even if she wasn't that kind of mistress, he knew about vampires. he was no one's pet, no one's slave, as he'd told daegan. he didn't bend over and let himself get fucked just because someone snapped their fingers and told him to do it. didn't matter that the first thing he'd wanted to do when he saw her was to drop to his knees and hope for her touch.

she did need some form of stability. but maybe it didn't have to be the whole enchilada. there were three marks. just one might help her, that one blood connection, and the only advantage she'd have over him would be knowing his geographical whereabouts. no way was he letting anyone into his head, the advantage of the second mark.

fuck, what was he doing? here he was, contemplating something there was no way he'd ever consider if he was in his right mind. this was jumping into a murky pond with no clue to the kind of monster beneath the water's surface. or, worse, he did have a clue, but he was considering it, anyway. for a lot of the reasons that jacob had uncomfortably just outlined. of course, jacob had claimed he'd dreamed of lyssa years before he'd met her, some kind of past-life bullshit. gideon hadn't even had a clear picture of anwyn before he walked into her place. it couldn't be the same.

sometimes it's a slow-moving creek that builds into a river . . .but did you dive headfirst in that shallow creek, hoping it would become a river before your fool head cracked open?

"gid, are you about to get yourself into the kind of trouble you can't get out of?"

"maybe. i'll call you later. give lyssa a slap on the ass for me and tell her to bring you a beer."

"yeah, i'll get right on that. gideon-"

"be easy, little brother. it's all right. it's a different kind of trouble, not the life-or-death kind."maybe.

"hey, do you or lyssa know anything about a vamp named daegan rei?" jacob and lyssa were of course telekinetically connected, so jacob must have offered the question in his mind. lyssa was suddenly on the line, her sensual voice frosted with ice he could feel, even long distance. "gideon, what's your involvement with daegan rei?"

"it's a long story. i just wondered-"

"i don't care how tough you are, you donot go after him."

"i'm-"

"i am not prepared to attend your funeral, even if there were enough pieces of you left to have one. i don't have a suitably demure black dress, and it will make me exceedingly angry to have to buy one."

"wear red lace, then. we're-"

he had only a blink of warning, a sense of impending heat. electricity jolted through his hand, enough to spasm through his fingers so that the phone clattered to the cement. he swore, shaking the tingling appendage. holy christ, how had she done that? he knew lyssa's fey abilities were growing, thanks to her exploration of her father's side of the family, but that was damned unsettling. he retrieved the phone gingerly, surprised it was still functioning. "how did you do that?"

"that's also complicated." jacob again. "you've really ticked her off. but i got the gist of it. you're not going after this guy, are you? if you are, i'm coming to you."

"no. what i was trying to say before she went all electron woman on me was that . . . we're sort of working together."

because that brought on a sudden shocked silence, he pressed the advantage to get the full message out.

"i don't really want to go into it right now, but i need to know what she knows about him. i'm fully aware he's a badass, and my intention isn't to tangle with that side of him. we're helping someone . . . someone turned by force. she means something to him . . . and to me, too. maybe. i mean, i just met her, but there's something . . . she needs me. don't start spouting damsel-in-distress-syndrome crap, or i'll hang up."

"hold on," jacob said absently. gideon waited, getting a vague sense of conversation, though no one was speaking.

"lyssa doesn't want to say a lot, but i told her you could be trusted with this. you can't repeat it, okay?

not even to daegan, because no one outside of the council is supposed to know. it's important."

"yeah, got it. like, who am i going to tell?"

gideon cursed to himself, but of course his brother had already jumped on it. "you're completely solo now, aren't you? you're taking them out on your own. you stupid, arrogant-"

"you going to tell me about daegan rei, or you going to waste your breath on bullshit?"

"i swear to god, if i could reach you, i'd break your fucking neck." jacob sighed. "fine. brace yourself for the irony. daegan rei is the council's private assassin. he's a vampire hunter."

