"Hi Sofia, this is Linda! How are you?"

"Good, thanks. Everything all right?"

"Oh yeah. I was telling D that Rainy went off the deep end when we told him about the girls!" She giggled. "Traci told him not to think about asking her to marry him just because she's pregnant, and he said she had no choice and he'd drag the priest to her. He almost beat down her door. They're in this horrible tiff right now."

"Wow, I didn't mean to start this," Sofia said.

"The doc would have noticed she was pregnant, just not the twin part and the girls part."

"Right. Totally not my fault then."

Linda laughed. "Listen, I wanted to see if you wanted to go Christmas shopping with us this weekend. It's one of the last weekends before Christmas. I'm way behind, and Traci-"

Since when did the concept of Christmas shopping seem so bizarre?

Since I became some sort of recently resurrected fortune-telling vampire. It was something normal people did during this time of year, something she'd done every year for twenty-three years.

"-count you in?" Linda asked.

Sofia covered the speaker. "Pierre, am I allowed to go Christmas shopping?"

"I hate this fucking library," he responded.

"Is that a yes?"

"Oui."

"Linda, I'll go."

"Great! We'll pick you up. Are you at D's?" Linda asked.

"Yeah."

"Traci's been there. She'll drive. We'll see you Saturday at nine."

"Great, thanks." Sofia hung up the phone, feeling as if she were emerging from a stupor for the first time in months. While she couldn't shake the sense of doom that followed her from the visions, she felt more normal, less afraid, at the thought that she'd be rejoining the rest of humanity for a shopping trip with the girls, even if only for a morning.

She left the library to return Damian's phone. It rang loudly in the hall, a rap song spitting F-bombs that made her eyebrows rise. She hesitated then answered.

"Hello?"

"Hello? Do I have D's number?" a warm, male voice on the other end said.

"Yes."

"And who are you?"

"Sofia. Who are you?"

There was a pause before the man on the other end answered. "Jule, a friend of his. I'm in town right now on an errand."

"Are you a good friend?" she asked.

"I'd like to think so," he said with a chuckle. "We met when he was a teen and went through some rough stuff together."

"Yeah, I know. His is a sordid history. What kind of a person was he when you met?"

"He's always been the best man I know," was the unhesitant response. His voice held an upbeat note and natural warmth that she liked. He wasn't like Dustin, who seemed more likely to kill a stranger than talk to one.

"If you all are on the side of good, why is there so much death?" she demanded.

"Trust me, there'd be more if the bad guys won. It's not easy being the good guy, and it's a job not many people can do. You have to stay true to your values while destroying something as well. It's rough," he said and gave a surprised laugh.

Damian trotted from the stairs toward the courtyard and paused, looking at her curiously.

"I'm having an issue reconciling the two," she admitted.

"Who?" Damian mouthed. She waved him away.

"We've all gone through that stage. You have to look at it like this: would you want someone to help you if something bad happened?" Jule continued.

"Yes."

"Exactly. But not everyone can do what we do, because we're, well, different than normal people. We're in a unique position to help people who can't help themselves against bad guys who want to hurt them," he said.

"I see. You have no regrets?" she asked, unconvinced.

"No way in hell, and neither does D. Because of us, many innocent people have been able to live their lives, and humanity thrives," Jule said with conviction she envied.

Damian watched her, eyes narrowing.

"I see why he likes you," she said quietly. "Thanks for talking to me. He'll call you back."

"Sofi-" Jule started to object.

She hung up and tossed Damian the phone.

"I'm going shopping Saturday," she told him. "And Jule called. He's in town."

"That's who you were talking to?" Damian demanded. She didn't miss the way he bristled but turned her back to him to return to the library.

"Yep. He's a good guy."

Don't answer my phone.

"Then stop doing that!"

No deal.

He drove her crazy, and she was hungry again. Always, always hungry. Was she destined to spend the rest of her life starving?

"Your drug dealer's still in business. For now."

"That's not funny," she said, turning to glare at him.

"No?" he asked, approaching her with a languid walk that stirred her blood.

He stopped in her personal zone, too close, but she wasn't about to back down this time. She crossed her arms and looked up at him, meeting his steady look with a challenging one of her own.

