When Liam didn’t stroll from the bedroom and out the door like usual, Danny stole periodic glances at the shut-off room, unnerved by the unsettling quiet on the other side. Mari surprised him by exiting from inside first, and when Danny realized she had dressed and done her makeup, he raised an eyebrow at her.

She smirked in a conspiratorial manner. “Have a good night,” she said, mouthing the words and adding only a soft whisper to them. Danny watched her walk out of the condo, struck mute, and when movement from the bedroom captured his attention again, he glanced back toward it without preparing himself first. Liam stood in the threshold, staring silently at him and looking nonplussed. Danny felt his pulse quicken. Freshly dressed, and with his longish hair tied back, Liam projected what had probably caught Danny’s eye the night he let himself get swept up on the dance floor.

The vampire ignored the curious interest in Danny’s eyes, nodding at what Danny wore with detached amusement. “I liked that suit,” he said.

“Suit?” Danny asked. Glancing down at himself, he saw he had fallen asleep in the donated outfit and laughed. “Oh, right. To be honest, I’ve barely been paying attention to what she’s handed me to wear. If not for Mari, I probably wouldn’t have even showered.”

“Mari’s done us all a public service, then.” Liam sobered, and let himself become lost in thought. “I find myself wanting to ask something impossible of you,” he said. “But it’s either do this of your own free will, or I will have to enthrall you to do it. And you seem to prefer being in control.”

“That sounds ominous,” Danny said.

“It is, but if you cooperate, I’ll allow you to retrieve some things from your apartment.” Liam leaned against the door frame, crossing his arms in front of his chest as he did. “Mari pointed out to me that you’d behaved yourself while out. I would like to trust your obedience, but I’m not sure you yet understand that your old way of life is over.”

“Right. I’m Mari’s pet now?”

Liam sighed. “She pointed out that it was rude of me to call you that, so I won’t. But your life isn’t your own. That part hasn’t changed.” A genuine and conciliatory frown tugged at the corners of his mouth. “I’m sorry, Danny.”

“It’s alright.” Danny dug his hands in his pockets, shoring himself up as he did. “Okay, what ware you beating around the bush in not asking me?”

“I need you to call your job and quit. We have people at the police station who say they’ve reported you missing. Again…” Liam weighed his words, delivering them again in a way that almost made him sound apologetic. “… You can’t carry your old way of life past this point.”

“And you can’t risk having more people searching after me.”

“Correct. I don’t expect you to be eager to comply with my reque–”

“I’ll do it.” Danny shut his eyes. Taking a deep breath, he exhaled it slow, fighting to chase away the rush of nerves that had raced through him. Agreeing warred against every survival instinct inside of him, but as he thought about Mari, and the confidence she’d given him, he remembered that brief vision of a life outside the closet she had granted him. “I have two demands, though,” he said, opening his eyes again.

Liam nodded. “Such as?” he asked.

“I want some of my stuff, yes. But I also want more freedom to leave the condo. It’s okay if it’s with you or Mari. Or both of you. I just don’t want to spend my last days shacked up inside.”

The vampire stared in silent consideration. Danny took off his suit jacket and tossed it onto the kitchen counter. Liam tilted his head, his expression inquisitive; eyes watching while Danny rolled up his sleeves and paced closer to him. As Danny studied him in return, he thought of Mari again and remembered the suggestion she’d made. If he wanted to live, the man who could make that possible stood in front of him. ‘You’ve had all of your objections answered,’ Danny thought. ‘Hell, you’ve slept with people for less.’ Locking his gaze with Liam’s, he continued to take slow, careful steps forward.

Liam held up his hand. “What are you doing, Danny?” he asked.

Danny shrugged. “This could work out for both of us,” he said. “In more ways than one.”

“I’m inclined to agree toward supervised outings. You don’t have to seduce me.”

“Remember, I had two demands? This is my second one.” Danny stole an additional step closer and undid the top button of his shirt. “Mari got to have me. If you’re going to feed on me, I want something more for my trouble, considering I barely remember the first time you fucked me.”

“For one, I regret indulging your use of the word demand, but for two, I recognize what you’re doing.” Liam sighed. As he looked at Danny, his gaze softened. “Don’t. Please. If you want us to get to know each other, then we can do that. If you want our rapport to be carnal, so be it. But I cannot do both.”

