He was back to staring at the floor. I couldn't stand it. I had to prompt him, but I tried to prompt him more kindly than before. I tried to think of him as my friend and not as the ex who always seemed to rain all over my parade.

"What do you want to tell me about the fight with Clair?" I even managed to keep my voice neutral. Points for me.

He took in a lot of air and let it out, then raised a pair of sad brown eyes to me. "Maybe that's not where to start."

"Okay," I said, voice careful, "start somewhere else then."

He shook his head. "I don't know how to do this."

I wanted to yell, "do what?" but I resisted. But my patience had never been limitless, and I knew that if he continued to be obtuse, I'd blow it. Or my temper would. That gave me an idea: Maybe if I started talking, he'd just jump in.

"It's been a while since I felt your rage," I said.

"I'm sorry about that. I lost control, I don't..."

"It's not a complaint, Richard. What I meant to say was that it felt different than the first time I touched it."

He looked at me. "What do you mean?"

"It felt, no, it tasted like my anger, like me, almost more than you."

I had his attention now. "I don't understand."

"I'm not sure I do either, but follow my thought. Asher once told me that Jean-Claude had become more ruthless because I was his human servant. But with Damian being my vampire servant, I gained some of his emotional control. You can only gain what your partner has to share."

He was looking at me, and the sadness was fading under him thinking. There was a good mind in there somewhere, he just didn't always seem to use it. "Alright, I understand that."

"If Jean-Claude gained some of my practicality, making him more ruthless, then what did you gain? I mean I got some of your beast and your hunger for flesh. I got Jean-Claude's blood lust and the ar deur. What did you gain from us?"

He seemed to think about that. "I gained some of Jean-Claude's blood lust. Blood is as attractive as flesh to me, almost. It wasn't before." He moved so he was sitting Indian fashion on the floor. "It's easier to talk mind-to-mind with you lately, and last night, I interfered with you controlling that zombie." He shivered just a little, like something about that scared him. Guess I couldn't blame him.

"But the mind-to-mind thing being this easy and the zombie stuff is recent, Richard. What did you gain the first time?"

He frowned at the floor. "I don't see..."

"What if you gained some of my anger?"

He looked up then. "Your anger can't be worse than the rage of the beast."

I laughed, and it was closer to humor than his earlier laugh had been, but not by much. "Oh, Richard, you haven't spent enough time in my head if you believe that."

He shook his head, stubbornly. "A human isn't capable of the kind of mindless rage that the beast is."

"You haven't researched many human serial killers, have you?"

"You know I haven't," he said, and he sounded grumpy.

"Don't go all grumpy on me, Richard, I'm trying to make a point here."

"Then make it," he said.

"See, that's exactly what I'm talking about. That sounds more like me, than you. You've been quicker to anger for the last bit, and I've been less quick to anger, why? What if you got some of my anger, and I got some of your calmness?"

He shook his head again. "You're saying that your human anger is worse than my beast's rage. That's not possible."

It was my turn to shake my head. "Richard, you seem to think that human is better than lycanthrope. I don't know where you get that idea."

"Humans don't eat each other."

"Shit, Richard, yes, they do."

"I don't mean cultures that have ritual cannibalism."

"Neither do I."

"Comparing lycanthropes to serial killers isn't going to make me feel better about being a lycanthrope."

"My point is that humans can be just as rage filled, just as destructive. The difference is that a werewolf is better equipped for mayhem than a mere human. If human beings had the fangs and the claws that you guys do, then we'd, they'd, be just as destructive. It isn't lack of wanting to do it, it's lack of the right tools that make humans less scary."

"If this is your rage, Anita, it's awful. It's worse than almost anything I've ever felt. It's like being crazy. So angry, almost all the time. I can't believe it's something that was in you."

"Not past tense, Richard, trust me. I had to embrace what I operate on a long time ago."

"What you operate on, what does that mean?"

"It means that at the heart of me, is this deep, seething, bottomless, pit of pure rage. Maybe I came with it. I know my mother's death helped fill it up. But as far back as I can remember, it's been there."

He shook his head. "You're just saying this to make me feel better."

"Why would I say something that wasn't true just to make you feel better?"

Anger filled his eyes, like magic. One moment trustworthy brown, the next moment serial killer dark. "Thank you, thank you very much, for reminding me that I don't mean shit to you anymore."

I shook my head, and let my hands fall into my lap. "If you meant nothing to me, Richard, nothing at all, we wouldn't be in this room alone."

"You're right, you're right. I'm sorry. I just get so angry, so angry." He tried to rub his arms, but the bloody scrapes hurt.

"You said you wanted to lick the wounds, go ahead. It won't bother me."

"It will bother me," he said.

"No, Richard, licking your wounds would make you feel better. You'd enjoy it, and that's what bothers you. Not the wanting to do it, but how good it feels when you give in to it."

He nodded, staring at his hands. "I tried to embrace my beast, Anita. I really tried."

"I felt you feeding on a deer. I felt how happy you were in wolf form. It felt like you had embraced it."

"When I'm in animal form, yes. But it's being human on the outside, and not human on the inside that gets me confused."

"Does it get you confused, or Clair?"

He gave me a look that wasn't exactly angry. "I thought you didn't hear the fight."

"I got one word when she was screaming at you— animal. Am I wrong? Was she complaining about herself and her beast?"

"No, you got it exactly right." He laid his hands in his own lap, and his eyes were back to being sad, like someone had hit a switch. Angry, sad, angry, sad. It was like some sort of demonic baby hormones. "She accused me of raping her." His voice was soft when he said it.

I gave him very wide eyes and let just how impossible I thought the idea was to show in my face.

He gave a very small smile. "Just the look on your face now is worth something. You don't believe it, just like that, you don't believe I could do that to her."

"I don't believe you would do that to any woman, but that's beside the point."

"No," he said, and his voice sounded more relaxed than it had since he entered the room, "that's not beside the point, not for me. After what a bastard I've been to you, that you still believe in me, that means a lot."

I wasn't sure what to say to that. If I agreed that he'd been a bastard would that start a fight? If he thought I believed in him, was that going to give him the wrong idea? I mean, not believing that Richard would rape someone didn't mean that much to me. He was a decent person, that's all.

"I'm glad it makes you feel better, but remember, I saw the beginning of the lovemaking session. You can't rape the willing, Richard."

His eyes looked haunted, as if there was something I'd missed. "She said that I always make love like it's rape."