FIFTY - ONE

As man caves went, V had always thought that the billiards room at the Brotherhood's mansion had it all. Giant-screen TV with surround sound. Couches with enough padding to qualify as beds. Fireplace for heat and that attractive smolderingember shit. Bar with every conceivable drink, soda, cocktail, tea, coffee, beer, whatever in it.

And a billiards table. Duh.

The only "bad" thing was a bene, anyway: The popcorn machine was a recent addition - and an odd sort of battlefield. Rhage loved to play with the damn thing, but every time he did, Fritz got nervous and wanted in on the action. Either way, it was cool. The little wicker baskets would get filled and then whichever of the pair hadn't done the loading and dispensing got a shot at it.

As Vishous waited to take his next pool shot, he snagged a square of blue chalk and polished the tip of his cue. Across the green felt, Butch bent over and lined up his angles while Rick Ross's "Aston Martin Music" pumped.

"Seven in the corner," the cop said.

"You're going to make that, aren't you." V put the chalk back down and shook his head as there was a smack, a roll, and a clunk. "Bastard."

Butch glanced over, a whole lot of "gotcha" glowing on his puss. "I'm just that good. Sorry, sucker."

The cop took a drink from his Lag and repositioned himself on the other side of the table. As he sized up the balls, his smart-ass smile was right where it should be: front and center, revealing that slightly off porcelain cap.

V had been keeping his eye on the guy. After they'd spent hours alone together, they'd parted awkwardly and taken separate showers. Fortunately, though, the hot water had been a reset for them both, and when they'd met up again in the Pit's kitchen, it had been business as usual.

And shit had remained that way.

Not that there wasn't the temptation to ask the guy whether all was still cool. Like, every five minutes. It felt like they had fought a battle together, and were sporting the stress fractures and the fading black-and-blues to prove it. But V was going with what was in front of him: his best friend whipping his ass at pool.

"And that's game over," the cop announced as the eight ball circled and got good and sunk.

"You beat me."

"Yup." Butch grinned and raised his glass. "You want another round."

"You bet your balls."

The scent of melted butter and the buckshot sound of kernels going apeshit announced Rhage's arrival - or maybe Fritz's? Nope, it was Hollywood over by the machine with his Mary.

V leaned back so he could look through the archway, across the foyer and into the dining room, where the butler and his staff were setting up Last Meal.

"Man, Rhage is playin' with fire," Butch said as he started to rack up the balls.

"I give Fritz thirty seconds before he's - Here he comes."

"I'm going to pretend I'm not here."

V took a swig of his Goose. "Me too."

While they got busy grabbing balls, Fritz came steaming across the foyer like a missile seeking a heat source.

"Watch your ass, Hollywood, true?" V muttered as Rhage came over with a basket of popped-and-fluffy.

"It's good for him. He needs the exercise - Fritz! How are you, buddy?"

While Butch and V rolled their eyes, Rehv came in with Ehlena under his mink-clad arm. The Mohawked motherfucker was bundled up, as usual, and he was as always relying on his cane, but his matedmale perma-grin was in place, and his shellan was glowing at his side.

"Boys," he said.

Various grunts greeted him as Z and Bella came in with Nalla, and Phury and Cormia arrived because they were spending the day. Wrath and Beth were likely still up in the study - maybe looking at paperwork; maybe putting George briefly at the head of the stairs so they could have some "private time."

When John and Xhex came down with Blay and Saxton, the only people not in attendance were Qhuinn and Tohrment, who were likely in the gym, and Marissa, who was at Safe Place.

Well, those three and his Jane, who was down in the clinic restocking the supplies that had been drained from the other night.

Oh, and of course his twin, who was no doubt ... "um, yeahing" ... with that surgeon of hers.

With all the new arrivals in the room, the sound of deep voices multiplied and exploded as people poured drinks and passed the baby around and copped handfuls of popcorn. Meanwhile, Rhage and Fritz were opening a fresh load of kernels. And someone was changing the channels on the TV - likely Rehv, who was never satisfied with whatever was on. And another person was poking at the roaring fire.

"Hey. You still all right?" Butch said softly.

V camouflaged his startle routine by taking a hand-rolled out of the pocket of his leathers. The cop had spoken so quietly there was no way anyone else had heard it, and this was a good thing. Yeah, he was trying to ditch the ultrareserved shit, but he didn't want anyone to know how far he and Butch had gone. That was private.

Flicking up a light, he inhaled. "Yeah. I really fucking am, true." Then he glanced into the hazels of his best friend. "And ... you?"