The answer surprised Danny. Liam remained motionless as Danny studied him, surrendering nothing else about his thoughts either by word or action. Lowering his hand from the next button on his shirt, Danny allowed it to settle by his side, lost in thought until he nodded. “Okay, I guess we’ll get to know each other, then,” he said.

Liam nodded. As Danny adjusted his mindset, he pointed at the front door, floundering for a smile. “Now,” he said. “After you, if we’re headed out.”

Quirking a brow, Liam gave Danny a warning look, but said nothing else as he led the way out the door. Danny followed close behind, grateful for the silence which fell between them at first until they reached the stairs. At that point, however, the quiet became awkward. While Liam lost himself inside his own thoughts, Danny tried to wrestle with the headache of whiplash, wishing he had Mari to consult with for this portion of the plan. He had been given a choice and opted for the more difficult path.

A part of him wondered why.

Danny reached to turn on the radio without resolving the internal debate, and though Liam didn’t stop him, he shot Danny a glance, suggesting he was keeping a running tally of infractions and had added this to the list. The music filled the space between them, though, and within a few minutes, Danny had managed to relax.

“You don’t know many people, do you?” Liam asked, reaching to turn down the volume of the music.

His question startled Danny more with its sudden delivery than its content. He regrouped quickly, though, and shrugged. “I mean, I know people, but I’m not exactly sure you’d call us close.”

Liam nodded. When he failed to offer a follow-up question, Danny wrestled with something else to say. “Why?” he finally asked.

“You seemed surprised I would force the issue of choosing between a carnal and conversational rapport with you,” Liam said.

“Granted. I’m not used to that being an option with somebody I’ve slept with.”

“Technically, you don’t remember that.”

“But you do.” Danny glanced at Liam. “The way you talked about it last night, it sounded like you’d had fun. Unless I interpreted –”

“No. You didn’t misunderstand me. I enjoyed it.” Liam sighed. His eyes remained focused on the road, though Danny could sense some temptation on Liam’s part to look at him. “What makes this different is the time we’re spending together. Mixing intimacy with emotions isn’t a wise decision.”

“You think of sex as intimate?”

“There are times. This would be one of them.”

Liam succumbed to the urge to look at Danny, when they slowed to a stop at a red light. “You were asking about being long-lived and forming closer relationships with mortals,” Liam said. “I resist it because the constant cycle of saying goodbye to the people you care about takes a toll. It’s difficult enough for somebody who lives a normal lifespan, such as you. Imagine for someone who’s lived for centuries, like I have.”

“I get it,” Danny said. The light turned green and Liam’s focus returned to the road, a much lighter silence falling between them when Danny failed to pick up the thread of conversation. Their drive to Danny’s neighborhood only took a few, additional minutes, and when they reached his apartment, Liam lingered close, from parking spot to front door.

‘Guess I can’t blame you for not trusting me yet,’ Danny thought, accepting a familiar key ring when Liam offered it and using his house key to unlock the door. While he crossed the threshold without being encumbered, Liam paused at the entryway, lingering there until Danny realized he hadn’t entered. “Are you going to come in?” Danny asked.

Liam glanced around the threshold. “Do you want me to?”

“Yeah, I don’t see why not.” As Liam straightened his posture, but the moment he strode into the apartment, Danny realized what had happened and groaned. “Did I just invite you in?”

“Not all things are myth. Please don’t attempt to throw holy water on me, though. It’ll only make me wet and angry.”

“Noted.” Danny resisted the urge to scold himself further and headed for the kitchen. He had left the house a disaster, and after several days of neglect, the dishes in the sink had started to smell. Rather than do anything about either that or the state of disarray in his living room, he paused by the phone and picked up the receiver. Liam shot his attention immediately away from an errant sock on the floor to Danny, and as Danny dialed the number for work, he felt ready to be reprimanded.

One of his co-workers answered on the third ring. “Blue Horizons,” they declared. “This is Jesse.”

“Hi, Jesse, can I talk to the manager?” Danny asked. “This is Danny Turner.”

“Oh yeah, shit. Hold on a second.” Danny heard the phone being set down on what he assumed had been the closest counter, left there when Jesse went to fetch the manager. The hum of background activity quickly disappeared when someone lifted the receiver again. Danny had little warning when another voice boomed on the other end.

“Danny, are you okay?” they asked. It took a moment before Danny saw the face of Patricia in his mind, who usually manned the weekend shifts.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Ish.” He stole a quick glance at Liam. “I’m sorry for falling off the face of the map. I’ve had a lot of shit going on.”

