Barron's Quotes

He pulls me around and kisses me. "You're Mac," he says. "And I'm Jericho. And nothing else matters. Never will. You exist in a place that is beyond all rules for me. Do you understand that?" I do. Jericho Barrons just told me he loves me.

V'lane: Are you busy tomorrow MacKayla ? Barrons: She's working on old texts with me. V'lane: Ah. Old texts. A banner day at the bookstore. Barrons: We're translating Kama Sutra...with interactive aids.

You're leaving me, Rainbow Girl.

Some people bring out the worst in you, others bring out the best, and then there are those remarkably rare, addictive ones who just bring out the most. Of everything. They make you feel so alive that you'd follow them straight into hell, just to keep getting your fix.

He raised a brow. 'Petunia, Ms. Lane?' I scowled. "Ass, Barrons.

When you know who I am. Let me be your man.

Barrons laughed again. "And there, my dear Fio, you make one of Womankind's greatest mistakes: Falling in love with a man's potential. We so rarely share the same view of it, and even more rarely care to achieve it. Stop pining for the man you think I could be -- and take a good, long, hard look at the one I am.

Last night you said you wanted to know what to expect so you could better select your attire. I told you we were going to visit a vampire in a Goth-den tonight. Why, then, Ms. Lane, do you look like a perky rainbow?

I was about to look away when he reached across the seat, touched my jaw with his long, strong, beautiful fingers, and caressed my face. Being touched by Jericho Barrons with kindness makes you feel like you must be the most special person in the world. It’s like walking up to the biggest, most savage lion in the jungle, lying down, placing your head it its mouth and, rather than taking your life, it licks you and purrs.

The moment I laid eyes on you, I knew you were trouble." "Ditto." "I wanted to drag you between the shelves, fuck you senseless, and send you home." "If you'd done that, I never would have left." "You're still here anyway." "You don't have to sound so sour about it." "You're upsetting my entire existence." "Fine, I'll leave." "Try and I'll chain you up.

I’m asking the questions tonight.” One day I was going to write a book: How to Dictate to a Dictator and Evade an Evader, subtitled How to Handle Jericho Barrons.

I was no longer sexually vulnerable to the death-by-sex Fae Prince. Jericho Barrons was my poison now.

What are you Barrons?” “The one who will never let you die, and that’s more, Ms Lane, than anyone in your life has been able to say to you. More than anyone else can do

Barrons was powerful, broodingly good-looking, insanely wealthy, frighteningly intelligent, and had exquisite taste, not to mention a hard body that emitted some kind of constant low-level charge. Bottom line: He was the stuff of heroes. And psychotic killers.

Okay, Barrons, it's time." "I am not helping you shave your legs." he said instantly. "Oh please. As if I'd let you.

Dying is overrated. Human sentimentality has twisted it into the ultimate act of love. Biggest load of bullshit in the world. Dying for someone isn't the hard thing. The man that dies escapes. Plain and simple. Game over. End of pain...Try living for someone. Through it all-good, bad, thick, thin, joy, suffering. That's the hard thing.

Stop staring at my dick," he growled. Oh, yes it was definitely an illusion. "Barrons loved me staring at his dick,"I informed it. "he would have been happy if I'd stared at his dick all day long, composing odes to its perfection.

I get off on a man with strong moral fiber. The closest Barrons ever gets to fiber is walking down the cereal aisle at the grocery store.

Sometimes, Ms. Lane," he said, "one must break with one's past to embrace one's future. It is never an easy thing to do. It is one of the distinguishing characteristics between survivors and victims. Letting go of what was, to survive what is.

Punch me." "Don't be absurd." "Come on, punch me, Barrons." "I'm not punching you." "I said, punch--OW!" He decked me.

Four: If you try to force yourself into my head, I will force myself into your pants.

We have to save the world," I reminded him. He reached for me. "The world can wait. I can't.

That's it. Fate is a fickle whore. We're not going. Take your clothes off and get back in my bed.