"Yeah. Me, too."

"Cool."

"Cool."

Heeeeeeeeeeey, check his shit out with the relating. Any more of this and he was going to get a gold star on his chart.

A knuckle tap later and Butch was back to the game, lining up his first shot as V basked in the glow of interrelating like a pro.

He was taking another hit from his short-and-squat of Goose when his eyes skipped to the arched doorway of the room.

Jane hesitated as she glanced inside, her white coat opening as she leaned to the side, as if she were looking for him.

When their eyes met, she smiled a little. And then a lot.

His first impulse was to hide his own grin behind his Goose. But then he stopped himself. New world order.

Come on, smile, motherfucker, he thought.

Jane gave a short wave and played it cool, which was what they usually did when they were together in public. Turning away, she headed over to the bar to make herself something.

"Hold up, cop," V murmured, putting his drink down and bracing his cue against the table.

Feeling like he was fifteen, he put his hand-rolled between his teeth and tucked his wife-beater tightly into the waistband of his leathers. A quick smooth of the hair and he was ... well, as ready as he could be.

He approached Jane from behind just as she struck up a convo with Mary - and when his shellan pivoted around to greet him, she seemed a little surprised that he'd come up to her. "Hi, V ... How are - "

Vishous stepped in close, putting them body to body, and then he wrapped his arms around her waist. Holding her with possession, he slowly bent her backward until she gripped his shoulders and her hair fell from her face.

As she gasped, he said exactly what he thought: "I missed you."

And on that note, he put his mouth on hers and kissed the everliving hell out of her, sweeping one hand down to her hip as he slipped his tongue in her mouth, and kept going and going and going ...

He was vaguely aware that the room had fallen stone silent and that everything with a heartbeat was staring at him and his mate. But whatever. This was what he wanted to do, and he was going to do it in front of everyone - and the king's dog, as it turned out.

Because Wrath and Beth came in from the foyer.

As Vishous slowly righted his shellan, the catcalls and whistling started up, and someone threw a handful of popcorn like it was confetti.

"Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout," Hollywood said. And threw more popcorn.

Vishous cleared his throat. "I have an announcement to make."

Right. Okay, there were a lot of eyes on the pair of them. But he was so going to suck up his inclination to bow out.

Tucking his flustered and blushing Jane into his side, he said loud and clear: "We're getting mated. Properly. And I expect you all to be there and ... Yeah, that's it."

Dead. Quiet.

Then Wrath released the handle on George's harness and started to clap. Loud and slow. "About. Fucking. Time."

His brothers and their shellans and all the guests of the house followed suit, and then the fighters broke out into a chant that raised the roof and then some - their voices vibrating through the air.

As he glanced over at Jane, she was glowing. Utterly glowing.

"Maybe I should have asked first," he murmured.

"Nope." She kissed him. "This is perfect."

Vishous started to laugh. Man, if this was living out loud, he'd ditch the tight-ass routine any night: His brothers were behind him, his shellan was happy, and ... okay, he could do without the popcorn in his hair, but whatever.

Minutes later, Fritz brought in champagne flutes, and now there was a different kind of popping, corks going flying as people talked even louder than before.

As someone shoved a glass into his mitt, he whispered in Jane's ear, "Champagne makes me horny."

"Really ..."

Slipping his hand down her hip ... and lower ... he tugged her in against his sudden arousal. "You ever meet the hall bathroom?"

"I do believe we've been formally introd - Vishous!"

He stopped nipping at her neck, but kept up with rolling his hips against hers. Which was a little indecent, but nothing that any of the other couples hadn't done from time to time.

"Yes?" he drawled. When she seemed speechless, he sucked on her lip and growled, "If you recall, we were discussing the bathroom? I was thinking maybe I could reacquaint the pair of you. Not sure if you're aware of it, but that sink counter has been crying out for you."

"And you do some of your best work at sinks."

V dragged one fang up her throat. "True that."

As his erection started thumping, he took his female's hand -

The grandfather clock in the corner started to chime, and then he heard four deep bongs. Which made him pull back a little and check his watch even though he didn't need to - because that clock had kept time correctly for two hundred years.

Four a.m.? Where the hell was Payne?

As the urge to go to the Commodore and bring his sister home struck hard, he reminded himself that although dawn was coming fast, she still had maybe an hour left. And given what he and Jane were about to do behind a closed door, he couldn't really blame her for eking out every moment she had with her male - even if he was absolutely, positively not going there.

"Everything okay?" Jane asked.

