Gena felt like a traitor. She was betraying Marcus. In her defense, she’d fully intended to tell him she was meeting Joy along with Hope. Everything had happened so fast once she brought Lady in from their stroll.

She couldn’t interrupt him kissing her. Then he’d been hungry, and she didn’t want to get in his way there, and then, of course, the rebels had called and he had other things on his mind. She didn’t want to be any more of a hindrance than she already was.

Because of the suddenness of the call Marcus got, she ended up at the restaurant about an hour early, and it felt like the longest hour of her life. The meeting spot was a smaller Italian restaurant with dim lighting and soft music playing in the background. It would have even been a peaceful environment under different circumstances.

Instead, Gena was filled with anxiety. She was anxious that her being alive would freak out Joy too much. She was worried about Marcus being alone with the rebels again, especially considering what had happened the last time.

She also knew Joy was going to try to convince her to come home, and she had no idea how she could tell her best friend she could never go home again.

Soon enough the wait was over, and Gena saw Hope walk into the small restaurant. Gena jumped up and looked around for Joy and couldn’t hide her dismayed expression when she didn’t see her. She walked up to Hope and gave her a big hug, taking a moment to relish in the simple pleasure of a friend’s embrace. “Where is she?” asked Gena.

Hope took a deep breath. “Well, something came up.”

Gena gave her a questioning look. “What could possibly come up?”

Hope glanced to the empty table. “I think you should sit down.” Gena shook her head in confusion but did take her seat. Hope took another steadying breath. “You know how you didn’t want me to tell Joy, but I couldn’t keep my mouth shut because seeing her in pain hurt me too much?”

Gena rolled her eyes in frustration. “We had this conversation like five hours ago.”

“Apparently Joy has the same problem I do,” said Hope.

Before Gena could ask what that meant, a soft voice came from behind Hope. “Gena?”

She recognized her mother’s voice before she even had a chance to look up. She pushed her chair back and ran as fast as she could into her mother’s arms, and neither could stop the tears from flowing. Gena hadn’t made sense of why she was there, but she couldn’t hide her elation. She had been afraid she’d never see her family again.

Her heart broke as she got a good look at her mother’s face. There were obvious signs of stress, between the dark circles under her eyes and her messy hair that was usually pulled back so neatly.

Gena and her mother, Jill, had always looked alike, with dark hair and blue eyes. Her mother now had gray peppering her dark hair, but somehow it made her look even better. Her cheekbones stood out more with age, but the huge gardens she kept up during her retirement helped her to maintain a healthy physique for a woman in her sixties.

“I don’t understand,” said her mother in a soft voice as she cupped Gena’s face and took a good look at her.

Gena felt uncomfortable under the close scrutiny. Would her mother notice any of the differences? “I don’t really understand either. That’s why I came here.”

“Why didn’t you come to me?” The pain in her mother’s voice was so apparent.

Gena mentally kicked herself for not going to her family, for not believing they would understand. “I don’t know,” she said honestly. “I just panicked and got the hell away as quickly as possible.”

Hope interrupted and whispered, “Maybe we should sit down. People are starting to look and we are talking about, um, sensitive subjects.”

Gena glanced around her and noticed that most of the other diners were in fact looking in her direction. She put her head down in embarrassment and led her mother back to her table. “What exactly did Hope tell you?”

Hope answered, “I didn’t say much of anything since there’s little that I actually know. I told her about Ryan and the circumstances of how you woke up.”

Gena narrowed her eyes. “All of the circumstances?”

Hope nodded. “Right down to the missing scars.”

Gena looked to her mother, who sat calmly across the table. “This doesn’t freak you out?”

Her mother tightened her lips. “I don’t understand it any more than you, but you can’t expect me to view this as anything other than a miracle. I buried my daughter yesterday and yet here I am talking to you. If that’s not miraculous, I don’t know what is.”

Gena couldn’t argue with that logic. It was pretty damn amazing she was sitting there, alive and well. “So you don’t have any idea why I’m still here?”

Her mother solemnly looked down at the table and Gena’s heart sunk. “I was expecting you to just say no. Is there something you know?” She already knew that her guardian angel other mother had brought her back (again), but she didn’t expect her biological mother to have any clue about this. Which one was her biological mother? Jill had given birth to her, but that body was now six feet under, and the body she was sitting in had been “created” by her angel mother.

Gena shook her head at the confusing thoughts and looked to Jill. “What are you not telling me?” she asked again at her continued silence.

“There are things about your birth that you don’t know. I’m not very proud of this, but I need you to know that I love you so much and the only reason I kept this from you was to spare any hurt feelings you might have.”

Well, this didn’t sound good. “What was so bad you were afraid to tell me?”

