“What?”

“I have another surprise for you. To finish it, well, I might be required to touch you.”

Jae raises his eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”

“I have a suit for you. It’s almost finished, but I need you to try it on so I can make sure the fit is perfect. I estimated your height, but it seems I was an inch off.”

He sits back slightly, laughing. “You’re telling me that you’ve tailored an entire suit for me without my physically being present for measurements? How is that possible?”

I shrug. “This is what I do, and I’ve been doing it for decades. Besides, I’m quite familiar with the intimacies and dimensions of your body, aren’t I?” I’m staring into his blue-rimmed hazelnut eyes, and in a pleasant turn, he doesn’t immediately look away from me. He matches my hooded gaze, but then smiles in a knowing way as he stands from the bed.

“Fair,” he says. “I need to respond to some emails for work, and I have meetings this evening. I’m trying to squeeze everything in before the flight tomorrow so I can be offline in Milan. I’ll try the suit on a little later today.”

“Sounds fine. I’ll make some coffee?”

“Cheers. If the weather stays clear, let’s walk out to the lake for lunch.”

“I would love that.”

He smiles as he walks past me, heading toward the door. Lulú, who has been curled up in the center of the bed this entire time, suddenly pops up, hops off the bed and pads through the door behind him. I shake my head. Traitor.

Milan

Forty-Six

Jae

“You can let Lulú out into the garden if she wants to go, Audrey. She’s… quite intelligent, and Jun is assuring me that she won’t get lost.”

Glancing out of the car window, Lake Como is a sparkling expanse of turquoise as we zip past. Across the water, the mountains are green and high, chock full of trees in multiple shades and set against a pristine blue sky.

It’s unbelievable that I’m in Italy, riding in the back of this luxurious town car in a custom-made suit and driving toward a place called Villa del Balbianello. I did an Internet search of the property, and it looks like something out of a multi-million-dollar romance movie that is a hit with audiences everywhere. The house we’re staying at (someone Giovanni knows) is also ridiculous. Correction, not a house. It’s a medieval castle. Our bathroom is like if you dropped a large freestanding bathtub into the middle of a stylish greenhouse.

“Yes, all that is fine. Thank you for checking on her,” I say into the phone. “Don’t hesitate to call if you need something… Yes, we’ll be back on Saturday… Okay, thanks, Audrey.”

“Is everything alright?” Junichi asks. He’s sitting beside me in the back seat. His suit jacket is a deep tan color, but his trousers and vest are black over a starched white shirt. The lapels have a black paisley design. As expected, it’s all fashionable as hell, but subtle. The suit he’s made for me is classic black, the only deviation being my tie and pocket square, which are the same rich tan color as Junichi’s jacket. I laughed when I saw him, but honestly… it’s nice, isn’t it? Plus, if I get lost, it’s a little bit like “please return to chaperone with matching jacket.”

“Yes,” I say. “Audrey is just nervous about the cat getting lost or attacked by wildlife.”

Junichi sits back, adjusting his long legs, and I glance down at his beautiful, shiny black Oxfords. “Lulú might outlive all of us, and she can defend herself. Audrey has nothing to worry about.”

“I suppose so, considering even your average cat has nine lives. How many more for a vampire cat?”

Junichi grins, nodding, then looks over and meets my eyes. “Are you nervous?”

“Yes. All of this is very surreal.”

“How so?”

“I feel out of place. But… I don’t know. I always have. Never quite fitting in anywhere. And now I’m here. It’s preposterous.”

“Well,” Jun says, clasping his hands in the gap of his legs. “You’ve always had dormant purebred energy inside you. You were trying to live your life as a human, but that wasn’t exclusively what you were.”

“Maybe. But there are other layers, too. Like, when I was a kid in London and going to school, I couldn’t ever find my footing. I was a bit too swirly for the white kids but not quite Asian enough for the others. When we moved to Bristol and I met Cy, I felt a little more settled, but then Cy and I have our own host of issues, don’t we?”

Junichi breathes in a laugh. “You have an interesting friendship, without question.”

Glancing out of the window again, we’re driving down a narrow road hooded with cypress and pine trees. The villa stands before us, large and square like a stucco palace. There’s a long line of cars toward the front, and I can see fancifully dressed vampires stepping out of their vehicles and heading inside. The hum of all their energies radiates against my skin. If I focus, I can pinpoint my senses on any particular one. If I don’t, all I sense and smell is Junichi. It’s like always being covered by a soft, lavender-scented blanket, but if I want, I can lift up the edge and peek outside.

“I’ve had so much time to think,” I go on. “About my life and what I’ve been doing. How much of it has been genuinely me, or my nature secretly driving me? Why things were a particular way. I realize… I only got into a groove when I went to Japan. I felt really good there—like I understood myself and the work I was doing. I was alone, but things finally made sense to me and I felt confident.”

“You weren’t alone, Jae. It’s the opposite. You were finally interacting with and part of a large, thriving vampiric community, and though you didn’t know it on the surface, your inner nature responded to that. It’s what you needed all along.”

Reaching up, I scratch the back of my hair. “I don’t know.” That sounds logical—and I know I’ve even told my patients to join local groups tailored to their specific circumstances. But why do I feel like a fish out of water? Like an imposter. Any minute now, this “purebred” skin will peel away, and surprise, I’m actually a lizard.

There’s a buzzing sound, and Junichi pulls his phone from inside his jacket pocket. He reads the screen, types something out, then leans forward to address the driver. “If you pull past this line, there’s a second road on the right that we need to take. The guard at the gate there will wave you through.”

“Yes, sir!”

The driver does as instructed, smoothly moving past the line of cars, turning and pulling up to a large, rather intimidating but ornately designed iron gate.

I’m staring out of the window like this is my first car ride ever, but a question pops into my head. I turn to Jun. “Do you know Cellina and Giovanni very well?”

Junichi is still texting on his phone. “Giovanni not very, but Cellina a little more. I was her escort to a few society events when she was stepping in for Haruka last year while Nino was recovering. She’s a lovely creature.”

“I’ve met her once before at the hospital, but not Giovanni… Were you seeing her?”

He flicks his eyes up at me before looking back down at his phone. “No. I couldn’t be bothered with ranked vampires, remember?”

I chuckle. “Ah. Right.”

“Even though that was before they’d bonded, I’d seen the way Giovanni watched her whenever they were in a room together. I don’t typically play by the rules, but there are some purebreds you just don’t fuck with.”

“Noted…”

Eventually, we’re on the opposite side of the villa. There’s a huge garden with all manner of flowers and rose bushes in every color, and I can see the greenish-blue glitter of the lake again if I peek through the trees.

When we step out of the car, the weather is perfect and there’s a slight, cool breeze. A row of stone steps ascends before us, and at the top, thick pillars grace either side of an intricately carved wooden door. When I peek from underneath the metaphorical blanket of Junichi’s essence, I know that Haruka, Nino, Cellina, Giovanni and even Asao and Sydney are somewhere up there, likely waiting for us.

“May I have your hand?”

Junichi is asking me and waiting, but his hands are in his trouser pockets as he stands there looking absolutely fucking delicious in his suit. He’s clean-shaven, which doesn’t really matter because I like him both ways. His curls are cut low against his head. I miss running my fingers into his hair.

My nature hasn’t gone berserk since that first time in my bedroom on Sunday morning. He hasn’t touched me since then, but… I want to try. I said I would. I reach out and he meets me, slowly clasping our hands.

“Is this okay?” he asks.

The warm tingles are there, shooting up my arm and reverberating in my chest and stomach, but I’m alright. “Yes.” I nod. He adjusts and entwines our fingers, then pulls me toward the steps.