It was dawning on him. “Because she sees no difference. She doesn’t have to accept, because she doesn’t even begin to judge.”

Avery nodded again. “She takes everyone just as they are. Even under frightening circumstances and even more frightening explanations, she took Abel’s side almost immediately. The power of that, Lucien, coupled with her capacity for love, loyalty, hope…There is nothing more powerful than that on the planet. Delilah is not all that we are. Delilah represents all that we can be.”

Lucien knew down to his bones that Avery was right.

There was no more to be said.

Therefore, he rose from his seat, murmuring, “I wish to get back to my bride.”

“Give her my love.”

Standing, looking down at Avery sitting in Gregor’s chair at Gregor’s desk, he felt his throat constrict.

He liked Avery. Respected him. As angry as he was, that would never change how he felt about him.

But he detested seeing him in Gregor’s chair.

“We often do not know what we have until it’s lost,” Avery said gently. “You’ve been on this earth a long time, but that’s a lesson we all seem consistently to forget.” Avery regarded him warmly. “I hope that this time, you won’t forget, Lucien.”

Lucien lifted his chin.

He wouldn’t forget.

None of them would.

Then he walked out of the room to find his bride.

* * * * *

Yuri

“Douse,” Yuri called.

When he did, the witches lounging on blankets and in lawn chairs on the grass around him, sipping wine, popping cashews or grapes or crackers slathered with brie in their mouths, lifted lazy hands and the fire consuming the vampire chained to the stake went out.

It was the vampire who’d killed his father.

His screams of agony faded to whimpers.

Yuri, with his back against a tree, legs out in front of him, laptop on his thighs, continued to catch up on email.

It had taken some time, but when he hit send, he saw he was finally done.

“Fire,” he said, and Barb, Ruby, Jezza, and Flo lifted their hands again.

The fire blazed and the screams returned.

Yuri snapped his laptop shut and rolled to his feet.

“You know,” Ruby stated casually over the shrieks, staring at the roaring fire like it was a campfire and not a vampire burning at the stake, “this is doing wonders helping me work out my feelings for vampires.”

Yuri felt one side of his lips hitch up.

“He’s at your mercy,” he announced, and the witches looked to him. “However, when you’re finished, so is he.”

Barb nodded.

“I go to Aurora,” he said to Barb. “We’re dining at a seafood restaurant in town tonight. You’ll join us for dinner?”

“Of course,” she replied.

“Be there with bells on,” Ruby called, shoving another cheese-smeared cracker in her mouth.

She wasn’t exactly invited.