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“I don’t want to feed on anyone.”

His hands slid around my waist, his head going to my lap, and I realized he was crying. “Please, don’t do this, Anita, please don’t do this.”

I stroked his hair, his face, and didn’t know what to say. What was I going to do if the ardeur was permanent? Richard didn’t let anyone feed off of him for any reason—same rule I had. Jean-Claude would be literally dead to the world when I most needed to feed. Micah was still a question mark. But in some ways, feeding off of Nathaniel because he was the only one that would let me, was almost worse.

I lifted his face from my lap, a hand on either side. Tears glittered on his cheeks in the faint light. I kissed his forehead, kissed his closed eyes, the way you would a child’s.

“Did I get here just in time, or am I interrupting?” It was Richard standing in the doorway. Perfect fucking timing, as always.

33

I FROZE WITH Nathaniel’s face cradled in my hands, him kneeling between my legs with the table hiding most of him, having just risen from kissing him, and knew how it looked. I wasn’t sure I could explain it to Richard’s satisfaction. To my knowledge Richard didn’t know about the ardeur yet, and right then I didn’t want to tell him.

I laid another gentle kiss on Nathaniel’s forehead and leaned back. I wasn’t going to act like I’d done something wrong when I hadn’t. Nathaniel took his cue from me, laying his head back in my lap, which I realized meant he was invisible from the doorway, the table hiding what he was doing.

Richard strode into the kitchen like an angry wind, his power biting along my skin. He came to stand where he could see that Nathaniel had his cheek against my thigh, gazing up at the larger man, as he towered over both of us.

Jamil and Shang-Da were hanging back by the doorway. They were good bodyguards, but some things bodyguards can’t keep you safe from.

I felt my face go neutral, empty, vaguely pleasant. “I was comforting one of my leopards, something wrong with that?”

“He looks very comfortable,” Richard said, voice mild enough, but his power was hot, like opening the door to an oven.

I licked my lips. I was going to have to explain the ardeur, sooner or later, and since I wanted him to help us save Gregory, tonight was probably the right time. “Nathaniel and I were discussing some side effects of marrying the vampire marks.”

“You mean the ardeur,” he said.

I was surprised and let it show. “Who told you?”

“Jean-Claude thought I should know. He encouraged me to come over and be here for you in the morning.”

“And you said?” I kept my voice as neutral as I could, but not as neutral as I wanted it to be.

“I don’t let him, or Asher, or any of them, feed off of me, blood or anything else. I don’t see why I should change that rule just because it’s you and it’s sex instead of blood.”

“Did he explain that if I don’t feed off of you, or him, I still have to feed off of someone?”

“There’s always your Nimir-Raj.” The contempt in his voice was thick enough to walk on.

“Micah’s been called away on pard business.”

“You really think he won’t be back before morning so you can fuck him? I do.”

I stared up at him, still sitting in the face of his burning power and the sheer physical presence of him. Richard was one of those big men who never seemed big unless he was angry. He seemed big now, and I wasn’t impressed.

I started petting Nathaniel’s hair, and he snuggled in against my legs, letting the tension ease out of his body. “You dumped me, remember?”

“And did you fuck him for the first time before or after you found out I’d dumped you?”

I had to think about that for a second or two. “After,” I said.

“You mourned my loss for, what, half a second?”

I felt heat crawl up my face. I was out of moral high ground, and explaining that it was the ardeur just wasn’t good enough for Richard.

“It took all three of us to get into this mess, don’t make it worse.”

“Don’t you mean four of us, or is it five now?”

I must have looked as blank as