16

death bringer. grim reaper. all the cliches, of course, wrapped up in the name he went by, a mix of the east and west. daegan for black or dark, rei for spirit or ghost. black spirit, dark ghost, or just ghost. lyssa knew his origins, the story behind how he'd gotten to be the council's private killer, but she wasn't willing to share any of that. apparently, no one but the council knew who the guy was. he existed outside even the strict vampire hierarchy of overlords and region masters, somehow moving under their radar like a ghost in truth.

it stood to reason, because though the vampire world worked through power and control, they had an illusion of diplomacy to maintain as well. because of the nature of the species, a vampire disappearing from sight for indefinite stretches of time rarely caused comment. therefore, the council at times found it more expedient to have the more embarrassing vampires in violation of council directives erased quietly, rather than hauling them up in front of the council for a public execution. translation: daegan was handling population control of the made vampires, like barnabus, who'd gone off the map and could expose the vampire world to humans in a big, violent way. less red tape and politics.

but something didn't figure, if only the council knew about him. barnabus had asked for daegan by name. did someone on the council no longer appreciate his services? or were they trying to test him in some way? he wondered if the realization that he'd been sold out had enhanced daegan's fury, an additional undercurrent to his intense reaction to anwyn's attack.

gideon was even more cynical than lyssa-and being more cynical than a woman who'd been around more than a thousand years was an accomplishment-and he could see rampant possibilities for abuse of that killing power. but what he'd seen of daegan so far didn't gel with that. cool control, clear-eyed and objective.

his lip curled. freaking politics. there were vampire hunters, few though their number were, who'd tried to band together into conglomerates, and gideon had shied away from them for that very reason. one of the few times he'd made the mistake of being a joiner outside his own personally organized cells had resulted in the complete snafu at the last vampire gathering. they'd been used as pawns of made vampires, and a lot of them had been killed. there'd been too many egos and players involved. no one listened, so no one realized they were walking into what ultimately could have been a death trap for all of them.

the rattling passage of the old man and his cart coming back stirred him. after his phone call, he'd remained against the brick wall of atlantis, staring into space, lost in thought. the black cat was curled between his boots, sleeping, her purr a soft motor at the back of his thoughts. he didn't know how long he'd been sitting there, but at length, he rose, dislodging the cat. sighing, he stopped at the kitchen door, rapped with his knuckles and met the gaze of the startled kid who popped open the door, obviously expecting a delivery. gideon gestured to the black cat.

"you have a customer. anw-miss naime would want you all to be feeding them while she's unavailable, right?"

the kid glanced at the cat, then up at gideon, his gaze wary. "i gave the whole lot of them a tray of chicken scraps a little while ago."

"hmmph." gideon glanced down at the cat. "faker." he kept going toward the maintenance door, leaving the boy staring after him.

when he reached the elevator entrance and punched in the code, he thought about those eight numbers.

twelve, seventeen, thirteen, ten. if a code was random numbers, people usually spelled it out.

one-two-one-seven, et cetera. but what if it meant december seventeenth, year 1310? could vampires be as predictable as people, using their birth-dates for access codes? that would make daegan about seven hundred years old. a hell of a long time for him to be around and nobody to know anything about him. the council had been around for way less time than that, and lyssa had indicated he'd served them for only the most recent decades. so where had he been before then?

gideon was surprised to find that daegan had moved anwyn out of the cell in the dungeon room to the couch in the sitting room. she was draped in a satin robe now, the blanket tucked around her. it seemed she hadn't yet stirred, or if she had, it had been brief and then she'd gone under again. it was the longest time she'd subsided, and he didn't know if that was a good or bad sign. maybe she'd dived deep into unconsciousness, knowing she'd have to take that hated blood when she woke.

the robe's neckline was loose, exposing the curves of her breasts, the column of her throat. with one hand above her head and another across her abdomen, she made an erotic picture even with her still healing scars. her expression was at rest, her lips full, inviting touch, lashes fanning her cheeks. but as he watched, pain flitted across her face, discomfort, and she shuddered. she turned, curling into a fetal ball.

moving forward, gideon adjusted the blanket over her. her skin was ice-cold. he picked up an additional throw from the nearby chair, unfolded and spread it over her, smoothing his hands over the curve of waist and hip, resting briefly on her thigh. when he went to a squat beside her, so close to her face, he remembered how she'd looked earlier, when she'd spoken so plain.i feel better when you're both here . . .

she didn't even know him. it was just nightingale syndrome, or whatever the hell they called it. as strong as she seemed, this was about as rough as anyone could imagine things getting. he'd shown up with daegan in the alley. her fixation had to do with his falsely heroic timing. that was all.