Lucern waved the apology away. He had turned the alarm off himself, so she had nothing to apologize for. And he didn't think she'd appreciate knowing that he'd crept into her room while she was sleeping. She most definitely wouldn't want to know that after finishing the task, he'd found himself standing at the side of the bed just watching her sleep for a while, staring with fascination at her innocent expression in sleep, watching the rise and fall of the bunnies on her flannel nightgown as she breathed. How he'd wanted to pull the top of that oh-so-proper nightgown away from her throat to see the pulse beating there. No, she definitely wouldn't want to know all that, so he kept it to himself and sipped his coffee again.
The drink was bitter, but an oddly tasty brew. Lucern couldn't think why he'd avoided it all these years. True, he'd been warned that the stimulant in coffee would hit his body twice as hard as a human's, but he really hadn't noticed any effects yet. Of course, he'd only had a couple sips so far. Perhaps he shouldn't risk any more. He set the cup down.
"So, what are we doing?" he asked abruptly, to get Kate off the topic of not waking up to check on him last night.
"Well, I've been dividing the letters into categories. A lot of them have similar themes or questions, such as requests as to whether you'll write Lucern's or Bastien's story next," she explained. "So I've been putting all those asking that question in one pile. That way, you can write a form letter for each pile, reducing the letters you write to twenty or so rather than hundreds and hundreds."
"Of course, it would be nice if you read each letter and wrote a line or two to personalize your response," she added, sounding tentative.
Lucern supposed she thought that the idea of all that work would annoy him. Which it did. He couldn't help but grumble, "I did not suffer these difficulties with my other books."
"Other books?" She blinked in confusion, then said, "Oh. You mean your historical texts. Well, that was different. Those were nonfiction. Most of them are used in universities and such. Students rarely write fan letters."
Lucern grimaced and gulped down another mouthful of coffee. It helped stop him from telling her that his novels were nonfiction as well, and that they were just peddled as vampire romance.
"Anyway, I think we have enough categories to make a start. I can tell you what each category is, and you can compose a sort of general response to each while I continue to sort the rest of the letters," she suggested.
Nodding his acquiescence, Lucern crossed his arms and waited.
"Wouldn't you like to get a pen and paper or something?" she asked after a moment. "So you don't forget any of them? There are at least twenty categories and—"
"I have an excellent memory," Lucern announced. "Proceed."
Kate turned in a slow circle, apparently trying to decide where to start. "Dear God, he sounds like that bald guy in The King and I," he heard her mutter.
Lucern knew he wasn't supposed to hear that, but he had spectacular hearing. He quite enjoyed her exasperation, so he added to it by commenting, "You mean Yul Brynner."
She jerked around to eye him with alarm, and he nodded. "He played the king of Siam, and did an excellent job of it."
Kate hesitated; then, apparently deciding that he wasn't angry, she relaxed a bit and even managed a smile. "It's one of my favorite movies."
"Oh, did they make a movie of it?" he asked with interest. "I saw it live on stage on opening night."
When she appeared rather doubtful, he realized that admitting to seeing the Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway show—which had premiered in 1951, if he wasn't mistaken—was rather dating himself. As he looked to be in his mid-thirties, it was no wonder she appeared taken aback. Clearing his throat, he added, "The revival of course. It hit Broadway in 1977, I believe."
Her eyebrows rose. "You must have been all of… what? Seven? Eight?"
Unwilling to lie, Lucern merely grunted. He added, "I have an excellent memory."
"Yes. Of course you do." Kate sighed and picked up a letter. She read aloud, " 'Dear Mr. Argeneau. I read and adored Love Bites, volumes one and two. But the first was my favorite. You truly have a talent! The medieval feel to that novel was so gritty and realistic that I could almost believe you were there.'" Kate paused and glanced up. "All the letters in this stack are along that line, praising you for the realism of your writing and the fact that it reads as if you were actually there."
When Lucern merely nodded, she frowned. "Well?"
"Well, what?" he asked with surprise.
"That reader is right."
"That reader is right?" She gaped at him. "That's what you're going to write? 'Dear reader, You're right?'"
Lucern shrugged mildly, wondering why she was raising her voice. The reader was right. His books did read as if he'd been there in medieval times. Because he had been. Not during the precise time period when his parents met, but not long afterward—and in those days, change was slow enough that little had differed.