Every once in a while, John was struck by the sheer impossibility of his life. He was a trained scientist, someone whose career was specifically and fully engaged in clear thinking and the scientific method. And he was one of God's soldiers, with an entire arsenal stuffed into the basement of his new home, who was capable of things that no amount of hand-waving could fit into anything even remotely resembling a logical pattern. He had given up someone whose very heartbeat was tailored to his, walked away from her for someone so evil he couldn't even get near her without his skin crawling and scorching. He was more than half-sure he'd die for the choice, and he grieved for his loss almost every day...and he'd never felt so alive, or more certain that he'd made the right decision. He existed in a perpetual state of paradox, of reason juxtaposed with instinct, of science with magic, evil with holiness. It was no freaking wonder God sent him to Rhydin. He should have been a native.

He rolled out of the Hypokeimenon and into the space just cornering the back alley. Anyone walking past would have been blinded by the flapping of the street's lantern in the stiff breeze hissing over the snowy street, just for so long as it took him to emerge. A shivering minute later, he was inside.

She was already there, speaking with the host while she pulled off her coat. "There, you see, here's my companion now. And I do know that Mr. Grey called ahead to let you know we were coming. Is our table ready?"

Her companion headed that way, wishing he'd had a chance to get his coat out of the lab before he was told to get the f*ck out for the day.

"Of course. Right this way, please." The host, a charming young scion of the family-run restaurant, led them toward their table with a flirtatious smile for Morana and a quick wink for John while he seated them with menus and a wine list. "Maria will be right with you, bella donna, bell'uomo. Please let me know if there's anything else you want." It was, perhaps (or perhaps not) coincidentally the same mostly-isolated table they'd shared almost ten months before.

"Hi." He looked at the menu again, mostly to determine that nothing had changed, and stuffed his hands in his armpits. "I still need love," he informed her. "But I'm being good."

Her smile turned up amused while she skimmed the menu, "Why ever would you do such a thing as be good, John? It seems so boring." By the time Maria arrived to take their order just moments after the charming young host stepped away, she was ready to order?a dry Pinot Noir and veal Marsala over angel-hair pasta.

"You say that now," he mumbled, after following suit with some gigantic 'Tour of Italia' thing that involved linguini with clams, a bowl of pasta e fagioli and a piece of thousand-layer lasagna roughly the size of his head. No wine for John. He sucked down half a glass of water like he thought it might help with the slow frying of his nerves in her presence.

Maria thoughtfully left the pitcher of water before she left to put in their order. Morana laughed quietly, reached for her own water glass. "Yes, I do. Please, don't hold back for my sake." There was blue shimmering through and behind the dark chocolate of her eyes, and she'd never put her hair back up. The graze on her cheek looked like it had been taken a day before instead of just after noon.

He didn't hold back. Instead, he just looked at her for a minute. Looked at her like his bones were melting, like she was already under him and nothing else in the world existed, like there was no chance that servers and other diners could see his expression as he sat there in a wheelchair with a half-full glass of water in hand and no excuse for that look. And out of all that frustrated heat, he asked her,
"How much was the forensics team able to get from the first crew?"

Her mouth curved up into an amused smile and she took a long sip of the ice-cold water before she answered. Her eyes were half-lidded, sultry under the pressure of his melting gaze, and her voice was perfectly composed. "Not much; Keeya and the male elf were?are?fraternal twins, while the second male is at least half troll. They test as precisely racial-standard with the expected magical residue for the abilities they displayed. Their attack was planned very well and there is little to no indication of their presence anywhere close to the building until just before they moved."

"You mind if I read the reports you get off this second crew?" He had another drink, the ice clinking along the glass, his throat working slow and steady.

"Not at all, darling. I think it will be at least another day before we reopen the Gira building, so you should have a bit of free time. If you want to spend it reading forensic reports you're more than welcome." She leaned forward, flipped her hair back from where it fell forward. "Would you like to look over the first set yourself, as well?" Pardon her while she watched him drink, eventually pulled her eyes away to look around the restaurant in a vaguely paranoid check of the surroundings.

"You did her?" oh, look, here was the soup. He shut up for a second while it was being delivered. The salad arrived with the soup, and while he watched, Morana treated Maria to a melting smile that probably confused the poor girl nearly as badly as he?d been by Mr. Grey. Once the waitress moved on, she looked back at John curiously, waiting for the rest of the suspended sentence. "?because she threatened me," he finished in the post-waitress silence, and gave her inquiring face.

"Yes." Her answer was calm and not terribly helpful in the way of explanation.

He was quiet with the soup for a minute or two, as he worked his way down the exact same logical path he'd traveled earlier in the day. Apparently she felt no pressing need to break the silence, alternating every few bites of salad with a small sip of the wine Maria had also delivered. She was watching him while she ate, though, and it finally drove him to speak. "I have to say," he said, "that I never really understood the phrase 'a piece of work' until I met you. Not really."

