" You came. You left. You died. You are dead," murmured Brian tragically if not a little dramatically.

I stared at him in horror.

"You cannot recite that. Not only is it terrible as a poem but its also quite horrible," I muttered shortly. Glancing up at Lucian's bent head I saw that he too had found it funny. Lips twitched up at the corner was a dead give away. I shook my head disapprovingly at him. Knowing that he noticed my reprimand even with his head bent over his work.

We were gathered in the library. Nicky and Brian tinkered with putting together verses to their perverse version of poetry. I sat with baby Ian in my arms. There was no way I would be calling him Christian or Chris even.

I had all but made a mad dash to Lucian's room where infant Ian lay cuddled up asleep. A newborn was so delicate. Fragile to say the least. I couldn't believe Lucian had been taking care of Ian himself this past week but he had been and was apparently an overnight expert in caring for Ian.

I raised the fresh faced babe to my lips and brushed my lips against his soft sweet smelling forehead. I couldn't help myself. It must have been my hundredth kiss. I was sure I resembled a frightful hen dropping her head ever so often to peck into the dirt. Not that Ian was anything close to resembling dirt.

I cooed at him. Making ridiculous baby sounds. Purposely miss pronouncing each word I uttered to give it a cooing quality. The ridiculous smile on my face wouldn't go away either. I was sure I looked stupid staring besottedly at my baby.

But I couldn't help that either.

"Its bed time for you, Brian," said Lucian, casually. It was actually well past everyone's bedtime. Brian and I had ordered in pizza. We fed ourselves while I watched Lucian feed the baby a bottle of milk and changed him for bed. But all that was hours ago. No one had any interest in turning in to our own respective beds for the night. Not that Nicky or Lucian needed anything as mundane as sleep. But they did it anyway simply because they could. But they were as keyed up as Brian and me, so we had instead absconded ourselves in the library just to be awake together.

I glanced away reluctantly from baby Ian and looked up at the pouting Brian. He acted so much older than his age at most times that I tended to forget his real age.

" Lucian's right, darling. You need your sleep. You're still a growing boy," I said softly. Brian rose reluctantly to his feet throwing down his pen as he did. Shuffling reluctant feet my way he dropped down low enough to drop me a kiss on the cheek. I pulled him in for a hug and kissed his cheeks back.

"Good night, sleep tight and don't let the bed bugs bite," I said automatically.

Brian paused to gaze first at me and then at Lucian. "I think that might be more apropos to you."

I stared up at him in shock. And then the most bizzare snort of laughter errupted from me. Lucian a freaking bed bug! It was so apt.

I must have gotten quite hysterical in my laughter because I found myself bundled up in Lucian's arms, baby and all. A moment later and we were in his room. I hadn't wanted to sleep in his bed knowing that he had shared it with his wife but Lucian was not one to cater to such sentimental mumbo jumbo.

" Its a bloody bed. Nothing more!" Had been Lucian's prosaic response. I couldn't come up with anything against that. For it was a bed. Just one he had shared in the past with his wife and his many girlfriends before that.

But Lucian had a response to that too.

"That was only because I couldn't have you."

I couldn't see the logic in that. Not back then and certainly not now.

"So you're saying you'd be okay in sleeping in the bed I had shared with Damon?" Had been my response to this.

But boy had that been the wrong thing to say. Still things had quietened down once I pointed out that it was him, Lucian who had taken my virginity.

So the matter of my discomfort with the bed choice was brushed aside.

I laid down reluctantly on the bed and watched as Lucian settled Ian in his crib.

The bed linen fluttered in the gust of wind then Lucian was sliding in beside me. Cold and naked. Just the way I liked him. All thoughts on beds and what not fled from my mind. There was only Lucian and his large frame enveloping mine. Our breaths and limbs entangled as we meshed together with ungainly eagerness.