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Mick
In the firelight, they're beautiful – his best friend and the girl he loves. Beth's laughing at one of Josef's outrageous stories, something from the 1800s, and Mick's happy to sit and watch them talk. It's been a hell of a year in so many ways, with more ups and downs than he can remember, but it's worth it for this. It's worth it to be simply happy.
He thought he was happy before, when he was making a decent living doing something he enjoyed and was good at. He'd been content to know Beth was alive and well and successful. Somewhere along the line, things got out of control – when the line had been crossed from journalist and PI, to human and vampire, rescuee and rescuer, woman and man. It hadn't been the plan, and Mick had done his best to resist.
Then, Coraline. Mick had done his best to forget Coraline, or at least to push her away from the forefront of his mind. He had not expected her to return, and he had not been prepared for her particular brand of sweet brutality.
But while the Coraline affair had gone badly, it had brought such joy – if for only a brief time. Mick has spent many a quiet moment since remembering those weeks in the sun; a memory brighter than his distant recollections of Los Angeles in the Fifties, and brightened yet still by the vision of Beth radiant on the beach. Being human again has changed Mick, brought him closer to something he had thought he'd lost forever.
It has also brought him closer to Josef. Theirs has always been an easy friendship, despite the yawning gulf in age and experience, in lifestyle and morals. Mick finds Josef refreshingly honest and direct in a world where too many people, including himself, are deliberately dishonest on a daily basis. But an edge has entered into the relationship since the night when Josef brought Mick back to the vampires' world. He's conscious of being more aware of Josef's moods, and for his own part, Mick has noticed his senses are sharper and his speed and strength greater. It feels pretty good, if he's honest, although at the same time the changes trouble him, adding a touch of bitterness to his happiness.
Mick knows at some point, if this relationship lasts – and he hopes, more than he's hoped for anything for a long time, that it will last – that he'll have to broach the topic of what happens next with Beth. He doesn't want to lose her; but he doesn't want to see all that makes her Beth vanish in the harshness of the life he's led for so long.
And so he'll hold off, for now, and be content to watch Beth and Josef in the flickering flames.
Beth
Every day she learns a little more about the men she's spending so much time with. During the day there's Talbot, of course – a good man, and a good lawyer – but it's Mick she thinks about when her mind isn't occupied with the investigation under way. Mick, and Josef.
She'd been nervous around Josef at first. How do you deal with someone with four centuries of experience under their belts; 400 years of survival and killing? He has an unnervingly intense gaze, a way of looking through her. Beth supposes that living that long gives someone a bit of an advantage when it comes to reading people, but all the same, Josef is particularly good at it.
But as time goes on, she's become used to him and his sardonic nature. There is a lot he does not say, but Beth has worked out that at the very least, Josef cares. He cares about his rules, and he cares about his secrecy, and he cares about Mick. She does not think he really cares about money, though clearly he has more than enough of it. And she likes his tales of times long gone. The journalist in her wants to sit Josef down with a notebook and interview him properly; the realist in her realises he would refuse point blank.
She is used now to Mick, too. Attraction has become affection, and affection has become love. Sometimes she catches him just watching her, as if he cannot quite believe she exists. It's a very different feeling from what she and Josh had, but she likes it. She feels safe, with Mick – not just because she knows she's always been looking for him, but because he understands her. Beth knows he would do anything for her. It's flattering and a little scary.
In return, she'll keep their secret, because she's worked out that one day it could be her secret too. Emma Monaghan and Josef's Sarah have been on her mind. Though Beth's not yet sure how she'll respond when Mick asks her, she knows he will.
She can't help wondering if it would change whatever it is that's between the three of them – she and Mick, and Josef, constantly present, very much a part of the relationship. Beth hopes that they could still laugh together and love together, whatever the future might hold.
Josef
He's beginning to think it's unhealthy, the amount of time he seems to be spending with Mick and Beth these days. First there had been the fallout from the Emma Monaghan thing – which had taken, frankly, far too much time and money to deal with – but even after that he found himself drifting around to Mick's place in the evenings.
It's not that he doesn't like Mick, or Beth for that matter. He's always liked Mick, despite the man's rather pathetic insistence on trying not to kill people, and Beth is growing on him. She's just a child, really, but she's got guts and she cares, and Josef can respect that. He can still remember falling for Sarah – after all, it wasn't that long ago – and he can see what Mick's going through.
To turn or not to turn, that's always been the question, and it's going through his friend's mind every day. Beth will be old in the blink of an eye; she could die tomorrow in a car crash. Josef tried asking Beth whether she'd considered being turned, but he somehow failed to complete the question and ended up asking her how being a civilian investigator was going instead. She looked at him oddly, as though she'd seen through him, but at least she did him the credit of answering the question asked rather than the one that hadn't been.
Mick collared him yesterday and asked him what he should do about Beth. There was no real answer to give – Josef's an expert on many things, including making a little money go a long way and surviving against all the odds – but he's not good when it comes to love. And there's no doubt that love is what's at stake here.
So he keeps on spending time at Mick's, drinking his refrigerated blood, reminiscing over times long gone, and watching the lovers learn about each other. He's not quite sure where he fits into the equation, but somehow he does, and he'll be satisfied with that. After 400 years, he knows this much; if something's working out, it's not worth meddling with.