God Said: Let there be light! I said: Say please.

I'm not the hero, Mac. Never have been. Never will be. Let us be perfectly clear: I'm not the antihero, either, so quit waiting to discover my hidden potential. There's nothing to redeem me.

We're translating the Kama Sutra," Barrons said, with interactive aids.

See me when you look at me.

I couldn‘t tell the difference between the two of you anymore!" he roared. I smashed my fist into his face. Lies roll off us. It‘s the truths we work hardest to silence. Then you weren‘t looking hard enough! I‘m the one with boobs!" I know you‘re the one with boobs!They‘re in my fucking face every fucking time I turn around!

I don't have any idea what to wear anymore, so I tried to cover all bases." "Try skin." "Little chilly for that." We looked at each other across the coffee table. His eyes didn't say, I'd heat you up, and mine didn't say What are you waiting for? He didn't reply, Fuck if I'm making the first move, so I was careful not to say, I wish you would, because I can't, because I'm... and he didn't snap ...choking on your pride?! "As if you aren't." "Excuse me?" "Really Barrons," I said drily. "I'm not the only one who didn't just not have that conversation, and you know it." There was the faint, sexy lift of his lip. "You're a piece of work, Ms. Lane." "Right back at you.

Oh ye of little faith. Not for IYD... But you didn't even try.

Was that the sum total of my exsitence? I didn't get the erudition of 'I think therefore I am.' Instead I got 'I am, therefore I want to fuck Jericho Barrons.

Keep hoping to see the light in her eyes. Even knowing it'll mean she's saying good-bye.

Jericho Barrons was my poison now.

Ancient eyes had stared at me, filled with ancient grief. And something more. Something so alien and unexpected that I'd almost burst into tears. I'd seen many things in his eyes in the time that I'd known him: lust, amusement, sympathy, mockery, caution, fury. But I had never seen this. Hope. Jericho Barrons had hope, and I was the reason for it. I would never forget his smile. It had illuminated him from the inside out.

Barrons’ lips twitched. I’d almost made him smile. Barrons smiles about as often as the sun comes out in Dublin, and it has the same effect on me; makes me feel warm and stupid.

Home, Ms. Lane?” His deep voice was gently amused. “I have to call it something,” I said morosely. “They say home is where the heart is. I think mine’s satin-lined and six feet under.

Was he a good kisser, Ms. Lane?” Barrons asked, watching me carefully. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand at the memory. “It was like being owned.” Some women like that.” Not me.” Perhaps it depends on the man doing the owning.” I doubt it. I couldn’t breathe with him kissing me.” One day you may kiss a man you can’t breathe without, and find breath is of little consequence.” Right, and one day my prince might come.” I doubt he’ll be a prince, Ms. Lane. Men rarely are.

I'm sorry your pretty little world got all screwed up, but everybody's does, and you go on. It's how you go on that defines you.

Barrons had just given me the most carnal, sexually charged hungry look I'd ever seen in my life, and I was pretty sure he didn't even know he had done it.

And you can tell Darroc that Ms. Lane is mine. If he wants her, he can bloody well come and get her

Maybe you need to get a grip on your libido, Barrons!" Fuck you, Ms. Lane!" You just try. I‘ll kick the shit out of you!" You think you could?" Bring it on." He grabbed a fistful of my T-shirt, and dragged me up against him until our noses touched. I‘ll bring it on, Ms. Lane. But remember you asked for it. So don‘t even think about trying to tap out on the mat and quit the fight." You hear anybody crying ‗Uncle‘ here, Barrons? I don‘t." Fine." Fine.

And here we go. She's bristling and my hackles go up. Bloody hell, I feel fangs coming on. Tell you what, Ms. Lane," Barrons said softly, "Anytime you want to have a conversation with me, leave the myriad issues you have with wanting to fuck me every time you look at me outside my cave, come on in, and see what you find. You might like it.