"You're getting braver, kiri," he said in a husky tone.

She tried not to let it affect her but suspected by his look of satisfaction that he saw how quickly her face changed colors.

"If you're half the man everyone tells me you are, you'll send Han some flowers. He's going to break his leg tomorrow."

"At your service, Oracle."

She ached to touch him but refused, hugging herself more tightly instead. Her nerve began to frazzle. She walked away.

"Sofia." There was a serious note in his voice that made her stop. His gaze was on her chest. She fingered the necklace there.

"The diamonds were a bit overwhelming for daily wear," she admitted. "I restrung it onto one of my chains."

He said nothing, and she saw the look that crossed his face, as if he wasn't sure what to make of it.

"Is that okay?" she asked.

"Very." He spun on his heel and left. She watched him go, admiring and puzzled.

"My dear Han, you were right about these damn moods," she said in the empty hallway. He was worse than a woman PMSing.

You're full of shit, he said into her thoughts.

She gritted her teeth, hating the fact he had open access to her thoughts and worse-he could respond to them!

"No," Pierre said, blocking the library as she approached. "I'm not wasting any more of my time in there."

"I have one more thing to do," she said, holding up her list. "Why don't you go spar? I promise not to leave."

He gave her a look of supreme distaste before he, too, walked away.

What was it with these men and their moods? She shook her head and returned to the library. In truth, it was the one place in the house where she felt safe and comfortable when she wasn't with Damian.

CHAPTER TEN.

Claire didn't look any worse for wear after a day in the offsite location Dusty had scouted as a temporary dungeon for their prisoners. If not for the worried flicker of her gaze past him to see who followed, Damian would have thought this a social call.

"Dusty's not here," he said, irritated by the inference that he was somehow someone to be less feared.

"I guess I should feel honored to have your personal attention," she said acidly.

She sat on one of two fold-out chairs in the concrete room, legs crossed and hands in her lap. He pulled up the other chair and sat across from her.

"Two hundred and sixty three," he started. "That's the number of Guardians you've killed directly with your actions over the past few thousand years. In an organization of less than five thousand, that's a lot."

"I offered to become your queen after Darian died," she replied. "You threw me out with nowhere to go after the man who was meant to be my husband was killed. Who do you think paid the bills if you didn't?"

"I'm not sure how betraying everything your husband stood for would excuse anything you did. You're a pretty twisted bitch."

Her eyes narrowed. Damian regarded her coolly, unwilling to let someone so undeserving get the best of him. When he wanted, he could be as cold as Dusty.

"You'd never understand," she replied.

"You're right. I'd never kill my mate or sell myself to Czerno."

"It's that bitch, isn't it?" she exclaimed, rising and pacing. "I was meant to be at your side, not her!"

Damian felt something cool further within him at the reference to Sofia.

"You were meant to be at Darian's side. Your skills as an Oracle were terrible, but he would've mated with you anyway," he corrected her.

She shook her head as if he were the fool.

"Will you tell me why you betrayed him before I kill you?" he asked with calmness at odds with the storm in his breast.

Claire glanced away then back at him, taking in the resolve on his face. Suddenly she was mewling, kneeling beside him, her hands on his thigh and her face soft and beguiling.

Like the night she'd come to visit him upon arriving in Tucson. Damian gritted his teeth, remembering how tempted he'd been by the same ruse a few nights before.

"Forgive me, Damian. What I did was wrong," she whispered. There were tears in her eyes, and she looked sincere.

She killed Darian.

Damian stood and moved away, emotions roiling. How could someone so treacherous have lived under his nose for thousands of years? How had he ever turned a blind eye to her? He touched her mind for the first time ever, and his resolve solidified at the images he saw there.

She'd never loved Darian and had used him to gain his title and power. Her betrayal struck him even harder.

"It doesn't matter, Claire," he whispered. "You killed my brother and two hundred sixty-three other Guardians."

She rose and dusted off her legs from where she'd knelt. Her eyes flashed with defiance, and she glowered at him.

"You've had tens of thousands of years to get rid of me. You can't tell me you never looked into my thoughts with your god-powers!" she snapped.