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hoarse with the beginnings of need.

“If we are with you tonight, you must give your word that you will not take the werehyenas to another city until we have enough other guards to replace them,” Jean-Claude said.

“And if I refuse?”

“Then you can go to Narcissus for tonight and the three of us will go to my bedroom without you.” He drew me in against his body and ran a hand through the waves of Richard’s hair, but it was Asher he looked at; we were just props for the game.

Asher’s breath went out in a long shudder, and then he simply walked past us toward the far curtains. He parted them, then hesitated in the opening with the stone hallway framed behind him.

“Are you coming, or has your nerve broken already, Ulfric?”

Richard squeezed my hand, then let go of it, and of Jean-Claude’s. The link was immediately not as great. It was like being suddenly less warm, as if a cloud had crossed the sun. Richard went to Micah and Nathaniel, leaned close, and whispered something to them. Micah nodded, and then Richard offered first Micah and then Nathaniel his hand. They shook hands, and Richard came back to us. His face was strangely peaceful, but his pulse couldn’t lie. It was jumping in the side of his neck. For all his brave talk, he was afraid of Asher.

Jean-Claude offered his hand to him, and Richard took it. He started to reach out to me, then hesitated and looked back at the other man. It made Jean-Claude smile and then reach his hand out to me. I went to him, and he led us by the hands to Asher at the curtains.

Jamil said, “What do you want us to do, Ulfric?”

“Have guards outside the door, and if we call for help, do your jobs.”

Wicked said, “Anita, Jean-Claude, this is a bad idea.”

I nodded. “Yep.”

“Why do it then?” Truth asked.

I couldn’t explain and I couldn’t share the mind-to-mind with them, so all I could say was, “It’ll be all right.”

“Don’t lie to a liar, Anita,” Wicked said.

Jean-Claude said, “Enough. If we’re doing this, I want enough hours between now and dawn to enjoy it.”

It was Claudia who said, “We have to tell Rafael.”

“Do that,” Jean-Claude said.

“He knows I’m here,” Richard said. “I went to your king for advice.”

“Rafael did not tell you to come here and bugger him,” Fredo said, pointing a thumb at Asher.

Richard smiled and said, “He knows why I’m here and what I’m planning to do, I promise you.”

The wererats exchanged looks, but the promise got them. “Mysterious shit bugs me,” Fredo said.

Jason gave a small salute as we moved through the drapes and followed Asher down the hallway. Was it wrong to think that Asher’s ass looked really good in his leather pants as he walked ahead of us up the hallway, or was it just true?

7

THE BED WAS done in red and black tonight. Jean-Claude changed all the bedding including the bed curtains between different color combinations. I’d never seen it being changed. I’d just come into the room and it would be blue, or red, or black, or even gold and silver, and various combinations of all the above. It was like magic: always fresh, clean sheets, always impeccably made.

Asher had stopped halfway between the door and the bed. He turned back, staring at us, his ice-blue eyes framed by all that golden hair. The look on his face was eager, but there was that edge of cruelty that I hated in him. I knew that whatever he was about to say, or do, would be unpleasant. He’d said he wanted this, but he was about to do something to wreck it.

“I want to see you nude,” he said, and his voice held an echo of what Jean-Claude’s could, as if the last word caressed down the body in a shivering line.

I waited for Jean-Claude to say something, do something, help. But it was Richard who said, “You’re angry, Asher. You say you want me, all of us, but now you’re angry and you’re going to sabotage it.”

I could feel a sort of sadness from Richard, not upset, just a deep, almost calm sadness.

I felt Jean-Claude’s hand in mine, but he started to shield, to cut down the connection between us. I think he was afraid of what was going to happen. We were standing in the bedroom with the two men in our lives most likely to fuck up a good thing.

“What do you