The corners of her mouth turned up again while she asked, "What do you mean, darling?" The salad was gone, the glass of wine half-empty.

"I get lost. Every time." He refilled his water glass. "You could have gotten more information out of her." The beans swam around in the bowl, chased by his spoon. He glanced over the edge of his glasses at her before taking another bite.

"Mmm." She folded her napkin back into her lap and leaned back slightly with her glass of wine in hand. "Yes, I could have. But why do you say you get lost, darling?"

"Circular thinking." He spun a whirlpool into the diminishing soup with the spoon. "It'd be nice to know when you're lying and when you're telling the truth, too." He reached out and brushed the side of his thumb down the 'scratch' on her cheek.

She laughed at that, soft and rich. "I'm sure you can guess how many times I've heard that, John." She opened her mouth, about to continue, and broke off while Maria arrived with the veal, the lasagna, the linguini, and another glass of wine. "Thank you, darling." The waitress, growing even more flustered, gathered the salad plate and the empty wine glass before she whisked off out of sight. "Was there something in particular you wanted an answer for?"

"I'm not big into threesomes, just so you know," he commented as Miss Flustered whisked off, and dug into the linguini. "And...I think you know already. But if you want me to spell it all out, I will." He surveyed his kingdom of food, trying to decide where to start. Maybe he really wasn't avoiding her eyes; maybe it was a coincidence of the moment. Maybe she just liked watching him squirm. He felt a little sorry for the waitress, the kind of 'sorry for' that involved a lot of empathy.

"Oh, she's just a bit of practice." Her smile was winsome across the table while she picked up her knife for neat bite-sized pieces of the tender wine-sauced veal. "Please, darling. Humor me."

"You could have talked to her for another couple of hours, but as soon as she threatened me you were done. Why..." he trailed off without finishing the sentence, spun up a forkful of the linguini and ate it while he tried to focus his thoughts. "What am I, to you?"

She took a bite of the veal, appearing to consider the question or the food (or both), and finally answered with a little curve of a smile and blue riding through the brown of her eyes. "You're mine, John, didn't you tell me that? Until I used you up or pushed you too far." The fork tinkled gently against the plate when she set it down. "And I want to keep you; you're valuable to me." The blue was melting from a gentle wash to bright flaring sparks that fought red and black in her gaze across the table at him. She paused, and her next words were quiet and rough as if they?d been forced through her throat. "I want you, John."

He watched it all take place in absolute silence, even his breath caught. When she was done, he went on watching the war in her gaze for a moment longer, and didn't know whether to congratulate himself or be angry for doubting. All the signs pointed to its being nothing but the truth. She didn't have to lie to him anymore. Not about that. But when she was the lie, how could she stop herself? How much of a shift in her worldview might it be for her to even consider it? "You know," he said finally, slowly, "that a different answer wouldn't have changed anything."

"I know." Her smile ticked up again while she picked up her fork, her knife, freed another bite of veal from the plate. "You're a man of your word. But I find that it's... easier to tell you the truth, when I tell you something." The blue shimmered in brief, glowing triumph before it melted into chocolate brown. "It makes you dangerous to me."

She took such a visceral pleasure in everything from eating to being looked at while she was walking around in those f*cking ridiculously high heels. How was he supposed to be able to think straight when her aura burned him and she ate like that? He frowned down at the linguini, snuck another sidelong glance at her. Yep, still eating. On the good side, he'd been thoroughly distracted from his earlier fears. "So is there going to come a time when you decide that the danger outweighs what you want?" He was pretty impressed with how even his tone continued to be.

It took a few moments before she lifted her glass for a sip of the wine and finally answered him. "I don't know, darling. It's possible, of course, but not close at hand. And while DeMuer is a threat I don't think it likely at all."

"Likely at all that...what, about DeMuer?" He was never, ever going to understand the way her head worked. It was fun to try, sometimes, but he really had no freaking clue. "What does he have to do with this?"

"I don't think it likely that your danger will outweigh your value to me while DeMuer is still a threat." She was calm as she rephrased herself. The blue was still lurking there over chocolate brown, though little fiery sparks were starting to flash up in protest. "He's becoming more aggressive."

He paused at that, lasagna halfway to his mouth. Then he popped it in, turned, and caught poor Maria's eye. "Hi," he said to her when she edged back over to their table. "Changed my mind. Could you bring a bottle of what she's having to the table, please, and a glass for me?" He knew the Pinot Noir wouldn't be a happy marriage with the linguini. Not only did he not f*cking care, he found it suddenly appropriate. Wine atop three scotches. This was going to be interesting.