I know part of what turns me on so hard, makes me so violent with lust, is that he's dangerous. I fell for the bad guy. I'm crazy about the one who's trouble. The alpha that doesn't play well with others and doesn't take orders from anyone.

You hated my rainbows, now you don't like my leather. Is there anything you like on me?

Deals with the devil, Ms. Lane, never go well. That‘s a given. You will not make one again. Do you understand me? If I have to chain you to a fucking wall to protect you from your own stupidity, I will!" He glared at me. I rattled my chains. "Wrists. Beam. Chained already, Barrons. Come up with a new threat." I glared back.

Even I don't know what you're doing, and I know everything.

-I'm going to kill the kid. - Barrons says faintly. Ryodan makes a burbling sound like a bodly laught. -Get in line

If he’d been any other man and i'd been any other girl, I’d have called the narrowing of his heavy-lidded dark eyes lust. But he was Barrons and I was Mac, and a blossoming of lust was about as likely as orchids blooming in Antarctica

Since the moment I laid eyes on Jericho Barrons, I wanted him. I wanted him to do things to me that pink and clueless MacKayla Lane was shocked and appalled and ... okay, yeah, well, utterly fascinated to find herself thinking about.

When Barrons looks at me like that, it rattles me. Lust, in those ancient, obsidian eyes, offers no trace of humanity. Doesn’t even bother trying. Savage Mac wants to invite it to come out and play. I think she’s nuts. Nuts, I tell you.

There are two kinds of people in the world Ms. Lane: those who survive no matter the cost and those who are walking victims.

The key to resisting Voice," Barrons instructed, "is finding that place inside you no one else can touch. "You mean the sidhe-seer place?" I said, hopping like a one-legged chicken. "No, a different place. All people have it. Not just sidhe-seers. We're born alone and we die alone. That place." "I don't get it." "I know. That's why you're hopping.

Try a rocket launcher. Think maybe you could manage to hit me with that?

Bring it on, Tinker Bell.

I heard there are no male sidhe-seers." Where did you hear that?" Around." And which one of those are you in doubt about Ms. Lane?" Which one of what?" Whether I see the Fae, or whether I'm a man. I believe I've laid your mind to rest on the former; shall I relieve it on the latter?" He reached for his belt. Oh, please." I rolled my eyes. "You're a leftie, Barrons." Touche, Ms. Lane," he murmered.

He didn't just occupy space; he saturated it. The room had been full of books before, now it was full of him.

You've mistaken me for someone else. Do not wait on me, Ms. Lane. Do not construct your world around mine. I'm not that man." "Screw you, Barrons." "I'm not that man, either.

Jericho Barrons just told me he loves me.

Barrons." I hastily shoved the phone between the cushions. Ms. Lane." He inclined his dark head. You tattooed me, you bastard." I got right to the point.

Being touched by Jericho Barrons with kindness makes you feel like you the biggest, most savage lion in the jungle, lying down, placing your head it its mouth and, rather than taking your life, it licks you and purrs.

Who's driving this motorcycle and who's in the bloody sidecar? I don't ride in the sidecar. I don't even own a pussy bike with a sidecar.

Barrons: "He got upset it wouldn't shut up and tore its head off." Mac: "The child?" I gasped

Barrons, Jericho: I haven't the faintest fecking clue. He keeps saving my life. I suppose that's something.

Dubh is do?" I was incredulous. It was no wonder I hadn't been able to find the stupid word. "Should I be calling pubs poos?" "Dubh is Gaelic, Ms. Lane. Pub is not.

She wants me to take out Patton.” Barron’s brows draw together. “Take out? As in transform him?” “No,” I say. “As in take out to dinner. She thinks we’d make a good couple.

How will we get back up?" I worried. "I have a different route in mind for our return trip." "Does it involve stairs?" I asked hopefully. "No." "Of course not. How silly of me. And for our return adventure we will be scaling the side of Mount Everest, hiking boots to be provided by our trusty sponsor, Barrons Books and Baubles.

