“Tell me something vital that requires there to be blood in my brain, or we risk the mice turning another sexual encounter into religious rite,” he said, in a low voice that sent shivers down my spine.

I took a breath. “Um. Okay. You remember I told you Brenna Kelly was a dragon? Well, she wants us to go back to Manhattan with her.” Dominic raised an eyebrow. I quickly outlined Brenna’s proposal: the purchase-slash-adoption, the money, the idea of raising a husband with love.

“Ah,” he said, when I finished. “The Covenant does something similar.”

“Still not comfortable with that.” I didn’t like the fact that the Covenant ran what was essentially a monster-hunter breeding program. Knowing that my family had belonged to it until just a few generations ago didn’t help.

Dominic took my hand and led me to the edge of the roof. He sat down. I sat beside him. Looking at me gravely, he said, “Do you remember when I asked if we were dating?”

“You mean when we were both naked, and you were like, ‘hey, girl I’ve been sleeping with for months, are we a thing?’” I asked. “Yeah, I remember.”

“I told you most of the knights of my generation would take lovers for the sake of the flesh, and then return home to suitable marriages,” said Dominic. “I didn’t want to do that, because I only wanted you.”

“Yes, this rings a lot of ‘wow that was an uncomfortable, horrible day’ bells,” I said. “What’s your point?”

“My point is if you hadn’t come crashing into my snare and my life, and if I’d remained the good Covenant soldier I was raised to be, I would have returned home to that marriage by now. I would have been lucky to meet the girl before I took her to the altar. Everything in our lives is curated. That includes our bloodlines. It’s necessary, when the same families have been fighting together for so many years.” Dominic looked at me solemnly. “I prefer how things happened with us—I’m delighted to have had the chance to fall in love—but arranged marriages haven’t destroyed the Covenant. For the dragons, they may be the only way.”

I blinked. “Okay, wow. This is the second conversation I didn’t expect to have tonight. You think I should do it?”

“I think you’ve already decided to do it,” he said. “I’m simply trying to make you feel better about the idea.”

“I love you.”

Dominic smiled. “I’m aware.”

Between dancing and talking, it had been over an hour, and the mice hadn’t appeared. That was a little odd: I assumed they had pilfered a lot of goodies from the motel kitchen and wanted to divvy them up before they went back to interacting with humans. The mice are loyal and dedicated to documenting as much of the family’s history as they can, but they have their own lives, and those lives are not lived according to human rules.

“I won’t be able to come tomorrow night,” I said, leaning my head against his shoulder. “The first day of rehearsals is always a killer. I’ve done it before, though. I’ll bounce back fast.”

“I’ll continue to do as I have done: hole up here, and watch the surrounding area for signs of danger or of Covenant presence. I’ve found plenty of danger so far, but nothing worth worrying about, and no traces of either Covenant monitoring or field teams. I suspect they’re still hung up on the East Coast.”

“Thank God for small favors,” I said. The idea of meeting another Covenant field team was enough to turn my stomach. Dominic had been working alone when I met him: he’d been willing to listen to reason. When the field team had shown up, it had been a lot less pliable and a lot more dangerous. “You’re sure you don’t mind?”

Dominic smiled. It was one of the sweetest sights I’d ever seen. “If I minded being here for you, I would never have followed you to Oregon. I’ll be fine. I’ll watch you dance on the television, and be gloriously glad to have met you on that rooftop in Manhattan, since it means I can be here now to see you moving. It will be fine.”

“You are the best.” I glanced at the display on my iPod. “But I don’t have time to show my gratitude right now. I gotta get back and go to bed if I’m going to survive the first day. Mice who are coming with me, front and center!”

“Are you sure they—”

“Have you met the mice?”

Sure enough, three Aeslin mice popped into view. One was carrying a Barbie-sized bag made from patches of cloth stitched together with dental floss. It bulged suspiciously at the seams, making me suspect the motel kitchen was missing more cheese than previously thought. Ah, well. It wasn’t like it was the good stuff.