He's fed a lot of vampires since Gabriel had made him. It was always something to enhance a scene, a moment of sexual pleasure, nothing more. When Anita came along, he stopped that, feeding the vampires on in their small circle when they had need, taking little but the pleasure of the rolling in exchange.

But watching Asher, that connection of mouth to thigh -- of where he laces their hands together now -- Nathaniel feels far more. It was intimacy Asher offers him, and he smiles, moaning softly, allowing his own eyes to close as bleed flows from him to Asher. He concentrates on that, on their hands, on how wonderful it feels to be wanted beyond this.