“Your father and I were desperate to have a baby of our own. You know we’d been trying for years and I suffered three miscarriages. Each one was just as devastating as the last. When I got pregnant for a fourth time, I told myself that this would be different, but right around the fourth month, just like the first three pregnancies, I felt such an intense pain in my stomach and the blood started.” Her voice caught and tears welled up, but Jill forced herself to continue. “I was so convinced I was losing another baby. Your father rushed me to the hospital and to everyone’s surprise, not only was the baby fine, but they couldn’t find anything wrong at all that would have caused the pain or bleeding. They sent me home and I was on bed rest for most of the duration of the pregnancy. And five months later, I delivered a healthy baby girl.” Her mother met Gena’s eyes and a tear rolled down her cheek. “I looked down at your beautiful face, so perfect and innocent, and I just knew. You were not mine.”

Gena sat back in her seat and stared wordlessly at her mother.

“My postpartum depression got worse and worse over the next few months. All I could think was that I had the wrong baby. Your father was very nice, all things considered. He attributed it to the other miscarriages and me thinking about what I could have had with our three lost children.

“I was so convinced you weren’t mine that I had the inside of your cheek swabbed and sent in for a maternity and paternity test. The results took months to return, and things changed in those months. You became more than just a baby. You would smile and giggle. You became Gena. I fell in love with you. By the time the test results came back, I had forgotten I had ever sent them out to begin with.”

“The results were negative, weren’t they?” asked Gena, even though she already knew the answer.

Jill reached across the table and grabbed Gena’s hand. “Whatever those tests said, you are my baby girl. Always have been and always will be.”

Gena gently removed her hand from her mother’s and wiped away her own silent tear. She needed to be strong for her mother’s sake. “I haven’t always been yours.”

A look of fear crossed her mother’s face. “Gena, I’ve always loved you.”

Gena shook her head. “I believe that, and you have to know that I love you and this doesn’t change any of my feelings about you. I came to the city to find out why I didn’t die. Well, I found out.”

As simply as possible, Gena told her mother about her angel mother, Anael, and Mary. She told her that Mary had been murdered and Anael had held on to Mary’s soul until she found a family good enough to raise her. “It took five hundred years for her to find a mother as good as you,” said Gena softly, mentally thanking Anael for finding her such a great surrogate family.

Hope, who’d been mostly silent during Jill's tearful confession, couldn’t hold back her excitement. “You were reincarnated?”

Gena shrugged. “I don’t think there really is a word for what happened. I guess you could say I was reborn?”

Gena almost laughed at the big smile across Hope’s face. At least someone was enjoying this craziness. Her mother wasn’t exactly smiling, but she wasn’t running for the hills yet either. She breathed a silent sigh of relief. Knowing that she could still talk to her mother in this strange afterlife she was in was beyond comforting. How many times had she had to fight the overwhelming urge to call her for support?

But it wasn’t just her mother there to support her now. Of course, Marcus had promised to help her in any way he could, and she also had Hope and Joy to bring her back down to earth when the world that Marcus lived in got to be too much.

Though Gena supposed that this was the world that she lived in now too. The more time she spent in this strange world of vampires and magic, the more comfortable she became with the idea. Could she ever go back to the day-to-day monotony that she’d been living in before? Sure, any nursing job was going to be much more interesting than an office job, but it was nothing compared to the little she’d seen of Marcus’s existence.

Would his crazy life seem half as tempting if he weren’t in it? What if it had been someone else who Anael had directed Hope to? Would she have been half as accepting of this life if she’d never had the opportunity to kiss Marcus?

Gena shook the thoughts of “what-ifs” away and focused on how great it was to see her mother. They both knew Gena would have to let her father know she was still alive. As far as he knew, his wife had taken an impromptu trip to deal with the grief of losing a daughter, but Gena and her mother knew that he was alone right now and dealing with his own grief.

As much as Gena wanted to tell him herself, she promised Marcus that she wouldn’t leave and she wasn’t breaking that promise. Her father would just have to take her mother’s word and she could see him when some of the craziness blew over.

There wasn’t any more immediate family who needed to know. There were a few cousins, but Gena wasn’t comfortable telling anyone more than necessary, and to Gena, her mother, father, and best friend were all necessary.

Gena, Hope, and Jill stayed at the restaurant until every other diner had left and the staff was cleaning off all the tables. Part of Gena didn’t want this night to end, she was still so overjoyed with being reconnected with her family, but another part of her desperately wanted to see Marcus again. She wanted to make sure he was still safe and sound after being behind enemy lines again.

She just wished she had a cell phone to send him a “how are you doing?” text, at least. If he was going to be spending time with such dangerous crowds, she really should have some way to track him.

Gena gave Hope a quick hug good-bye and then held her mother so tightly she was afraid she was going to break her. Hope reminded her again that Joy was in town and would be seeing Gena sometime in the next week. Gena eagerly agreed that once Marcus was back they would arrange a meeting.

Even with the gun and silver knife in her purse, Gena would feel safer if he was around. Sure, she’d proved she could handle herself in a tough situation, but she’d rather have backup if she found herself threatened again.