Barrons breaks heads. Ryodan turns them inside out. Barrons fucks you up. Ryodan makes you fuck yourself up. He pushes buttons and rearranges things according to his own private, coolly sociopathic plan.

Barrons has something the rest of us don't have. I don't know what it is, but I feel it all the time, especially when we're standing close. Beneath the expensive clothes, unplaceable accent, and cultured veneer, there's something that never crawled all the way out of the swamp. It didn't want to. It likes it there.

What I know, brother, is you break every goddamned rule for Mac.” “Back at you, Ry. Difference is, I’ll help you do it.” “Lor has never been Pri-ya.” Ryodan shakes his head in disgust. “The princess can’t turn us. Son of a bitch, Mac’s ass is—” “Mine,” Barrons says flatly. “You will never go there. You have a problem with Mac, you work it out with me. I am her shield, I am her second fucking skin.

For what other reason would you have me save you? Because I like you? Better to be useful than liked.

Burns from dropped matches, Ms. Lane? Matches one might have dropped while flirting with a pernicious Fae, Ms. Lane? Have you any idea the value of this rug?” I didn’t think his nostrils could flare any wider. His eyes were black flame. “Pernicious? Good grief, is English your second language? Third?” Only someone who’d learned English from a dictionary would use such a word. “Fifth,” he snarled. “Answer me.

Open your eyes and say my name.” I squeeze them shut more tightly. “It would make my cock hard to hear you say my name.” My eyes pop open. “Jericho Barrons,” I say sweetly. He makes a pained sound. “Bloody hell, woman, I think a part of me wants to keep you this way.” I touch his face. “I like how I am. I like how you are, too. When you are…What is that word you used? Cooperating.” “Tell me to fuck you.” I smile and comply. We’re back in territory I understand. “You didn’t say my name. Say my name when you tell me to fuck you.” “Fuck me, Jerricho Barrons.” “From now on, you will call me Jericho Barrons every time you speak to me.

The paranoid one's wards are still active. They keep me several feet from the building." "But not his car," I said, a smile tugging at my lips. Barrons would go nuts if he knew that V'lane had touched his Viper. And stretched out on it nude? He'd have an aneurysm.

I began to cry. Barrons looked horrified. "Stop that immediately, Ms. Lane." "I can't." I sniffeled into my cup pf cocoa so he couldn't see my face. "Try harder!" I gave a great sniff and shudder, and turned it off. "I have not been her lover for...some time," he offered, watching me carefully. "Oh, get over yourself!

Then why was his tongue in your mouth? Was he conducting a clinical test of your gag reflex?" He smiled, but not nicely. "How is your gag reflex, Ms. Lane? Are you a hair trigger?" Barrons likes to use sexual innuendo to try to shut me up. I think he expects the well-raised southern belle in me will think eew and back off. Sometimes, I do think eew, but I don't back off. "I'm a spitter, if that's what you're asking." I flashed him a too-sweet smile. "Didn't look that way to me. I think you're a swallower. His tongue was halfway to China and you were still taking it." "Jealous?

If you are not with me, you are against me. I have no mercy for my enemies.

Unpredictable as a hungry lion, he might be feared by everyone else, but he never ripped out my throat, only licked me, and, if his tongue was a little rough sometimes, it was worth it to walk beside the king of the jungle.

Unbelievable," I heard Christian mutter behind me. "She toops them both?" I head Drustan ask. "And they permit it?" Dageus sounded baffled. I looked between V'lane and Barrons. "This isn't even about me." "You're wrong about that." Barrons reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone. "You know how to find me if you want me." He was walking away. "More nifty acronyms?" He was gone.

He wasn't handsome. That was too calm a word. He was intensely masculine. He was sexual. He attracted.

The four Keltar Druids brought their wives and children. They breed like it's their personal mission to populate their country in case somebody attacks again, as if anybody wants the bloody place.