Getting back with the program, he dropped his head. "It will be as soon as I get you up on that counter."

He and Jane were in the loo for forty-five minutes.

When they came out, everyone was still in the billiards room. The music had been cranked and Lil Wayne's "I'm Not a Human Being" was echoing up to the foyer's ceiling. The doggen were buzzing around with little fancy crap on silver trays, and Rhage had a circle of laughing people around him as he cracked jokes.

For a moment, it felt like the good old days.

But then he didn't see his sister in the crowd. And no one came over to tell him she'd gone up to the guest room she'd been using.

"I'll be right back," he said to Jane. A quick kiss and he ducked out of the party, skated across the foyer, and went into the empty dining room. Rounding the fully set but very empty table, he got his cell from his pocket and dialed the phone he'd given her.

No answer.

He tried again. No answer. Third time? No ... goddamn answer.

With a curse, he punched in Manello's number, and shuddered at what he might be interrupting - but they'd probably pulled the drapes and lost track of time. And phones could defo get lost in sheets, he thought with a wince.

Ring ... ring ... ring ...

"Fucking pick up - "

"Hello?"

Manello sounded bad. Gunshot bad. Mortal-injury bad.

"Where is my sister." Because there was no way the surgeon was like that if she were in his bed.

The pause was not good news, either. "I don't know. She left here hours ago."

"Hours?"

"What's going on?"

"Jesus Christ - " V hung up on the guy, and called her phone again. And again.

Cranking his head around, he looked out to the foyer and the door to the vestibule.

With a subtle whirring sound, the steel shutters that protected the house from the sun started to ease down into place.

Come on, Payne ... come home. Right now.

Right ...

Now ...

Jane's gentle touch snapped him back to reality. "Is everything okay?" she asked.

His first instinct was to cover it all up with a crack about Rhage's impression of Steve-O in a projectile Porta-Potty. Instead, he forced himself to be real with his mate.

"Payne is ... maybe MIA." As she gasped and reached out with her other hand, he kind of wanted to bolt. But he held his feet to the Oriental rug. "She left Manello's" - hours ago - "ah, hours ago. And now I'm just praying to a mother I despise that she comes through that door."

Jane didn't say anything further. Instead, she angled herself so she could also see the way in from the vestibule and waited with him.

Taking her hand, he realized that it was a relief not to be alone as the party raged on across the way ... and his sister still did not come home.

That vision he'd had of her on the black horse, going at a screaming tilt, came back to him in the silence of the dining room. Her dark hair was flying out behind her as the stallion's mane streaked as well, the pair on a tear ... to God only knew where.

Allegorical? he wondered. Or just the yearnings of her brother that she finally be free ... ?

Jane and he were still standing there together, staring at a door that did not open, when the sun officially rose twenty-two minutes later.

As Manny paced around his condo, he was going balls. Absolute balls. He'd meant to leave his condo shortly after Payne had, but he'd run out of gas and had ended up spending the whole night staring out ... into the night.

Too fucking empty.

He'd been just too fucking empty to move.

When the phone had rung beside him, he'd checked the number and come briefly alive. Private caller. It had to be her.

And considering his mind had been going over what he'd said to her again and again, he'd needed a second to pull things together after all that useless spinning. That speech he'd rolled out had, at the time, seemed so rational and reasonable and smart ... until he'd stared down the barrel at a future that was beyond vacant and deep into black hole.

He'd accepted the call not expecting anything male on the connection.

Much less her brother. Much less the bastard going all surprise-surprise when Payne wasn't at the condo.

While Manny marched around in circles, he stared at his phone, willing it to ring again ... willing the fucking piece of shit to go off and have it be Payne telling him she was okay. Or her brother. Anyone.

Any-cocksucking-one.

For chrissakes, Al Roker could call him with the goddamn news she was all right.

Except the dawn arrived way too soon and his phone stayed way too quiet. And like a loser, he went into his recent-calls list and tried to hit back "private caller." When all he got was a dial tone again, he wanted to throw the cell across the room, but then where would that leave him.

The impotence was a crusher. A total crusher.

He wanted to go out and ... shit, find Payne if she was lost. Or bring her the fuck back home if she was out by herself. Or -

The phone went off. Private caller.

"Thank fuck," he said as he accepted it. "Payne - "

"No."

Manny closed his eyes: Her brother sounded like hell. "Where is she."

"We don't know. And there's nothing that we can do from here - we're trapped inside." The guy exhaled like he was smoking something. "What the fuck happened before she left? I thought she'd be spending all night with you. It's cool if you two ... you know ... but why did she leave so early?"

