I took my hand back and Richard let me. I settled back on my side of Asher. The vampire continued to hold my hand while we watched Richard.

“I hadn’t understood how much the rage kept me from forgiving anyone, or working my issues, until Anita fed off it and took it back. The anger was almost like another beast inside me, but full moon didn’t bring any relief. It’s a horrible way to live, Anita.”

I shrugged. “You get used to it.”

He shook his head, sending his hair sliding across his shoulders. “I didn’t. It was killing me. I had my own problems with self-loathing, but the anger made it all worse.”

“I’m sorry about that,” I said. I almost didn’t want to say anything else, but I knew now that every time we left things unsaid between us, it came back and bit us down the road. “The anger is gone, Richard, I get that,” I said, “but the self-loathing was all you. You hated being a werewolf. You broke up with me because I was more at home with the monsters than you were.”

“My turn to apologize again,” Richard said. His arms loosened and he sat back against the pillows. “I can’t stop being a werewolf. It’s like trying to stop being human. It is what I am. I could give up being Ulfric, but I’d still have to belong to the pack, and being king is better than being a follower. I learned that the hard way. I am Jean-Claude’s animal to call, and the third leg of the triumvirate of power that allows him to run the city and have enough power to keep everyone safe.” He looked at Jean-Claude now. “You are a good Master of the City, Jean-Claude. I didn’t realize that the Master of the City is like the boss of a business. If the boss is a crazy bitch, then she hires more crazy people, and she keeps everybody else crazy. Nikolaos was that kind of Master of the City. Anita killed her to save all of us, but it was you that took control of the city and made everything work better than it had ever worked. You had managed all the vampire businesses in town for years. You’d been the financial leader all along.”

“Thank you, mon ami.”

“No, all of the wereanimal leaders think things are a thousand times better with you in charge.”

Jean-Claude bowed just from the neck. “I have done my best.”

“You have, you really have, and so has Anita. The only one that hasn’t helped secure our base of power is me. I’ve spent the last few years alternating tightening my grip on the wolves like a tyrant, and letting go of so much control I was practically forcing some of my dominant wolves to challenge me for leadership. I’ve apologized to Sylvie for that. She’s my second-in-command, and she’s earned it putting up with me.”

I hadn’t seen him in nearly four months, and now he was sitting there saying things I’d given up on hearing. It was all too good to be true. I must have tensed, because Asher began to stroke the back of my hand with his other hand as he held me.

“I have longed for you to understand some of this, Richard,” Jean-Claude said, “but I admit I had given up.”

“Some of the other wereanimal leaders had an intervention, I guess you could call it. They told me that I was endangering them all. That by crippling the best Master of the City they’d ever had, I was hurting everyone. I reminded Rafael that his biggest taboo for all his wererats had been that they didn’t feed Nikolaos, so how could he let his rats be food for you.”

Richard looked down, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “Rafael said, ‘Nikolaos demanded I give her my people. Jean-Claude never asked, I offered, because every animal group that gets close to Jean-Claude and Anita gains in power. They do not steal power away; they help everyone grow more powerful.’ I thought about what he said, and it was true. You both help everyone around you be better. I tried to think if I’d helped anyone be better, or stronger, in the last few years, and you know what?”

He hesitated, so I said, “What?”

He gave me a quick smile. “I helped the kids I taught, but other than my job I hadn’t helped anyone, not even me.”

“This is wonderful, mon ami,” Jean-Claude said, “but I have to ask. Why are you here tonight? Why have you come?”

“Rafael told me he’d offer up his own body and blood in my place if he could help make St. Louis a safer place for his people. I know that the swan king, Donovan Reece, is already feeding Anita on a regular basis, and his swans are now doing blood donations to the vampires. Micah and his leopards are with Anita, and through her, with you. Everyone is trying to build us into a unit with you as its head, except me.”

“Grand talk, Ulfric,” Asher said, “but talk is very cheap, so I’ve found.”

Richard looked at the vampire. “I’m working my issues, Asher; you need to do the same.”

“What does that mean?” he asked.

“It means you’re pissed. You want Jean-Claude to love only you, and he doesn’t. I wanted Anita to love only me and for us both to stop being part of the monsters. Neither of us is getting what we wanted. We need to make the best of what we have.”

“Mon Dieu, you sound too good to be true, Ulfric, and too boring.”

I drew my hand out of Asher’s. He looked at me then. “You wanted Richard for you to touch, but it’s like you’re angry that you can’t be here alone with Jean-Claude, or Jean-Claude and me. You’re so angry and so conflicted that you’re going to pick at us all until something breaks. You do that when you’re angry; you always did.”

He sat up. “So, because I have not spent the last four months in therapy I am to be cast out of the bed. Well, while you were doing therapy I was here doing my part as his témoin, his second-in-command.”

“I know that, Asher, and I’m sorry that I wasn’t here to help,” Richard said.

Asher started to push himself out from between us and move for the side of the bed. Richard grabbed his arm. “Let go of me, wolf,” Asher hissed.

“I thought you wanted me to touch you.”

That stopped the vampire and made him turn to look at the other man. He made sure his hair hid the one side of his face as they looked at each other. “I do.”

“Then where are you going?”

Asher looked at Richard’s hand where it still held his arm. He relaxed slightly, but said, “Did your therapist put you on drugs? Is that why this new calm?”

Richard smiled. “No, nothing much works for werewolves. Our body processes them too fast.”

“Then you cannot mean this, and if you run away from Anita, who you love, and Jean-Claude, who you feel truly drawn to, you will not be able to tolerate my touch.”

“There are limits to what you can do to me, and with me, that’s true, but I share some of Jean-Claude’s emotions and memories. I remember loving you, Asher, and I still have a body that could do it.”

I stared at Richard, and then at the look on Asher’s face. I’d never seen the vampire so surprised. He laughed, a wild, abrupt sound. “Are you offering what Jean-Claude has denied me?”

Richard smiled. “I think that would be pushing my newfound resolutions, but I am offering to try. You are powerful enough to have your own territory now with Narcissus; by staying here you make Jean-Claude stronger, which makes us all safer.”

“And what are you willing to do to make me stay, Richard?” There was derision in his voice again.

Richard pulled him backward with that one hand on his arm. Asher let himself be pulled. Richard settled back against the pillows and drew the other man’s back in against his chest. He had his legs to one side so Asher was against only his chest, but it was more touch than I’d ever seen him do with any other man but Jean-Claude. Richard wrapped those strong arms around the vampire and held him. “I’m a shapeshifter; we like to sleep in big puppy piles.”

Asher stroked his fingers down Richard’s bare arms. Richard settled back deeper against the pillows, cuddling the other man closer to him. Asher bent his head and laid a kiss against that tanned, muscular arm.