Ryodan says softly, “Holy strawberries, Dani, we’re in a jam.” I look at him like he’s sprouted two heads. Holy strawberries? In a jam? Even Barrons looks stumped. He continues, “But don’t worry. Holy priceless collection of Etruscan snoods—you really butchered that one, by the way—I’ve got it in the bag. How about this one: holy borrowing bibliophile, let’s book.

Hey, I thought you wanted to know about the Sinsar Dubh!” I was so startled by his abrupt departure that I spoke without thinking. I regretted it immediately. I had no idea where Vlane had gone, or why he‟d disappeared so suddenly, but I decided Id be wise to do the same myself. Before I could move, a hand closed on my shoulder. “I do, Ms. Lane,” Barrons said grimly. “But first I‟d like to know what the fuck you were doing kissing him.

Women have been repeating the same mistake since time began: falling for a man’s potential. We rarely see it the same way, and even more rarely care to achieve it.

Beautiful women rarely possess sufficient depth of character to survive without their pretty feathers.

I think I’m under control, that I’ve stripped away all weaknesses. That committing to my mission has made me impervious. I’m wrong. The thought of Barrons smiling brings other thoughts. Barrons naked. Dancing. Dark head thrown back. Laughing. The image doesn’t “gently swim up in my mind” in a dreamy sort of way, like I’ve seen in movies. No, this one slams into my head like a nuclear missile, exploding in my brain in graphic detail. I suffocate in a mushroom cloud of pain. I can’t breathe. I squeeze my eyes shut. White teeth flashing in his dark face: I get knocked down but I get up again. You’re never gonna keep me down. I stagger. But he didn’t get up, the bastard. He stayed down.

And then what? Said, 'Oh, I'm so sorry, Ms. Lane, I didn't mean to wrinkle your lovely blouse. May I press that for you?' Or perhaps you gouged it with one of your pretty pink nails?" I was really beginning to wonder what his hang-up with pink was, but I didn't resent the sarcasm in his voice.

Enlightenment is its own reward, its own punishment. You begin to see so much more. And so much more sees you.

He strips his shirt over his head and I catch my breath, watching those long hard muscles ripple. I know how his shoulders look, bunched, when he's on top of me, how his face gets tight with lust, as he eases inside me. "Who am I?" "Jericho" "Who are you?" He kicks off his boots, steps out of his pants. He's commando tonight. My breath whooshes out of me in a run-on word: "Whogivesafuck?

Had he stood outside my door as I'd stood outside his, fists at his sides, lips drawn back? Did it have him as bad as it had me? Was it eating at him, gnawing at him with the same sharp vicious little teeth that wouldn't let me sleep? Yes, it was. I could see the rage of insatiable uninvited lust in every line of that dark, stoic face that had once been too subtly etched for me to read. I wasn't the only one lying awake at night, fevered with memories, tossing, turning, soaking my sheets, burning up--not for Fae sex, but him, damn it all to hell, him.

Walk out of this with your parents, the stones, and Darroc dead, Ms. Lane, and I‘ll give you the bloody thing.

Ryodan doesn’t like Mac. He never has. She got between him and his best boy-bud. I give him a look. “I’ll tell you a secret, Ryodan. You mess with her, Barrons’ll kill you.” I drag a finger across my neck. “Just like that. You aren’t all that. Barrons’ll stomp your ass, hand’s down.” He smiles faintly. “I’ll be damned. You have a crush on Barrons.” “I do not have a crush—“ “You do, too. It’s all over your face. Anybody could see it.” “Sometimes, boss, you’re just wrong.” “I’m never wrong. You might as well take out a billboard. ‘Dani O’Malley thinks Jericho Barrons is hot.’ My offer to teach you is still open. Save you from future embarrassment. If I can see it on your face, he can, too. ” “He never figured it out before,” I grumble then realize I just admitted it. Ryodan has a tricky way of wording things that makes you say things you didn’t mean to say. “Maybe I’ll ask Barrons to teach me,” I mutter and turn away from the stairs, heading for his office. I run smack into his chest. “Dude, move. Trying to get somewhere here.” “No one but me is ever going to teach you, Dani.” He touches me before I see it coming, has his hand under my chin, turning my face up. My shiver is instant and uncontrollable. “That’s non-negotiable. You signed a contract with me that grants exclusivity. You won’t like it if you try to break it.

