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of reforming me.”
    Vampires didn’t often discuss their own histories; everything was supposed to be a big mystery. Everything. Much worse than any Cosa Nostra code of silence bullshit. With the mob it was always really about money; with vampires it was always really about perceptions of power. He didn’t think it was about real power but personal power, which was stupid, but fine with him. And he thought that much of the secret nature of the society came down to many vampires not wanting to remember being forced to crave the rapes, beatings, and humiliations they’d endured as companions. Alice had tamed him, but she’d given him respect.
    Clare drew his attention back to the present. “You going to make a project out of reforming Morgan Reese?”
    He shrugged. “Maybe. Probably. What do you think?”
    She bit her bottom lip for a moment, then said, picking up on his thoughts, “I think that people’s real natures don’t change, whether they’re mortal or immortal. Who their master is and how they’re treated as a companion influences the type of vampire they become—but pretty is as pretty does, as I’m told my great-grandmother always used to say. Reese ain’t pretty. But he’s hot,” she added with a grin. “Sizzles with power. I understand your wanting to drink that.”
    Power he didn’t know he had, Ben thought. “The stage magician doesn’t know he’s a real magician, does he?”
    Clare shook her head. “I don’t think he has a clue that the real stuff exists.”
    Yet Reese had been drawn to perform at the Silk Road, a place run by people made immortal by the use of ritual magic. Not only were the real magicians in charge, the vampire who owned the place collected magical artifacts and spell books and put some of the stuff on display as part of the hotel’s décor. Reese was surrounded by magic, and it was only a matter of time before he was drawn into the real magical world. Ben intended to be the one who introduced Morgan Reese to the underneath world, but in a way that would make Reese want to be a part of it.
    Ben stroked his chin as he watched the stage magician take a bow. Applause swelled, drowning out Ben’s words as he said, “Maybe old Ibis’s books and junk’ll come in handy.” He chuckled. “It’ll be like inviting Reese up to see my etchings.”
    “What?” Clare asked. “I didn’t hear you.”
    “Old joke,” Ben answered, brushing her curiosity aside. “You don’t need to understand.”
     
The stripper’s breasts looked hard as rocks; great mounds of flesh-covered silicon that stayed firmly in place no matter how much she gyrated and jiggled and whirled around the pole in the center of the little stage.
    Haven didn’t care that the boobs weren’t exactly realistic. They were boobs, and he had trouble taking his eyes off them. Char had nice boobs. Not very big, but nice. He loved Char’s boobs, but Char wasn’t there, and her breasts would have been modestly covered if she was. And she would have been asleep, as it was eleven in the morning and vampires were not day people. So Jebel Haven sipped his second beer of the day and took uncomplicated enjoyment in the sight of a naked female as part of the bachelor party entertainment.
    There was a conversation going on between the two other men at the table in the small strip club. Haven was aware of the sometimes tense, sometimes excited tone of his friends’ voices, but he didn’t give any of his attention to what they were saying. It became apparent that Baker and Santini wanted him on it when Baker waved a huge hand in front of Haven’s face to get his attention.
    Haven sighed, and peeled his gaze away from the woman on the stage.
    Santini grinned at Haven, his bearded face as maniacal as ever. Maybe more. Della was no saint, even if she did run a homeless shelter. Marriage wasn’t going to change the crazy biker. He raised his beer to his lips, drained it, then asked, “You wanna?”
    Haven knew exactly what