“A phone call would’ve been nice. We’ve been struggling to cover your shifts.” Patricia lowered her voice. “Look, Bill is furious and I’m not sure we can save your job.”

“It’s okay. I had some cops come by one day and figured I would finally do this properly.”

“And you’re sure you’re okay?”

Danny refused to respond. In the space between her question and his extended failure to respond, Patricia sighed. “I get it,” she said. “Just make sure you don’t wind up in a ditch somewhere, okay?”

“I’m working on that,” he said. “Um, I guess you can mail me my last check. I’m sorry for stranding you guys.” Carrying on the lie had become tedious. Patricia began to say something else, but Danny preempted her, saying, “Goodbye,” and hanging up before she could get in another word. Liam raised an eyebrow at him and tracked his trek from the phone to his bedroom. For that fact alone, Danny slammed the door shut behind him, getting away from the careful gaze of the other man.

He took a deep breath and leaned against the shut door, closing his eyes and trying to gather his composure back. It took a few seconds of beating his head against the wood – and telling himself that Liam could probably find him no matter where he ran – before he summoned the ability to push off from the door and walk to his closet. Several outfits found their way onto the bed, tossed there with resignation, when the door opened again.

Danny saw Liam in his periphery and decided against meeting his gaze until he was ready. While Danny scoured for socks, underwear, and t-shirts, Liam drifted casually toward his bookcase, turning his back to Danny as Danny freed a suitcase from a precarious stack of boxes in the back of his closet. It landed on the mattress when Danny tossed it there, and though Liam spared it a glance, he remained otherwise unaffected by the animated way Danny packed his belongings. Instead, he pulled a book from the shelf and began thumbing through it.

Once he had the suitcase filled, and secured shut, Danny finally sated his curiosity, trying to see what book had sparked Liam’s interest. When he saw his old, battered copy of Interview with the Vampire in Liam’s hands, Danny breathed a soft chuckle. “I doubt you’d like that one,” Danny said. “It’s probably not anywhere close to the truth.”

“You would be surprised, actually,” Liam said. His attention remained on the book, fingers deftly turning pages. “My first night as an immortal almost felt the same as Louis’s. Nothing came alive, but the night has a certain quality to it that defies explanation.”

“Oh yeah?” Danny hefted the suitcase upright, but kept it situated on his bed for the time being. “When was that?”

“Eighteen hundred eleven,” Liam said. “I was away from Dublin, docked in Southern England, and made the mistake of getting drunk beyond my threshold before becoming some vampire’s meal.” He shut the book, lifting his gaze to make eye contact with Danny. “He could have finished me off, but he took pity on me. I wish I could say my maker saw something in me worth preserving, but I caught his attention, at the very least.”

“You weren’t kidding about two centuries.” Danny furrowed his brow. As he studied Liam, the vampire quirked an eyebrow at him, but remained still through Danny’s examination. “You couldn’t have been older than thirty when you were turned.”

“Twenty-seven,” Liam said with a faint, amused smile. “And unmarried, though I doubt it would have stopped my maker. It simply made transitioning into vampire life easier.” Slowly, Liam sat on the bed, placing the book beside him as he did. “Are you from Philadelphia?”

“New Jersey. Voorhees.” Danny lifted the suitcase, moving it onto the floor. “I moved into the city after high school.”

“What brought you here?”

Danny shrugged. “I needed room to breathe. I didn’t have my sister any longer and my parents are a lot to handle. This seemed like the one place where I could be me without them knowing anything about it.” As the night before came to mind again, Danny took a deep breath, releasing it with heaviness. “You know, that had been the plan, but I still act like they can see me from where they are. You mentioned me not being close to anyone. Some of that is self-preservation.”

Liam failed to respond. When Danny looked at him, he saw the vampire quirking an eyebrow at him, asking a question in expression without placing it in words. “I’m still in the closet,” Danny explained. “Well, mostly anyway, except for with a couple of friends. You caught me at the one spot where I let myself go.”

“That sounds a lot like how Mari had been when I found her,” Liam said.

“That’s what she said.” Danny laughed, struggling between the urge to continue looking Liam in the eye and glancing away. He fidgeted with his hands, placing them in his lap. “What did you tell her when you realized that she’d been hiding away who she is?”

“I said she shouldn’t feel the need to be so reserved. Man lives only for a time and dies nearly as swiftly as he arrived.”

