So Claudia needn't be in the room for this after all. This is an amendment for Louis alone, a stipulation spoken into the warm slip of space between them.

It should be easy to give. It should be. But Louis is still quiet, meeting Lestat's eyes without straying. (Thinking of an altar, Lestat's hand on his chest. The first time he'd tasted blood in Lestat's mouth as they'd kissed.)

"I never wanna smell her on you again," Louis tells him. "I want you to take care of it before the week is out."

Does this fix everything? It feels as if it might, in the moment. It's easier to think of Antoinette's mingling with Lestat's on that record than it is to think of the rest. The imprint of a head on the glossy wood of his own casket. Lestat's fingers hooked into his jaw, dragging his body along the pavement stones. The long years of simmering resentment and ever widening distance between them.

Even in the scant light, Lestat's eyes are so very blue. His skin is warming under Louis' fingers, and if Louis pressed down, he know Lestat would wince, or tense. Some sign of reaction that Louis doesn't know whether or not he wants again.

"Tell me she's nothing to you."