VERIS AND BRODY KEPT hovering around Taylor where she sat quietly on the Craftsman chair that was Brody’s favorite. Marit clung to her knee and Veris kept kissing her, on whatever section of flesh was closest; her hands, her mouth, her forehead. Taylor’s making had upset them and made them appreciate all the more her return to them.
So Alex took over the pouring of champagne, including half an inch in a glass for Marit, and handed them out to everyone. He arranged chairs for Brody and Veris right next to Taylor and forced them into them, and handed them each a glass, too. Then he went off and found Mia, and brought her back to the library and set her up with a glass, and a chair, despite her protests.
Raphael had pulled the sofa over and Sydney was settled down next to him, leaving Alex a seat beside her. Alex came over to the sofa, but stayed on his feet. He held up his glass. “To long life,” he invoked.
Everyone held up their glasses. Sydney frowned as she sipped and the others brought the sparkling liquid to their lips.
“It really is a long life, for all of you, isn’t it?” Sydney asked. “Even Taylor, now.”
Taylor pressed her lips together. “Don’t envy me.”
Alex picked up Sydney’s spare hand. “You would go through what Taylor did for a few more years?” he asked quietly.
“There must be other ways to do it. Gentler ways,” Sydney said.
“There is,” Veris said. “But you would deprive Alex and Rafe the years of living with a human?”
Sydney looked startled.
“There are always two sides to the coin,” Veris said. He picked up Taylor’s hand and kissed it. “I cannot conceive of a life without Taylor in it, and for that to happen, she had to be turned. But I would have asked for more time, if I’d had a choice.”
Sydney’s eyes sparkled. “But now Taylor is safe. Nothing can ever harm her. Surely, that must give you comfort?”
“Nothing comforts me more than knowing you will be here tomorrow,” Alex told her. “Tomorrow, and all the days after it. Anything else that happens we can deal with, as long as you’re here.”
Sydney squeezed his hand. The sparkling in her eyes had turned to gathering tears. “You want me to stay human?”
Rafe sighed. “Yes, we both do,” he said. “For now. I like your human-ness. The heat of your body against mine in bed. Your scent.”
“Don’t rush into any changes,” Brody said. “You’ll find there are big changes you have to make just because you’re together now. Don’t trade off your life because of fear.”
Sydney swallowed and nodded.
“Besides, you have five vampires that call you family,” Veris said, “and any one of them would jump to defend you and solve your problems. Especially Alex and Rafe. That sort of helping is part of what makes living with a human so rewarding.”
Sydney sighed. “There’s so much to learn.”
“Comes from living so long,” Rafe said. “Although we still manage to complicate things in a very human way from time to time.” He glanced at Alex. “All of us,” he added.
Alex lifted his glass again, in a small salute, then looked at Veris. “There’s one thing I haven’t worked out yet. I don’t know if you have. The queen coming after Taylor, that I understood. But why did she try to kill Sydney?”
Veris leaned forward and put his glass on the coffee table. “Marit said that Tira came from our future,” and he rested his hand on Marit’s shoulder for a second. “I have no reason to doubt her. As Tira was driving the same Ford Explorer on both occasions, we have to assume that she came back from the future to deal with both Taylor and Sydney at once. As we can’t think of a single reason why Tira would even know Sydney, let alone want her dead, it has to be something in the future.”
Sydney was squeezing her glass. “Something I did?”
“Marit called Sydney ‘the queen lady’,” Brody said softly, as if he was speaking just to Veris.
Veris frowned. “We can only speculate,” he said slowly. “Clearly, Marit of the future knows Sydney well. Perhaps she knows her well enough to know her middle name, and the meaning of it, and that was what she meant.”
“Or?” Alex asked sharply.
“Or Marit was being literal,” Veris replied, “and somewhere in the future, Sydney becomes a queen.”
* * * * *
When Bruce smashed a porcelain bowl, the third valuable knickknack in twenty minutes, Sydney apologized for the third time. “It’s just for the night,” she told Rafe, as he swept up the shards.
Rafe shook his head. “This house isn’t childproof and hasn’t been for years. We can fix that. Besides, he’s family, too.”
Alex sat on the bottom step of the stairs and watched Sydney calming Bruce down as he settled on the blanket by the bottom of the stairs, and Rafe sweeping. It was a very domestic sight and it made him sigh.
“You’re thinking deep thoughts, my philosophical infidel,” Rafe accused him as he swept up the last of the porcelain.
“Happy thoughts,” Alex admitted.
Sydney brushed her sweaty brow with the back of her wrist. “And they would be?”
“Don’t encourage him,” Rafe told her. “He’ll start talking about the meaning of life and we’ll be here all night. I’d rather be in bed, communicating with my hands and my mouth.”
Alex shook his head. “I was just thinking about how a while ago, I didn’t know if I deserved to call myself a Christian. What I am and what I wanted seemed to be so wrong.”
Neither of them looked appalled, or upset, or anything but interested, and that encouraged him to go on. “This…us…feels so right. I couldn’t understand how what I’ve been taught to think of as a sin, and as me and you, Rafe, as abominations, could make me feel so happy.”
Rafe leaned on the broom. “You’re talking in the past tense. So that means you’ve decided that…?”
Alex shrugged. “I’ve decided that love must be right. No matter what shape it comes in.”
Rafe dropped the broom and kissed him. Then he held out his hand toward Sydney. “Come, my lover. Let’s take him to bed and make him laugh.”
Sydney took his hand and smiled at Alex, a wicked grin. “Can we make him scream, first?”