"Where's Jean-Claude sleeping?"
"Asher's room," I said.
He had left his suitcase by the door, but he was in the middle of the floor, halfway between the door and the bed. He licked his lips and wouldn't quite look at us. He was nervous—why?
"Jason has his new girlfriend bunking with him."
"Perdita, Perdy," I said. She'd come to us from the master of Cape Cod. She was a mermaid. A real live mermaid. The first I'd ever met. Though I'd never seen her look anything but human. I was told she really could be part fish, but I'd never seen it.
Richard nodded.
Micah moved against me and let me know he'd thought of something. Oh. "Do you want to stay here with us?" Micah asked.
Richard closed those perfectly brown eyes, the color of milk chocolate. He took a deep breath, let it out slow, then nodded.
We all exchanged a look, which was almost finished by the time he opened those eyes. We must have looked surprised, though, because he said, "I'm a shapeshifter; we like big puppy piles for sleeping."
"Most of you guys do," I said, "but you've never willingly slept with me and any of the other guys."
"This is who you are, Anita. This is who we both are." He shoved his big hands into his jacket pockets and looked at the floor. "I was on a date when I got the call that some insanely powerful vampires are in town." He looked up, and his face held that anger that he'd gotten from me through Jean-Claude's vampire marks. He shared my rage at the world, and it had made him even harder to deal with. "I had to call it an early evening, and I couldn't explain to her why."
"We had to cut our date short, too," Nathaniel said.
Richard looked at him; it was not an entirely friendly look, but his words were civil. "You guys were trying to celebrate some kind of anniversary."
"Yes," I said.
"Sorry it got ruined."
"Sorry your date got cut short," I said. My, we were being terribly polite.
"They found bugs in my house, Anita. My dates, my phone calls, everything recorded." He rocked on the heels of his boots.
"I know," I said. "Same for us."
"The Circus is the most secure place we have, so I'm here for the duration."
"Scary," I said.
"The scary part is that I might be endangering the kids I teach. If it's not fixed by Monday, maybe I should take a leave of absence."
He seemed to be asking my opinion and I didn't know what to say, but Micah did. "We've all been blindsided by this. Let's get some sleep."
Richard nodded his head, a little too rapidly, a little too often. There were guest rooms in the underground. There was even a couch big enough for him to use in the living room. So why was he here?
"I can stay?" He asked it without looking at us.
"Yes," Micah said.
"Yes," I said, my voice soft.
He looked up. "Nathaniel?"
"I'm not dominant to anyone in this room; I don't get a vote."
"It's polite to ask," Richard said.
"Yes," I said, "it is. I appreciate it."
"So do I," Nathaniel said, "but you don't have to ask. It was your bed before it was ours."
That seemed a little impolitic, but strangely Richard smiled. "Nice of someone to remember that." But he didn't sound angry as he said it. He picked up his suitcase and started walking toward the bed. He walked past the bed, and we all watched him. He put the suitcase down beside the armoire in the corner that held extra clothes for all of us. He knelt, opened the case, and began to unpack. He took his jacket off first and put it on a hanger in the armoire. Then he took out shirts, socks, and underwear and put them in the drawers. He unpacked as if we weren't there. We all exchanged looks again. This was too weird, entirely too civilized for Richard. The other shoe had to drop soon, and all hell would break loose, wouldn't it?
Micah moved the covers, letting me know to get off them enough to get under them. He was right; discretion was the better part of valor. We were all three under the red silk sheets when Richard finally finished putting everything away—including one trip with a toiletry kit to the bathroom. He left the door wide open so he had plenty of light, then walked to the light by the door and turned it off. It was so normal, it scared me. I hadn't seen him this reasonable in months, maybe years. My shoulders and arms were tight with tension. It felt like the quiet before the storm, but I couldn't tell if the tension was just me projecting. Richard and I could share each other's dreams, let alone thoughts, but right now he and I were shielding so tight that nothing got through. We were separate from each other metaphysically, or as separate as Jean-Claude's marks would let us be. It was safer that way.
Richard walked to the bed, his eyes downcast, not looking at us. He sat down on the bed near me. The three of us scooted back a little to give him more room. He must have felt the bed move, but he ignored it. He pulled off his boots and let them fall to the floor, then socks. He took off his T-shirt and I was suddenly looking at the muscled expanse of his naked back. His hair caressed the edges of all that bare skin.
I fought the urge to touch him. I was afraid of what would happen. Afraid that he would take it wrong.
He had to stand up to undo his belt, unbutton the fly. The sound of the buttons coming undone jerked things low in my body. Richard had been the man who taught me the joys of button-fly jeans.
Micah's arm curled around my waist, drawing me in closer to his body. Was he jealous?
Richard hesitated. As a shapeshifter nudity should have been second nature, maybe first, but he didn't like being nude in front of my other lovers. He just didn't. He stripped the jeans down in one motion. If he'd been wearing underwear, he wasn't now. The sight of him nude did what it always did: it made me catch my breath and think about touching him. All Richard had to do to win any fight with me was to strip. I just couldn't argue with him when he looked so scrumptious.
He let the jeans hit the floor, then turned toward the bed. His eyes were still downcast, his hair spilling forward around his face. He finally looked up, and our eyes met. I didn't try to keep my face blank. I let him see what I thought of him beautiful and nude before me. Even with Micah's body pressed against me in the bed, Richard was still beautiful.
He smiled, half shy, and half the old Richard. The Richard who had known how much I loved him, and how much he meant to me. He lifted the covers up and slid under them. He was tall enough that he had no trouble getting into the bed without help. "Scoot over… please," he said.
Micah scooted, moving me with him a little. Richard slid into the space we'd made. I felt the bed move, which meant Nathaniel had moved, too. The bed wasn't a king-size, it was an orgy-size bed. We'd had more people than this on it at the same time, sometimes even for sleeping.
Richard scooted down until he was almost pressed to the front of my body, but not quite. Micah's hand was still around my waist. "I'm not sure where to put my hands," Richard said.
Micah laughed, but it was a good guy laugh. "I know what you mean."
"Where do you want to put them?" Nathaniel asked.
I glanced over my shoulder and found that Nathaniel was peering over Micah's more slender body at us.
"I'm nervous, tired. I want to be touched and held."
"You're a shapeshifter," Micah said. "We all like skin contact when we're shaky."
Richard nodded. He was propped up on one elbow, and he made even Nathaniel look small. Richard was one of those large men who didn't seem that large until moments like this; then you appreciated the full physical presence of him. "I brought wolves with me. They're in one of the guest rooms. I could have my puppy pile. I didn't have to come here for that."
I swallowed hard enough that it hurt.
Micah said, "Then why are you here?"
"I'm tired of running from myself."