Barrons Books and Baubles had been ransacked! Tables were overturned, books torn from shelves and strewn everywhere, baubles broken. Even my little TV behind the counter had been destroyed. "Barrons?" I called warily. It was night and the lights were on. My illusory Alina had told me more than an hour had passed. Was it the same night, nearly dawn? Or was it the night following our theft attempt? Had Barrons come back from Wales yet? Or was he still there, searching for me? When I‘d been so rudely ripped from reality, who or what had come through those basement doors? I heard footsteps, boots on hardwood, and turned expectantly toward the connecting doors. Barrons was framed in the doorway. His eyes were black ice. He stared at me a moment, raking me from head to toe. "Nice tan, Ms. Lane. So, where the fuck have you been for the past month?

He will give them to my sidhe-seers," Rowena said sternly. "We will place the stones." Barrons gave her an incredulous look with the subtle arch of a brow. "In whose f*cking reality do you think that's going to happen?" "You have no business being involved." "Old woman, I don't like you," Barrons said coldly. "Be careful around me. Be very, very careful." Rowena closed her mouth, perched her glasses on her nose, and pursed her lips. I looked at V'lane. "Did you bring the fourth stone?" He looked at Barrons. "Did he bring his three?" Barrons bared his teeth at V'lane. V'lane hissed. The Keltar growled. And so it went.

His voice worked on me like an aphrodisiac. I was wet and ready. I had been since he began speaking. For two months, I'd been trapped in a Fae-induced sexual frenzy, having constant, incredible sex with him, while listening to his voice, smelling his scent. Like one of Pavlov's dogs, I'd been conditioned by repeated stimuli to have a guaranteed response. My body anticipated, greedily expected pleasure in his presence. I inhaled, caught myself straining for the scent of him, forced it back out, and closed my eyes, as if maybe I could hide behind my own lids from an ironic truth : V'lane and Barrons had swapped roles. I was no longer sexually vulnerable to the death-by-sex Fae Prince. Jericho Barrons was my poison now.

Don‘t do it. I let you push me pretty far sometimes, but not this time. I will not have you put your"—it took me a moment to find the right words—"sorcerer‘s brand on me, so you can hunt me down whenever and wherever you please. And that, Jericho Barrons, is non-negotiable." Well done, Ms. Lane. Just when I think you‘re all useless fluff and nails, you show me some teeth." You win. This time. I won‘t tattoo you. Not today. But in lieu of that, you will do something for me. Refuse and I tattoo you. And, Ms. Lane, if I chain you up one more time tonight, there‘ll be no more talking. I‘ll gag you.

He places the last pillow on the pile and looks at me. He jerks his head to the pile of pillows. “I watched you die. I need to fuck you Mac.” The words slam into me like bullets taking my knees out. I lean back against a piece of furniture-an armoire I think. I really don’t care. It holds me up. It wasn’t a request. It was an acknowledgement of a requirement to make it from this moment to the next like I need a transfusion my body has been poisoned. “Do you want me to ” There is no purr or coyness or seduction in his voice. There is a question that needs an answer. Bare bones. That’s what he’s after. That’s what he offers. “Yes.