"I told her it wasn't going to work out."

Long silence. "What the fuck are you thinking?"

Clearly if it hadn't been all bright and sunny outside, motherfucker would have been knocking on Manny's door, looking to kick some Italian ass.

"I thought that would make you happy."

"Oh, yeah. Abso - break my sister's fucking heart. I'm all for that." Another sharp exhale, like he was blowing smoke. "She's in love with you, asshole."

Didn't that stop him in his tracks. But he got back with the program. "Listen, she and I ..."

At that point, he was supposed to explain the stuff about the results of his physical and how he was all freaked out and didn't know what the repercussions were. But the trouble was, in the hours since Payne had taken off, he'd come to realize that however true that shit was, there was a more fundamental thing going on at the core of him: He was being a little bitch. What the go-away had really been about was the fact that he was shitting in his pants because he'd actually fallen in love with a woman ... female ... whatever. Yeah, there was a tremendous overlay of metaphysical stuff he didn't understand and couldn't explain, blah, blah, blah. But at the center of it all, he felt so much for Payne that he didn't know himself anymore, and that was the terrifying part.

He'd pussied out when he'd had the chance.

But that was done now. "She and I are in love," he said clearly.

And damn him to hell, he should have had the balls to tell her. And hold her. And keep her.

"So like I said, what the fuck are you thinking."

"Excellent question."

"Jesus ... Christ."

"Listen, how can I help - I can be out in daylight, and there is nothing I won't do to get her back. Nothing." Energized by obsession, he headed for his keys. "If she isn't with you, where would she go. What about that place ... the Sanctuary?"

"Cormia and Phury went there. Nada."

"So ..." He hated thinking like this. "What about your enemies. Where are they during the day - I'll go there."

Cursing. More exhaling. Pause. Then a flicking sound and an inhale, as if the guy were lighting up another cigarette.

"You know, you shouldn't smoke," Manny heard himself say.

"Vampires don't get cancer."

"Really?"

"Yup. Okay, here's the deal. We don't have a specific locale for the Lessening Society. The slayers tend to imbed themselves in the human population in small groups so it's nearly impossible to find them without serious disturbance. The only thing ... Go to the alleys by the riverfront downtown. She might have met up with some lessers - you're going to look for evidence of a fight. There'd be black oil everywhere. Like engine oil. And it would smell sweet - like roadkill and baby powder. It's pretty fucking distinctive. Let's start with that."

"I need to be able to reach you. You need to give me your number."

"I'll text you with it. Do you have a gun? Any weapon?"

"Yeah. I do." Manny was already taking the licensed forty out of his closet. He'd been living in the city all his adult life and shit happened - so he'd learned his way around a gun about twenty years ago.

"Tell me it's bigger than a nine."

"Yup."

"Get a knife. You're going to need a stainless-steel blade."

"Roger that." He headed for the kitchen and took out the biggest, sharpest Henckels he had. "Anything else?"

"A flamethrower. Nunchakus. Throwing stars. Uzi. You want me to go on."

If only he had that kind of arsenal.

"I'm going to get her back, vampire. Mark my fucking words - I'm getting her back." He grabbed his wallet and was heading for the door when dread stopped him. "How many of them are there. Your enemies."

"An endless supply."

"Are they ... male?"

Pause. "Used to be. Before they got turned, they were human men."

A sound came out of Manny's mouth ... one that he was very sure he had never uttered before.

"Nah, she can handle herself with the hand-to-hand," her brother said in a dead tone. "She's tough like that."

"Not what I was thinking." He had to scrub his eyes. "She's a virgin."

"Still ... ?" the guy asked after a moment.

"Yeah. It wasn't right for me to ... take that from her."

Oh, God, the idea she could be hurt ...

He couldn't even finish the sentence to himself.

Snapping into action, he stepped out of his place and went over to call the elevator. As he waited, he realized that there had only been silence on the other end of the phone for a while. "Hello? You there."

"Yeah." Her twin's voice cracked. "Yeah. I'm here."

The connection between them remained open as Manny got into the elevator and hit P. And the entire trip down to his car was passed with the two of them saying absolutely nothing at all.

"They're impotent," her twin finally muttered just as Manny was getting into the Porsche. "They can't have sex."

Well, didn't that do nothing to make him feel better. And going by the tone of her brother's voice, the other guy was thinking the same way.

"I'll call you," Manny said.

"You do that, my man. You frickin' do that."