She liked him ... The words evoked a truly juvenile response inside him. He felt a peculiar urge to run tell someone, "She likes me, she likes me."
Ye gods, what was that?
He was two thousand years old. Long past the age for such behavior.
Yet there was no denying the satisfaction and happiness he felt.
Awkward silence fell between them while they ate.
As she finished, Amanda did her best not to think about her house. All she'd lost. She would deal with that tomorrow. At the moment, she just wanted to get through the night.
"Tabitha is staying put," she said as she watched Kyrian take his plate to the sink and rinse it off.
"Good."
"You know," she said quietly, "you still haven't told me how you knew so much about my sister the night we met."
He put the plate and silverware in the dishwasher. "Talon and Tabitha have a mutual friend."
Amanda's eyes widened at that. A mole... who would have thought. "One of Tabitha's Zoo Crew?"
He nodded.
"Who?"
"Since this person spies for us, I'm not about to tell you who it is."
She laughed at that, then narrowed her eyes, trying to divine who it was. "I'll bet it's Gary ."
"I'm giving away nothing."
It was intriguing, but not nearly as much as the Dark-Hunter before her. Sighing, Amanda continued to eat and glance around the richly appointed kitchen while Kyrian put the food away. There was a marble breakfast counter that vaguely resembled a Greek temple. It separated the table where she sat from the rest of the kitchen. Three tall bar stools were set before it.
Everything was crisp and clean and enormous.
"This is a big house for one person. How long have you lived here?"
"A little over a hundred years."
She choked. "Are you serious?"
"There's no need for me to move. I like New Orleans."
She got up and took her plate to him. "You put down some serious roots, don't you? Where did you live before here?"
"Paris for a while," he said, putting the plate aside. "Geneva. London, Barcelona, Hamburg, Athens. Before that I wandered around."
She watched his face while he spoke. There was no telltale sign of his mood. He was hiding his feelings from her and she wondered if there was any way to draw him out. "It sounds really lonely."
"It was okay." Still no facial clues.
"Did you ever have friends in any of those places?"
"No, not really. I've had a few Squires over the centuries, but for the most part, I prefer solitude."
"Squires?" she asked. How strange. "Like in the Middle Ages?"
"Something like that." He looked at her, but didn't elaborate. "What about you? Have you lived here all your life?"