“Guys, this is all crap. You haven’t seen each other in two hundred years. Hug each other. Punch each other. Talk to each other.” Cinn threw up her hands. “I’ll wait outside. And no, I won’t need a guard because there’re plenty of people in the kitchen at this time of night. Oh, a warning: Wreck my greenhouse and you pay in blood.” She slammed the door leading to the kitchen as she left.

Dacian sensed fear beneath Cinn’s frustration with them. Fear they’d fight? He didn’t think so. She probably shared his fear that they’d turn and walk away from each other.

Well, he wouldn’t be the one walking. “Heard you got married.”

Taurin nodded, but his mask didn’t slip. “She’ll give me hell for slipping away from her like this to meet you. She’s afraid I’ll try to kill you. The thought has merit.”

Why did you do it? Why did you let me think you were dead for two hundred years? Taurin’s unspoken accusation hung between them, poisoning the air and the closeness they’d once shared. Was forgiveness possible?

“Do you want to hear the story?” Dacian was losing his vampire cool. He clenched his hands into fists.

“Tell it.” Taurin’s voice gave nothing away.

Dacian kept it short. In clipped sentences he described what happened each time he turned Stephan down. He didn’t spare himself as he described the slaughters for which he was responsible.

“And you didn’t think I’d want to know about this? Didn’t think I might be able to help you? Didn’t trust me enough to share what you planned?” Taurin’s smooth mask was slipping also. Anger, hurt, and a long sorrow shone in his eyes.

Even though Taurin didn’t emphasize any of his words, Dacian knew which one his brother wanted to shout. Trust. He’d hurt Taurin, and knowing that tore at him.

“If I’d told you everything, would you have let me disappear for two hundred years without contacting me?”

For the first time, Taurin broke eye contact. “No.”

Dacian remained silent. He’d made his point. It was Taurin’s turn.

Dacian’s brother met his gaze again. Anger had pushed the other emotions into the background. “Did you know I spent two hundred years trying to kill Eric Mackenzie because I blamed him and the other Mackenzies for your death?”

Dacian winced.

“Yeah, and he almost killed me right back. I’d be dead if it weren’t for his wife, Donna. She saved me after Eric left me in a field to meet the sun.”