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Grayson regarded him out of those luminous eyes. “You’re not all like Lawson.”

Ryder grimaced and was the first to look away. “No. I want to say no. But more are like him than--”

“Like you or Demos?” Grayson finished for him. He shook himself and took another sip. “Just because you’re strong enough to do a thing doesn’t mean you will. I can’t believe I’m saying that.”

Grayson was now looking down into his wine and glaring at it as if the wine had said something it shouldn’t.

“You don’t believe that? Because it sounds like you do,” Ryder suggested.

“I don’t. I… I do. I don’t know!” Grayson shook his head. “I didn’t grow up on the streets. I was… I don’t want to say normal because normal doesn’t really exist. But I had a good life. I was really safe until my powers kicked in. Though maybe that’s not really true. I don’t know.”

“It’s all right not to know. New information can change one’s mind.”

“That’s just it! I was trusting and wanted to believe in people for a long time. But most people cannot be trusted.” Grayson bared his teeth for a second. “Sam tried to help, but he was drunk most of the time and that made him as much a potential victim as I was.”

“But you had your powers,” Ryder pointed out softly.

He poured more wine in their glasses. Grayson took an angry swallow, but his expression relaxed for a moment as the wine did taste remarkably good.

“I did, but, in the beginning, I couldn’t control them.” Grayson’s hand fisted around the delicate glass balloon. But he relaxed his grip before the glass shattered. “Bad things happened because of it.”

“I can imagine.”

And Ryder could. A telekinetic push could send a human flying into a wall, break their back, shatter their skulls, end their lives. And if Grayson’s powers were like any of theirs, when he was angry or upset or afraid the stronger the powers were, but the less in control they were.

“I actually believe that.” Grayson let out a breath.

“When we’re in our animal form, the urge to hunt--to hurt--that’s always there as a Vampire is so much more. We become more basic in our needs and our control,” Ryder explained.

“Yeah?” Grayson studied his face.

“I’ve hurt people, too. People I didn’t intend to,” Ryder said.

And then he remembered why the tavern came into his head. The boy he’d taken into the alleyway. It had been a pathetic trap by the boy’s pimp. Get him alone with his trousers down, rob him, and likely beat him to death. But he hadn’t been their prey. They had been his.

Killing them had not been necessary. A wiser course would have been to knock their heads together and take the pimp’s coin. Tell the boy to run and never come back. But Ryder had been new and eager and angry. So he’d shifted.

And he’d attacked.

He barely remembered that other than the screams and the hot taste of blood on his tongue. He remembered it because that was the last time he’d lost control. But with Grayson, he felt that hot, eager desire of the Vampire within. Not to hurt. Not that. Not exactly. But he couldn’t explain it.

Why am I here? To keep Grayson safe or simply near me?

“Yeah, I did that and hurt others I did intend to. But then I had to be careful that people didn’t see what I’d really done or understand it really,” Grayson explained. “I just wanted them to be, not afraid of me, but wary. I wanted everyone to stay away.”

“If someone imaginative had discovered your gift they would have wanted to use it for their own ends,” Ryder said more to himself than Grayson.

“There were a few times when someone nearly did. That’s why I got out. There was no future on the streets. I had to claw my way out.” Grayson’s hand curled tightly around the glass again. “I thought that my life was okay. Better than before anyways. But…”

“But?”

Grayson was quiet for long moments. “I’m jealous of what you have.”

“What?”

“You can use your powers and people clap.” Grayson gave him a rather tremulous smile. “Lawson is a pig.” Ryder grimaced at that. “But Demos is pretty damn cool. And though I know you don’t like them yet, I think Caemorn and Balthazar and Seeyr and all of them are interesting. I can’t feel like a freak with you guys really. I mean I’m the most normal of all of you.”

Ryder laughed. “Point taken! Yes, you fit in here very well.”