"Of course, signore." Poor Maria was blushing fiercely as she took the request and hurried away; it only took her a few minutes to return with a fresh bottle of the wine already opened and a new glass for John.

Morana's eyes were shimmering with laughter, just a little crease there at the corners, as she purred out to the girl. "Grazie, mia dolce."

"Thank you," he echoed, and poured himself a rather full glass. As soon as Maria was out of earshot he said, calmly, "So your point is that it's to my advantage to cause trouble for you?" There went half the glass, just as smoothly as the water had gone down. He rolled the last mouthful back and forth across his tongue and waited for her answer.

A quick laugh pulled free while she took another sip of wine, alternating it with the remainder of her veal and pasta. "Darling, if you were the cause of the trouble I wouldn't have to do anything; Malloy would take care of it for me. My point is that you're an ally, useful and valuable, and I don't like to waste my assets." Every word shimmered the blue he was coming to associate with truth across her eyes.

"You don't think I could get around him?" He'd run out of linguini. Shifting over full-time to the lasagna, he finished off the glass, poured another.

A thoughtful look stole over her features, contemplative. "That's a very good question. Of course, you have abilities he doesn't - but darling, I make it a point to hire the best whenever possible. Malloy is very, very good." Her smile turned up one corner of her mouth, then. "He's very unhappy about you as it is."

"Because I walked into your office without knocking?" He shook his head at that and limited himself to a more conservative sip. It was a little oaky, a little tannin-heavy. Still, really drinkable. Went better with the lasagna than the linguini, for sure, which made him grin at her.

Grin for grin and a laugh while she leaned forward slightly across the table. "I think right now it's because I let you in on the questioning and because this latest..." She wiggled her fingers a little to indicate the assassination attempt, "happened while I was at the building you work in. That's twice you've been there, to his mind."

This reminded him, ?You haven?t told me what happened." He offered the bottle.

She accepted and refilled her glass. "Mmm. I went in early this morning, remember? It was for a meeting with Director Aiken; I left from the Throne with Mr. Grey by cab and we were in conference from... oh, just after seven until half past noon or so. And on the way out of the building, I felt my wards warping, slipping from my grasp. Then they opened fire, from the rooftop of the Temple of Mammon." Little flames were burning up in her eyes, scorching her voice beneath the outward calmness. "I killed one of them and disabled Keeya; the guards took care of the other."

It was his turn to turn a casually paranoid glance around the dining room. No sly and rapacious elves to be seen. "That was where his smart-assed remark came from about the car, I guess."

"Mmm. He's very paranoid, really, but also probably right." That sounded a little rueful as she picked up the small dessert menu and slid one finger over the choices there. "Of course he knows that I don't have to have a car to get around; it makes his security easier in some ways, but does rather put a damper on the bodyguard idea he'd presented." Her eyes flicked back up to his face, her expression thoughtful.

"Tiramisu," he told her. "So, okay." Think, think, think. It was getting kind of hard to do. "You realize I've never seen you naked? How'd they know you were over there?"

She blinked at his question about nakedness, and then her laughter rolled out rich as sin and the coffee-cream of his suggested dessert. "Would you like that, John? It can be arranged." Poor Maria was nine kinds of confused by that laugh as she appeared to collect empty plates and take the dessert order.

Once Maria had left, Morana's curve of smile eased down. "That is the question right now. The appointment was on my books, of course."

"Yes. No. Yes." Wait. They were talking about the assassins. With the plate out of the way, he propped an elbow on the table and dropped his chin into his palm. This was an equally thoughtful squint. "So. Anyone who had access to them, or who knew about the car, or who was...watching either building..."

"Mmm." She made a sound of agreement while she mimicked his position and looked at him across the table. "You have a beautiful mouth, darling. I believe Malloy is concerned about observers right now, and possibly someone who has access to my official schedule."

"They got into your wards." Hey, she'd never seen him naked. Not that that was any big prize. Hell, she'd never even seen him with his shirt off.

"Yes. The woman, Keeya - she was able to take them from me. I think, given what she said there at the end, I have an idea of how she might have done it. Unfortunately, if she did what I think she might have, it's not something I have a very effective defense against, yet." Her finger tapped against her lower lip while she studied him. Her focus was surely a relief for poor Maria when the waitress returned with the tiramisu and two long-handled spoons.

Oh, poor Maria. Some fit of perversity made him say to the waitress, "Tell her I get the bigger half." It was the first time he'd really taken a good look at the waitress. Not that he'd ignored her, but he'd been more focused on Morana.

Maria was attractive, dusky-dark and looking straight off a Nexus-point from Sicily with lush curves and thick coarse curls of hair that surely usually gathered her a lot more attention than John had previously spared. Now Maria blushed furiously and stammered as she turned to Morana, "I - Bella donna, the man, you - " And when Morana looked up at the woman with a sultry warm smile, the poor girl turned and fled back to the kitchen.

