Vampires and Sexy Romance by Mercy Walker, Eva Sloan, Ella Stone

setting.  “I’m going to be your beard.”
    “You’re going to be his what?”  Dante looked completely confused.
    “His beard,” Lucy answered.  She looked up into Gabriel’s scorching gaze.  “So you’re gay and you don’t want your family to know.  Well, I wouldn’t have guessed.  Course, it’s hard to tell nowadays.”
    “I’m not gay,” Gabriel said flatly.
    “Not that it’s any of my business, but I think trying to hide that kind of thing from your folks isn’t good for you.”
    Gabriel looked taken aback.  
    “I mean, stress like that can ruin your complexion.  Not to mention put lines on your face before their time.”
    “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”  Gabriel shook his head and Lucy saw that his fists were balled up.  “I’m not gay.  But there’s nothing wrong with being so.”  He shot her through with his eyes.  “Only low people still find homosexuality something to hate or be embarrassed about.”
    Whoa…this guy is serious as a heart attack, Lucy smiled.    More interesting .  And kind of likable, if you ignore the whole “low people” barb.
    But, Lucy peered up at Gabriel Enoch’s exacerbated face , I like yanking his chain.
    “So, Gabe…then your family’s a bunch of bigots?”
    The look on Gabriel’s face turned downright scary.  He bent down, one of his fists on the table, lowering his face to mere inches from Lucy’s.   “My family is none of you goddamn business.”
    Lucy felt a stab of fear.  But instead of leaning away from him, she leaned toward him, her smile still in place but her eyes turning cold.  That wonderful annoyed heat was building in her head again.  It was such a relief, how that feeling seemed to clear her head and make her calm.  Well, calm wasn’t quite the word for it.
    Determined maybe?  That heat seemed to let her see where she was supposed to go, what she wanted, and what she needed to do to get it.
    “Then my family and my motifs are none of you goddamn business either.  And I’m not a prostitute, so quit looking at me like I am!”
    A smile flickered across his lips.  There was something, suddenly, passing through the air between them.  Be it something sinister of simply a trick of hormones, but whatever it was made Lucy’s toes curl and the back of her neck tingle.
    He smells so good…
    But he is such a jerk!
    The heat evaporated from Gabriel’s expression as he straightened to his full height.  He was smiling and shaking his head.  Lucy didn’t like his smile.  She liked him better when she was pissing him off.
    “She’ll do,” he told his uncle, and then he nodded to Lucy as he started to walk away.
    “Gabriel?”  Dante said.  “Where are you going?  There is much to discus.”
    Gabriel spoke as he walked to the door:  “You know the terms we need.  I’m certain you can handle things from here.”
    And with that Gabriel Enoch was gone out the front door, disappearing into the bright Californian daylight.
    Luvici sat down and pawed through the menu.  Dante turned and looked at Lucy.  She couldn’t stop smiling.  Had she passed the test?  What came next?  She was seeing the sparkling diamond at the end of her journey again.  And this time, it was twice as big as before.
    Dante sat down, shaking his head and then looked up at his lunch guests with a weary look in his eyes.  That look extinguished when Luvici called out an order for a bottle of Chateau Margaux 1995, and an appetizer of oysters.
    “Very well, Francis.”  Luvici glared at Dante, but didn’t say anything back.  “Shall we order?  Then we can talk business?”
    “Fine by me.”  Luvici went on to order a huge and exurbanite meal.  French onion soup and a Cesar salad—as if his breath needed any help being disgusting.   Then he ordered a porterhouse steak (rare) with provolone cheese and scampi shrimp on top.  Throw in a baked potato with butter, sour cream, bacon bits and chives, and Lucy