“That’s both beautiful and macabre.”

“It’s the truth, though.” Liam chuckled. The look in his eyes turned soft when Danny settled on maintaining eye contact. A smile ghosted across his lips. “You both worry about judgment, and I don’t blame either of you for it, but from my perspective, it isn’t worth the concern of others.”

“The concern of others becomes a part of day-to-day life, though.”

“It does. I recall telling you that your old way of life is gone now, though.”

“You keep sending me mixed signals, Liam.” Danny raised an eyebrow and smirked. “Part of you wants to keep me around. You couldn’t kill me quickly and I get this idea that you threw up a wall between us quickly because a part of you could really get to like me. It was so much easier to hold me at a distance and right now, you’re taking steps forward you’re going to regret later.”

“What do you mean?” Liam asked, brow furrowed.

“I mean, you want me to let go of my inhibitions. I think you’ve seen how that looks for me, though.” Danny dared himself to inch closer to where Liam sat. Liam straightened his posture, but didn’t move, and as Danny reached for one of his hands, Liam didn’t flinch away. He also didn’t grasp hold of Danny either, and as Danny slid his fingers over his cool skin, he kept his eyes focused on the human man.

“You don’t want to get attached,” Danny said. “Are you sure you’re going to be able to manage that?”

Liam took a deep breath and shut his eyes. “I would think you’d be lobbying for whatever kept you around the longest, Danny,” he said, “not making a stronger argument for me to kill you.”

“You’re not going to, though. I’m sorry, but that’s a fact.”

Danny made up the remainder of the distance between them, sliding that final inch which separated them and aiming for Liam’s lips as he closed his eyes. Liam didn’t move, and when they kissed, he remained still, finally taking a breath, but otherwise lingering in the soft, temporary sensation of Danny’s lips. When Danny kissed him again, however, Liam’s lips parted and finally, whatever dam of resolve had been holding back the flood waters broke.

Knocking Danny’s hand from his, he reached up to touch the side of Danny’s face and plunged into a deeper, far more passionate kiss.

Danny felt the sensation ripple all the way down to his toes, losing his mission in a series of muddled thoughts when one kiss rolled into the next and dragged him under the current. Soon, kissing Liam became like breathing, holding a level of instinct propelled forward by whatever desire had overcome him in the nightclub. Flashes of memory – of them dancing against each other, bodies moving toward some erratic form of ecstasy – played through his mind until Danny broke for air.

Neither man moved. Something about the tingling on Danny’s lips reminded him of electricity, building another layer atop the twist his life had taken in the last two days alone. How, he thought to himself, had he gone from loner to captive and now, on the cusp of feeling like kindred to two dangerous creatures. “You are not allowed to kiss me like that again unless you intend to fuck me,” Danny whispered. He asked himself what it said about him, that flirting with the edge of death had made him feel so alive.

“You said that to me in the club,” Liam murmured back. He opened his eyes as Danny did, and both men studied each other within the tension of a pregnant pause. “I’ll consider it. Would that be good enough for the time being?”

“Yes.” Danny grinned and allowed himself another brief, tentative union of their lips. Pulling away made him yearn to dive back in and drown, but he relented to caution, adding yet another new experience to this already strange encounter. Liam slid away, steadying himself before lifting to a slow stand. While Danny followed suit, the vampire looked more fazed than even Danny felt.

Liam took a deep breath. “You’re a narcotic,” he said, adjusting his suit jacket. “I hesitate to admit I subconsciously might have done a poor job of enthralling you for that reason.”

“Hoping I would find you again?” Danny snorted. “There has got to be a part of you wishing you hadn’t.”

“It doesn’t help that you’re muddling my reservations.” Liam managed a small, playful smile. “Come, let’s get back before Mari wonders after us.”

Danny nodded, failing to add Mari’s parting comment to the discussion. Hefting up his suitcase, he followed Liam out the door, paused when Liam locked up the apartment. The drive back to Manayunk turned quiet, with swaths of conversation occurring over the sound of music playing from the stereo. A small part of Danny felt disappointed – nervous, even – while another struggled with a new and hopeful form of elation. Maybe, he thought, this could be his way of life after all, though seducing Liam had stopped being a play on Liam’s sympathies. The truth was more nefarious than that. It had nothing to do with Danny keeping his life.

And everything to do with wanting Liam to open his heart to him.