“So, where do te want me to start from?”

“The beginning would be good.”

Lestat smirked. “The whole sordid bit?” He sat down on the sofa and leaned back, looking up at her. “Where a young man, barely an adult, was abducted and turned into a vampire da another who then left him to fend for himself for years; who abandoned him to learn the rules of vampirism alone?”

Tiana sank down onto the table, facing him. “How old were you?”

“ I was almost thirty.” He shrugged at her. “I can still remember, even now, how scared I was; what it felt like when my cuore was racing in fear.”

“Does it hurt? Dying, I mean?” Even as she detto it, Tiana blushed with embarrassment at asking so personal a domanda of him.

“It’s...” Lestat thought for a moment before answering. “It’s uncomfortable. There’s a moment where te feel you’re going to asphyxiate, when your cuore begins to stop. And then it just stops and everything’s different. Your senses pick up things they never noticed existed before. I remember the secondo I’d been reborn I was hungry for more; story of my life.”

“M-more?”

“Blood.”

He detto it so casually that Tiana wondered for a moment whether she oughtn’t to be afraid of him. Automatically her hand went to her throat.

“Relax,” Lestat said, calmly watching her. “You’d have noticed if I’d fed on you, even if I’d hypnotised you. Trust me.”

Tiana grimaced. “Do te want to feed on me?”

To her surprise, Lestat laughed. “You think I saved te from getting hurt da those brutes the other giorno just so that I could feed on you? Tiana,” he said, sobering up, “if I wanted to hurt you, I’d have done that a long time ago.”

Tiana felt bad for accusing him of such a thing. “I’m sorry,” she stammered, blushing deeply, “I just...assumed...”

“That all Vampiri#From Dracula to Buffy... and all creatures of the night in between. are ruthless killers?”

“No! I mean...I don’t...”

“It’s alright,” Lestat replied. “You’d be right. I used to be like that.”

Tiana smiled, thinking he was teasing her. “I don’t believe that for a minute.”

“No?” Lestat raised an eyebrow. “What if I told te that I once drank from two prostitutes and then killed them both without feeling any regret whatsoever?”

Tiana stared at him. “You...killed them?”

Lestat shrugged. “That was back when I’d forgotten what it was like to be human and have those sorts of emotions.”

Tiana felt a shiver run down her spine. “Were...were those the only two?”

“No,” he replied, still seeming unregretful, “there were plenty più after that.”

Tiana looked at the floor. She was unable to look him in the eye. Here he was, in her home, one secondo saying that he didn’t want to hurt her o put her in any danger, and the successivo he was admitting quite casually that he had killed people before. “Did te have to kill them?” she whispered.

“No. I didn’t “have” to. But I did.”

She didn’t look at him. Lestat leaned forwards and put his hand on her wrist, which was resting in her lap. Tiana looked slowly up at him. Of everything about her, Lestat liked her eyes the best; big, brown, deep and so alluring that they made him feel human for the first time in years. She blinked at him. Had he still had a beating cuore in his chest, it might have done a backflip at that point. “Tiana,” he said, softly, meeting her gaze. “I could have killed those men for trying to hurt you, but I didn’t. It would have been surprisingly easy, but I controlled myself.”

“Why?” Tiana asked, slowly. “You just told me you’d done it before. What changed?”

“I met you.” Almost hesitantly, Lestat leaned forwards and kissed her. His last baciare had been filled with a kind of hungry passion, but now it was so gentle, as if he were afraid of losing control and hurting her. Suddenly forgetting everything, Tiana flung her arms around his neck. “Tiana,” Lestat murmured, breaking the baciare as she caught her breath. “You make me want to be human again.”

Tiana blinked up at him. “Me? Why?”

“Because I’m attracted to you,” he replied, with a smile. “I don’t want to do anything to hurt you, although now te know about my past, te probably think badly of me as it is.”

