He nearly spewed coffee, choked instead. He waved a hand at her as his laugh rumbled out. “Don’t mind me. Finish the story.”

“Ah... Well, he took her deep into the forest and had his way with her, and she, like a woman under a spell, wanted his touch. To try to save his life, she offered her blood to him. So she was bitten, and drank his blood in turn, as this was another kind of mating. She died with him, but she did not cease to exist. She became the thing we call vampyre.”

“A demon for love.”

“Aye, I suppose. In vengeance against men, she hunted them, fed from them, changed them, to make more of her kind. And still she grieved for her demon lover, and killed herself with sunlight.”

“Doesn’t quite hit Romeo and Juliet, does it?”

“A play. I saw the book of it here, on the shelf. I haven’t yet read it.” It would take years to read all the books in such a room she thought as she toyed with the end of her braid.

“But I read another tale of the vampyre. It tells of a demon, mad and ill from a spell even more evil than it, thirsting wildly for human blood. He fed, and the more he fed, the more mad he became. He died after mixing his blood with a mortal, and the mortal became vampyre. The first of its kind.”

“I guess you like the first version better.”

“No, I like truth better, and I think the second is the truth. What mortal woman would love a demon?”

“Led a sheltered life back in your world, haven’t you? Where I come from people fall for monsters—or what others consider monsters—all the time. Ain’t no logic with love, Shorty. It just is.”

She tossed her braid behind her back in a kind of shrug. “Well, if I love, I won’t be stupid about it.”

“Hope I’m around long enough to see you eat those words.”

She closed the book, drew up her legs. “Do you love someone?”

“A woman? Been close a few times, and that’s how I know I didn’t make it all the way to the bull’s-eye.”

“How do you know?”

“When you hit the center, Shorty, you’re down for the count. But it’s fun shooting for it. Gonna take a special woman to get past this.” He tapped a finger to his face.

“I like your face. It’s so big and dark.”

He laughed so hard he nearly spilled his coffee. “You got that one right.”

“And you’re strong. You speak well and you cook. You have loyalty to your friends.”

That big dark face softened. “Want to apply for the position of love of my life?”

She smiled back at him, at ease. “I’m thinking I’m not your bull’s-eye. If I’m to be queen, I must marry one day. Have children. I hope it won’t be only duty, but that I find what my mother found in my father. What they found in each other. I’d want him to be strong, and loyal.”

“And handsome.”

She moved her shoulders, because she did hope that as well. “Do women here only look for beauty?”

“Couldn’t say, but it don’t hurt. Guy looks like Cian, for instance, he’s got to beat them off with sticks.”

“Then why is he lonely?”

He studied her over the rim of his mug. “Good question.”

“How did you come to meet him?”

“He saved my life.”

Moira wrapped her arms around her legs and settled in. There was little she liked more than a story. “How?”

“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Bad neighborhood in East L.A.” He drank again, lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “See, my old man took off before I was born, and my old lady had what we’ll call a little problem with illegal substances. OD’d. Overdosed. Took too much of some bad shit.”

“She died.” Everything in her mourned for him. “I’m sorry.”

“Bad choices, bad luck. You gotta figure some people come into the world set on tossing their life into the shitter. She was one of them. So I’m on the street, doing what I can to get by, and keep out of the system. I’m heading to this place I know. It’s dark, steaming hot. I just wanted a place to sleep for the night.”

“You had no home.”

“I had the street. A couple of guys were hanging out on the stoop, probably waiting to make a score. I got my bad attitude on. Need to get by them to get where I want to go. Car rolls up, blasts at them. Drive-by,” he said. “Like an ambush. I’m caught in it. Bullet grazes my head. More coming, and I know I’m going to be dead. Somebody grabs me, pulls me back. Things got blurry, but it felt like I was flying. Then I was someplace else.”

“Where?”

“Fancy hotel room. I’d never seen anything like it outside of movies.” He crossed his big, booted feet as he remembered. “Big-ass bed, big enough for ten people, and I’m lying on it. Head hurts like a mother, which is why I don’t figure I’m dead and this is heaven. He comes out of the bathroom. Got his shirt off, and a fresh bandage on his shoulder. Got himself shot dragging me out of the cross fire.”

“What did you do?”

“Nothing much, guess I was in shock. He sits down, studies me like I’m a frigging book. ‘You’re lucky,’ he said, ‘and stupid.’ He’s got that accent. I’m figuring he must be some rock star or something. The way he looks, the fancy voice, the fancy room. Truth is, I thought he was a perv, and he was going to want me to... Let’s just say I was scared shitless. I was eight.”

“You were a child?” Her eyes widened. “You were just a child?”

“I was eight,” he repeated. “Grow up like I did, you aren’t a kid long. He asks me what the hell I was doing out there, and I give him some sass. Trying to get some of my own back. He asks if I’m hungry, and I shoot back something like I ain’t going to... perform any sexual favors for a goddamn meal. Orders a steak dinner, a bottle of wine, some soda pop. And he tells me he isn’t interested in buggering young boys. If I’ve got someplace I’d rather be, I should go there. Otherwise I can wait for the steak.”

“You waited for the steak.”

“Fucking A.” He gave her a wink. “That was the start of it. He gave me food, and a choice. I could go back to where I’d been—no skin off his—or I could work for him. I took the job. Didn’t know the job meant school. He gave me clothes, an education, self-respect.”