He nuzzled my neck as though seeking comfort, and I couldn’t deny him. I stroked his hair and tried to quiet my pounding heart. The contact was more emotionally intimate than any of the times he’d touched me before. I suddenly couldn’t remember why I’d been angry with him.

It felt right, holding him like this. As if someone finally needed me. Not because I was going to save their life. Not because I was going to fulfill some long-held parental expectation. Cyrus needed me because I was me.

“You wanted to ask me something?” His words were heavy with sleep.

Did I? The question drifted lazily to the surface of my consciousness. “Right. What’s up with Vampire New Year?”

He let out a low rumble of laughter. “Where did you hear about that?”

“Around.”

To my relief, he didn’t question further. “Vampire New Year is a tradition created by my father. You’ll enjoy it, if you let yourself.”

Cyrus gently moved me from his lap and stood, then walked to an intercom box beside the door. “Send for Clarence. Tell him I’ve changed my mind about breakfast.”

Static crackled, followed by a “Yes, sir.”

Cyrus smiled at me, but it was clear he’d wasted much of his energy getting to the door. I made a move to help him, but he refused me. “So you want to know about the New Year?”

I did, but his weakened state worried me. “You fed from Ziggy. Why are you having such a hard time?”

“I didn’t feed enough. I didn’t want to anger you,” he said, supporting himself on the heavy wooden arm of the sofa. “As you get older, you’ll find you need more blood to function. It makes life rather difficult if you have to go a day or two without feeding.”

I shifted into doctor mode. “If you don’t feed, will you die?”

“Not right away.” He eased onto the couch and patted the seat beside him. “But it’s very uncomfortable after a while.”

I joined him, fitting familiarly to his side. “How many days has it been for you?”

“The last time I drank my fill was the night we first met.” He kissed my forehead. “I’ve been a bit distracted since.”

And he hadn’t fed tonight because of what I’d uncovered as I’d snooped through his brain. To assuage my guilt, I changed the topic. “You were going to tell me about the NewYear.”

“Oh, yes. A fitting topic, actually. You remember what I told you about my father?”

I nodded. How could I have forgotten?

Cyrus seemed to draw strength from talking about his father. “Though he hasn’t been a vampire much longer than I have, the blood of the elders he drained seems to have sped up his—blast, what’s the word for it?”

“Metabolism?” I supplied.

“Yes, exactly. Within fifty years of turning, he needed to feed from two, sometimes three bodies a night. It was too hard to keep his identity concealed for long. We moved from village to village, but suspicion followed us everywhere. Father discovered that if he ingested vampire blood, his hunger was sated longer.