Barrons stood inside the front door, dripping cool old-world elegance. I hadn’t heard him come in over the music. He was leaning, shoulder against the wall, arms folded, watching me. “ ‘One eye is taken for an eye . . .’ ” I trailed off, deflating. I didn’t need a mirror to know how stupid I looked. I regarded him sourly for a moment, then moved for the sound dock to turn it off. When I heard a choked sound behind me I spun, and shot him a hostile glare. He wore his usual expression of arrogance and boredom. I resumed my path for the sound dock, and heard it again. This time when I turned back, the corners of his mouth were twitching. I stared at him until they stopped. I’d reached the sound dock, and just turned it off, when he exploded. I whirled. “I didn’t look that funny,” I snapped. His shoulders shook. “Oh, come on! Stop it!” He cleared his throat and stopped laughing. Then his gaze took a quick dart upward, fixed on my blazing MacHalo, and he lost it again. I don’t know, maybe it was the brackets sticking out from the sides. Or maybe I should have gotten a black bike helmet, not a hot pink one. I unfastened it and yanked it off my head. I stomped over to the door, flipped the interior lights back on, slammed him in the chest with my brilliant invention, and stomped upstairs. “You’d better have stopped laughing by the time I come back down,” I shouted over my shoulder. I wasn’t sure he even heard me, he was laughing so hard.

I stay back, because if i get close I'll have to roll him over and look in his eyes, and what if they're empty like Alina's were ? Then I'll know he's gone, like I knew she was gone, too far beyond my reach to ever hear my voice again, to hear me say, I'm sorry, Alina. I wish I'd called more often; I wish I'd heard the truth beneath our vapid sister talk; I wish I'd come to Dublin and fought beside you, or raged at you, because you were acting from fear, too, Alina, not hope at all, or you would have trusted me to help you. Or maybe just apologize, Barrons, for being too young to have my priorities reffined, like you, because I haven't suffered whatever the hell it is you suffered, and then shove you up against a wall and kiss you until you can't breathe, do what I wanted to do the first day I saw you there in your bloody damned bookstore. Disturb you like you disturbed me, make you see me, make you want me-pink me!-shatter your self-control, bring you crashing to your knees in front of me, even though I told myself I'd never want a man like you, that you were too old, too carnal, more animal than man, with one foot in the swamp and no desire to come all the way out, when the truth was that I was terrified by what you made me feel.

He misinterpreted it. "It is a gift," he said stiffly. Wounded, proud prince. I touched his face. He'd given me my mom and dad, my whole town, the entire state of Georgia back. "I was shaking my head at something I was thinking, not your words. Yes, I'd like to have your name, V'lane." He gave me that brilliant smile again, then his mouth was on mine. This time, when he kissed me, the unpronounceable Fae name slid sweeter than tupelo honey across my tongue and pooled there, warm and delicious, filling my mouth with a feast of taste and sensation beyond description before melting into the meat of it. Unlike the other times he's implanted his name in my tongue, it felt natural, unobtrusive. Also unlike those times, I wasn't battered by an erotic attack, forced into orgasm by his touch. It was an extraordinary kiss, but it invited without invading, gave without taking. He drew back. "We are learning from each other," he said. "I begin to understand Adam." I blinked. "The first man ? You know about Adam and Eve ?" V'lane didn't seem the kind to study human creation myths. "No. One of my race that chose to become human," he clarified. "Ah, Barrons comes growling." He gave the startling equivalent of a human snicker and was gone. I reached instinctively for my spear. It was back in the holster. I frowned. I'd forgotten to check. Had it ever been gone ? I turned. "Growling" was a mild word for it. Barrons stood in the doorway, and if looks could kill, I'd have been flayed alive in the street.

One of the most fundamental problems in the spiritual order is that we sense within ourselves the hunger for God, but we attempt to satisfy it with some created good that is less than God. Thomas Aquinas said that the four typical substitutes for God are wealth, pleasure, power, and honor. Sensing the void within, we attempt to fill it up with some combination of these four things, but only by emptying out the self in love can we make the space for God to fill us. The classical tradition referred to this errant desire as "concupiscence," but I believe that we could neatly express the same idea with the more contemporary term "addiction." When we try to satisfy the hunger for God with something less than God, we will naturally be frustrated, and then in our frustration, we will convince ourselves that we need more of that finite good, so we will struggle to achieve it, only to find ourselves again, necessarily, dissatisfied. At this point, a sort of spiritual panic sets in, and we can find ourselves turning obsessively around this creaturely good that can never in principle make us happy.