It’s close enough to make no difference! I snapped.

You think not? Let me ask you this—you believed you had severed our relationship a year ago. How many men have you slept with since then?

You know full well I haven’t been with any man, sexually or romantically. What’s your point?

My point is that I did not believe our bond had been broken. I did not have then, nor do I have now, any desire to engage in sex with any woman but you.

I thought about that for a moment, strangely pleased by the little tinge of outrage to his words. But you would if you had to?

He sighed. There is no way I’m going to be able to continue this discussion without you becoming angry with me.

I was going to point out that was a cop-out, when Inner Fran piped up once again with yet another dish of wisdom: What might have been was not important. It was the here and now that mattered. You’re right. I won’t lambaste you for something you haven’t done.

I didn’t think it would happen, but you have changed, Beloved.

Matured?

Not in the sense you mean. Before, you were fairly insular, very reticent to become involved with anything or anyone. Now you are more aware of others. You are more . . . earthy.

I hope being earthy is a good thing.

Oh, yes. He let me feel his emotions. The little spark that had always been between us shimmered into an electrical charge of attraction that skittered down my back. I could feel him considering me, as if he was seeing me with new eyes, and what he saw pleased him immensely.

I basked in that for a moment before I realized David was saying something to me.

“Fran? Benedikt has said he would not attend the tyro unless you agreed.”

I looked from David to Ben, my emotions torn. On the one hand, I wanted to tell David to stuff the tyro where the sun doesn’t shine. On the other hand, I knew from feeling the strength of Ben’s emotions just how much this mattered to him, to them both. And while I didn’t have any qualms about dissing Naomi, I hesitated at giving in to jealous anger if it meant that David’s lion friends might suffer for it. “There will have to be conditions. I want to know exactly what is involved in the orgy part of the evening.”

Ben’s lips thinned. “I will escort Naomi to the tyro. She will name me as a new member. They will initiate me into the group.”

“With sex.”

“A group celebration of primal forces.”

“Sex,” I said, nodding. I held up a finger. “Condition one: no sex.”

“Agreed,” Ben said. David watched us warily.

“No getting naked and rolling around with other people.”

Ben frowned. “That is not sex.”

“I don’t care. I don’t like the idea of Naomi seeing you naked.”

Ben said nothing.

I gasped, and socked him as hard as I could on the chest. “You didn’t!”

“I have to take a shower sometime, Francesca. I try to do it when she’s not around, but there are times when it is inevitable.”

I seethed for a few minutes, and desperately tried to remember a curse I had learned when I was fourteen. When my mother found out that I was trying to practice what she called harmful magic, she grounded me for three straight months. “There will come a day, Ben, when I am going to settle things with Naomi.”

To my surprise, he grinned. “I look forward to seeing that.”

Don’t be so happy—I have a few things to settle with you, too. “Can you at least try to limit the nudity in quantity and time? Maybe just take off your shirt and hope no one notices your pants?”

“Yes,” he said gravely. I thought I heard David snort, but when I looked, his expression was blank.

“Condition two: no touching or kissing Naomi.”

“Francesca,” Ben said on another sigh.

“I don’t want you kissing her,” I said, realizing full well I sounded like a petulant child.

“She will be suspicious if I distance myself from her in that manner. I don’t enjoy it, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said.

I ground off a layer or two of enamel. “Fine. You can kiss her. But I get to kiss other men. In fact, I think I’ll start with David.”

David’s eyes widened as I leaned toward him, reaching for his shoulders. Before my mouth was even close to his, I was yanked backward, onto my feet, and spun around to face a Ben whose dark oak eyes fairly spat flames. “You will not kiss other men!”

I raised my eyebrows and tapped my fingers on his chest.

His jaw tightened as David laughed.

“Fine,” Ben snarled, letting go of my arms. “I won’t kiss Naomi. But I can’t stop her from kissing me.”

I thought about that for a minute. “Fair enough.”

Once again, he looked surprised at my acquiescence. I made sure I kept hidden the thought that I’d just see to it that Naomi didn’t have the chance to try any moves on him.

“Are those your only conditions?” he asked.

“For now,” I said. “I reserve the right to include others at a later date.”