Tiana wanted to, she really did, and yet, when she looked into his eyes, she didn’t see a bloodthirsty murderer there; just a vulnerable young vampire who had been hurt and who had hurt others simply to relieve the pain. How many times had she seen people vent their frustrations onto others in her line of work? How many times had she and Meg and Belle, after a stressful giorno at work, shouted at one another, and in Meg’s case, even thrown things? Alright, so Lestat’s actions were far più extreme, but somehow she just didn’t hate him for it. “No,” she whispered, finding her voice. “I don’t think badly of you, Lestat. I should, but I don’t.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because, if I wanted to, I could kill te right now. It would be deliciously easy.” Tiana shuddered. “I’m sorry,” he added, sensing her unease. “It’s the price that comes with being a vampire.”

She pushed all thoughts of killing to the back of her mind. “Tell me about being a vampire,” she persisted. “Do te have special powers o something? Can te read minds?”

He smiled. “I can.”

“So, what am I thinking right now?”

“About a book in your cucina called Mastering the Art of French Cooking.”

“Anything else? Can you...I don’t know, turn into a bat o whatever?”

Lestat laughed again. “Have te been Leggere Dracula?”

“My friend Belle lent it to me.”

“In the words of an old friend of mine, they’re just the vulgar fictions of a demented Irishman. I can’t turn into anything.”

“Ok, so, what, then? There’s got to be più to it than just mind Leggere and,” she swallowed, “blood-drinking.”

“Well,” Lestat replied, uncurling her arms from his neck, “we can sposta incredibly fast, which te probably noticed that night I saved you.”

“I did, but I thought I was imagining it.”

“We can walk up walls, and we can fly.”

“What’s that like?”

Without replying directly, Lestat got to his feet and held out his arms to her. “Come here.”

Bewildered, Tiana got to her feet and walked into his embrace. secondi later, she felt a strange rush, as though she were falling, but sideways, yet Lestat didn’t let go of her and she tightened her embrace as the cool wind whistled around her. She remembered feeling like this once before; when Lestat had danced with her. He had picked her up, she realised, lifted her off the ground for a second. And then her feet touched solid ground.

Lestat held onto her for a few più minutes, breathing in the scent of her hair. “You smell lovely, te know that?”

“Do I?”

“Mm. Like...strawberries.”

She relaxed. “That’ll be my shampoo,” she replied, pulling away from him. Then she gave a little gasp as she realised that they were standing on the roof of The Blue Moon. “Oh my God!”

Lestat smirked. “Now te know what it’s like to fly.”

Tiana leaned, precariously, over the edge of the building. They were at least thirty feet off the ground. The height made her feel giddy but Lestat grabbed hold of her and pulled her away from the edge. “Sorry. I guess I’m used to the vertigo, being a vampire and all.”

Tiana shook her head to shake away the giddiness. “No, it was amazing!”

Lestat smiled. “That’s one word for vampirism.”

Tiana looked up at him. “You don’t like it?”

“Would te enjoy living in eternity forever?” Lestat let go of her and sat down on the edge of the building. Sitting with his knees tucked up to his chin and his hands laced together, he looked più vulnerable than a schoolboy. “Being abandoned da everyone; even those te turn to yourself to keep te company? Spending più time alone than a hermit?” He sighed. “Tiana, being a vampire has its ups but it has its downs too.” He glanced at her. “You can spend the rest of your life with me, but I can’t spend the rest of mine with you.”

Tiana sank down beside him. “Lestat that’s...that’s...”

“The curse of being a vampire,” Lestat finished for her. “Yeah.”

They sat in silence for a few minuti and Tiana thought about their whole situation. Here she was; her parents were dead, one of her best Friends was getting married, the other was likely to get snapped up any time soon da some hunky guy, she was working in a job with an abusive boss and now she was in a sort-of relationship with a lonely vampire. “Lestat?”

“Mm?”

“Did te just say te could turn people into vampires?”

Lestat whipped around to face her. “I know what you’re thinking and the answer is no!”

“What?”

“I’m not turning te into a vampire.”

“But-!”

“Tiana, if I did that, I’d never forgive myself.”

“But you’ve turned people before!”

Lestat looked at her for a few minuti and then sighed. “But I never loved any of them before.”