He'd never taken his chin out of his hand. After watching the young woman flee, he shifted his gaze back to her, fingers drumming against his chin. "Okay. I could possibly be persuaded to rethink the threesome if you promised me you wouldn't break her in half." The weight of the alcohol was the only way he managed to say it with a straight face.

There was her laugh again, mirth and sheer amusement brighter than the seduction. "But darling, I really can't promise that." She reached over and offered him one of the two spoons. "But if you want the bigger half of dessert - "

"I cut, you pick?" He grimaced at her, then sectioned off a corner of the slab, roughly a quarter of the total. Then he looked hopefully at her. And while the ice and fire of being so near to her lashed at him, and he fell in love with her all over again, and it occurred to him that he'd had too much to drink to safely give the ketamine in his pocket a shot, he said, "Why can't it be simpler than that?"

She was laughing again, at the uneven division and his hopeful look. She added another section to the tiramisu, leaving roughly two-thirds closer to him on the plate. "Why can't which be simpler than what, John?"

"Okay." He struggled to focus. "I'm sorry. I need you to be honest with me for just a second. This pertains. Does he know about me?"

"I don't believe so, no." Her voice was serious as she took a spoon of the cream and coffee-soaked pastry. "Unless he managed to pick up on you the other day and put together far more pieces than I believe he has."

"Wait." He frowned fiercely at her. Maybe sugar would help. He ate a few bites of tiramisu, and then tried again. Speaking with each syllable distinct as a knife-cut, he asked, "Does Chief Malloy know what I am." Yes. Definitely drunk.

"No, of course not." After she licked away a little bit of cream from the corner of her mouth, she added, "He knows there's something unusual about you - after all, you did manage to slide right into my office, and you keep shorting out his cameras when you do, but other than that? No."

"Okay." All that frown went away. He pushed himself back in his chair and spread his arms, spoon in one hand and empty wineglass in the other. Ta-da! "I need a pet name for you," he told her then, as if the entire earlier conversation had been completely resolved.

She leaned back in her chair and asked in a voice rich with humor, "Why is that, darling? And do you want to explain here, or at your place? I believe there was a request for nakedness..." Oh, poor, poor Maria. Of course Morana had timed the comment for the woman's arrival with the bill.

He blinked up at the bill. He followed the deliverer of the bill's arm up to its source. "Tell her," he said to Maria, "that if I can feel her, why can't someone else?"

Maria didn't even try to relay that message, just tried to unobtrusively melt into the carpet while she waited for the bill to be paid. Morana, on the other hand, had gone wide-eyed with the question. Then her eyes narrowed again, thoughtfully, and she tapped one finger absently against her cheek. "You see, John. You're valuable for more than your pretty face."

"It's pretty simple, huh," he said to Maria, and emptied the contents of his pocket out onto the table. Stack of gambling chips, handful of gold, credit, work ID, bottle of ketamine. He dug through it and offered the credit to the girl. "He doesn't know I can feel her. He probably doesn't know she can be felt. Wanna come home with us?"

"I - oh - " And the girl fled with the credit, blushing furiously. Morana, meanwhile, had picked up on the chips, the gold, and finally the bottle of ketamine with an arch of her eyebrows. Across the restaurant, Maria was still blushing while she pointed them out to the eponymous Vinny.

"Uh." He watched Maria go, filled his shirt pocket with all those goodies instead. "I think that was a no. Sorry, your deepest darkest fantasy is going to have to wait for another day. What about 'P*ssy Willow'?" Then Vinny was headed to the table. Which reminded him of the earlier incident with Grey.

Vinny returned with the slip for signature and John's card, and his voice was a threatening rumble. "Signore, Signora, I hope that you enjoyed your meal." It was a not-so-subtle hint to leave. Morana gave Vinny one of those brilliantly seductive smiles while she set her napkin on the table.

John shut up, fast, and scowled at the slip as he signed it. MFF? Sure. Anything else? Not so much. What if something...touched? But wait, he thought as he handed back the slip. He'd been seriously digging on the guy with the nobody face.

"I don't know if 'P*ssy Willow' rolls off the tongue, darling." The words did, drolly amused as she gathered her coat, patted Vinny's cheek and left him stunned and stammering nearly as badly as Maria. "Shall I meet you at your place? Or will you be entertaining fantasies of sweet Maria instead?"

"Yeah." Wait. "I mean, yes, meet me there." He considered, added just in case, "please." He gave Vinny a look that was more than a little sympathetic, backed up from the table and rolled for the front door.

"Of course, darling." Her swaying stride barely limped at all as she followed John to the door and left Vinny devastated in her wake. Once she was outside, around the corner, she Stepped through Void to John's nifty split-level rented house.