“And I reserve the right to qualify any subsequent terms,” he added.

I made a face, but stopped when David took my hand and shook it vigorously. “Thank you, Fran. I know that you must be anxious to Join with Benedikt, and I appreciate you putting it off on my behalf.”

I glanced at Ben. You’re going to hell for all those lies you told him.

I haven’t lied. The Joining has been delayed until such time as you feel comfortable with it. His mind felt shuttered, as if he was trying to keep something from me.

And if that is never?

Then it will still be postponed.

This is because of Naomi, isn’t it? I asked, trying to see what it was he wanted to keep hidden.

He didn’t answer. The patented Ben silence . . . but I was no longer a teenager intimidated by that sort of tactic.

Let’s say I was ready to Join with you right now. Why couldn’t you use that as your excuse for not wanting to indulge in the orgy at the sex party?

Unfortunately, Naomi knows enough about Dark Ones to realize the difference between a Beloved who is not yet Joined and one who is. If we Joined, she would know that you would take precedence in my thoughts, and that she could never hold sway over me. That isn’t the case now.

I didn’t know what hurt worse: the thought that Ben was willing to continue with the farce, or that I didn’t matter as much to him as David.

Francesca—

No, don’t say it. I am ashamed of myself for even thinking that. I gave him a chagrined smile. I’m going to have to get used to you seeing the real me, warty thoughts and all.

There’s nothing about your thoughts that are warty. I just wish—

I know, I interrupted. I’m being selfish and self-centered, and you’re only trying to help your friend. All right, we’ll help him.

David had been thanking me during that entire exchange, finally finishing with, “I can’t tell you how much this means to my pride and me.”

I was even more ashamed that I had put my own feelings so far ahead of his concern for his family. “There’s no need to thank me. Is there anything I can do to help you?” I glanced at Ben. “I assume Ben told you about my abilities?”

David looked down at my black-laced hands. “Yes, he did. I don’t know how psychometry can help us now, but I appreciate you offering your assistance, and I’m just desperate enough that I will ask for help should you be able to give it. I just hope you forgive me for . . . er . . . bringing you here as I did. Benedikt told me to bring you without causing you any distress, and it seemed easiest to simply drug you.”

“I won’t say I enjoyed it, but there’s no harm done.” I looked around us, trying to figure out just where we were. We seemed to be in some sort of thickly wooded area. A faint thrum of noise sounded in the distance. “Are we near the Faire?”

“About seven miles,” Ben said. “This is a small wild-life preserve that David uses when he’s in the area. No one ever comes out—”

He stopped speaking when three people, two men each wearing half a horse costume, and a woman clad in a nude-colored body stocking and knee-length blond wig, strolled past with polite greetings.

“—here,” Ben finished, looking after the threesome.

“This is the weirdest town I’ve ever been in,” I commented.

“I’ll take you back to the Faire,” Ben said, holding out his hand for me. I took it, smiling to myself when he peeled off both sets of gloves, handing them back to me before taking my hand again.

“Will David be all right out there by himself? Well, by himself and with whatever oddballs are walking through the woods in the middle of the night in stage costumes?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder to see David waving at us before disappearing into the shadows.

“Yes. His kind prefers solitude to intense contact with mortals. Would you have really kissed him?”

My secret smile grew a lot bigger. “What do you think?”

He helped me down a gravelly incline, holding back the branches of a scraggly fir tree. “I think you were deliberately trying to bait me.”

“Then that must be the answer,” I said complacently, greatly enjoying the irritated look he shot me as he lifted me over a fallen tree. I debated pointing out that I was perfectly able to clamber over obstacles on my own, but decided to enjoy his show of masculinity.

Ten minutes later we reached a narrow dirt track. Ben’s lantern didn’t cast much light, but there was enough for me to see no bulky shape of a car. “We’re walking to the Faire?”

“No.” He tugged me after him. A few hundred yards down the track, it curved. As we rounded it, a black shadow loomed up against the darker trees. I stopped, a strange joy filling me. “Your bike! You still have it?”

“Of course. It’s a classic.” His lips quirked for a moment. “No helmets, though. Do you think your mother will be angry?”