "The cost of my job has become far too dear. I nearly lost what mattered most to me. I do not work at their behest, but at my own."

Anwyn pressed her lips together, her eyes suddenly bright with emotion. "You said that just to play on my female side."

"Cher, you are all female. And I thank G.o.d for it." Daegan lifted a shoulder. "My mother is gone, an accident caused by the onset of Ennui. One of the few mind-diseases that can affect our kind," he added when Anwyn looked puzzled. "When a vampire has lived a certain amount of years, some are afflicted with a malaise, a severe apathy of sorts. She wandered outdoors too close to sunrise and wandered too far. Her mind was altered, thinking she was in her gardens, in darkness. Her servant tried to bring her back, and she wouldn't permit it. She kept telling him to let her smell the flowers. She became ash in a botanical park, which I think gave her some small measure of happiness. I was unfortunately on an a.s.signment at the time.

"I will not be absent again when someone else I love needs me." He closed his hand over Anwyn's. "You deserve a life. Whether it's running your club or whatever you decide you wish to do, I am going to make certain you have it, sooner rather than later."

"Daegan," she murmured, obviously moved. Even Gideon couldn't doubt the sincerity and determination he saw in the male's expression. But Anwyn shook her head. "You can't. Think of all the vampires like Barnabus you've stopped. It's important."

"Yes, it is. But there will always be battles to be fought. If time is not taken to love and live, then it's easy to forget that there is more than blood and death in life." He flicked a quick glance at Gideon, making it clear the conversation might apply to more than one of them at the table, after all. "A vampire's life is long, Anwyn. I can take some time for this. Though I admit I do not intend to go quietly into the night until I determine who it is who betrayed me, and confront that loose end."

"Thank G.o.d. I was going to say you were a real p.u.s.s.y if you let that one slide." Gideon took another liberal swallow of the beer, appreciated the cold, bracing taste. It helped steady him. Being a witness to this significant turning point in Daegan and Anwyn's relationship gave him that out-in-the-cold feeling once more. But was it because he didn't belong, or because he was the one incapable of stepping back over the threshold?

Daegan gave him a narrow glance. "Of course, if I have to put up with your servant, I may already have lived too long."

"I'd be happy to help you with that."

"I'm sure." Daegan c.o.c.ked his head. "How about you, vampire hunter? What do you need in order to stop? What will finally answer the bloodl.u.s.t you carry?"

Gideon's brow creased anew. Jesus, how did he do that? Jesus, how did he do that? "Psychoa.n.a.lyzing me now?" "Psychoa.n.a.lyzing me now?"

"No. But I am wondering if I might hold the key to the answer you won't give yourself."

With a jolt, Gideon realized Anwyn wasn't the only one on whom Daegan had planned to drop a bomb this evening. Only he felt an inexplicable urge to bolt, as if Daegan was about to throw that door wide-open, making it clear that only Gideon's will was keeping him out in the yard, off that threshold.