Gena watched Hope and her mother drive off in a cab before she turned back to make her way to Marcus’s penthouse. She periodically glanced behind her to make sure no one was following her, either a rebel or her mother. She didn’t want to be attacked unaware, and she didn’t want anyone she cared about knowing where she was staying, as to keep them as far away from the danger.

She was supposedly immortal now, but she didn’t want to take any chances, nor did she want to risk anyone who was more vulnerable than her.

Though she kept looking over her shoulder, she never saw anyone follow her. She eventually felt safe enough to hail a cab. She kept a close eye on the cars behind her, which was hard with so many cars on the road and the dark night sky making it hard to distinguish colors and models of different vehicles.

By the time she was dropped off at the penthouse, she felt rather secure that no one was watching her, but she still put one hand in her purse and on the gun as she walked into Marcus’s building. The doorman waved at her and let her in. By now, all of the doormen knew she had free access to the penthouse, and she always had at least one who she could count on to help her with Lady if Marcus wasn’t around.

She’d felt brave enough to go on some short walks with Lady in the sunlight, but now that night had fallen, she’d rely on the nice men downstairs to take Lady on short walks. She felt as if she was being paranoid, but was it really paranoia after being murdered twice and being attacked by three vampires? At this point, all these precautions started to feel like common sense.

The penthouse was empty, save for Lady, as Gena walked in. She’d hoped that Marcus would be back already but hadn’t really expected him to be.

She swallowed her disappointment and tried to keep herself busy, which was easier said than done. She couldn’t get herself to concentrate on the television and was too afraid to leave the penthouse. Instead, she busied herself cleaning various rooms.

The whole place was clean enough that it didn’t need cleaning, but Gena needed to feel like she was being useful. She hated the idea of just sitting around while Marcus could be in danger. Maybe she should have stayed with her mother and Hope longer.

She brushed the idea away as quickly as it came. She left to keep them safe. She kept on reminding herself of that.

Finally, Gena heard the door open and she ran around the kitchen counter to see Marcus walk in. Without a second thought, she jumped into his arms and fueled all of her worries into a passion-filled kiss.

He met her kiss, but stopped before it became more than a kiss. She looked at him questioningly. Outwardly, he looked well enough, but his slight frown told her he was stressed.

She tried to subtly look at his clothes to see whether there were any red stains this time, but he saw right through her. “I didn’t hurt anyone,” he said softly.

Gena blushed at being caught. “Sorry. What happened tonight? You don’t look happy.”

Marcus let her go and paced into the kitchen. “Something is up,” he said. “They are going to attack the opening of the Tower tomorrow.”

“Well, didn’t you already expect that?”

“I expected them to try. They know as much as I do about the Tower. They have to have at least one guy on the inside giving them information, but from the sounds of it, they have more than one.”

“You said that one guard, Fredrick, was working with them before. It makes sense they would have more people working with them.”

Marcus ran his fingers through his hair. “None of this makes sense. I was going to meet with the rebels, recognize them immediately, find out who the leader was and beat him until I knew every detail of their plans. Now I’m surrounded by fucking pure bloods I have never even heard of who claim they have an army just waiting to start another war. How the fuck do they have an army?” he screamed.

Gena jumped back at the outburst, but she knew it wasn’t directed at her. “Do you think he’s bluffing?” What did an army entail? Hundreds of vampires? Thousands? How many casualties would there be if there was a war?

Marcus shook his head. “I hope so. I keep on feeling like I should be doing more, but it seems like Rok is always one step ahead of me, and he isn’t even the head of the operation. He’s just a middleman.”

Gena walked up to Marcus. “How much more can you do? Your own people already hate you because you’re pretending to be something you’re not, and you’re constantly risking your life. You’re doing all you can.”

His jaw was still clenched tight, but he seemed to calm down a tiny bit. “I don’t mean to take this out on you.” He sounded genuinely remorseful. “Was your night with Hope any better?”

Gena couldn’t stop the smile that crept onto her face. “Much better. Hope brought a surprise guest. My mother!”

That caught his full attention. “Your mother is in the city? Are you sure that’s safe?”

Well, he didn’t exactly sound happy for her, but she wrote that off as stress. “I’m not sure at all, but Hope never told me she was coming, so there was nothing I could’ve done. But I got to tell my mom that I was alive and I got to hug her again. I never thought I would. It was amazing.”

Marcus turned away from her and opened the fridge for a bottle of blood.

“It’s good news,” said Gena, confused at his silent reaction.

“Are you going back to Michigan?” he asked solemnly.

“Are you trying to get rid of me again?”

“You were here because you wanted to know why you didn’t die and you had nowhere else to go. Now you have your mother and Hope. And probably her sister Joy if Hope really can’t keep her mouth shut,” he pointed out. “So it makes sense you would go home now.”

Gena stared blankly at him. He was right. The only reasons she had to stay were gone. “I don’t want to go,” she said, bluntly. “I can’t think of anywhere I would rather be right now than here with you.”

She immediately regretted the words. She wanted to be with him, but she didn’t want to scare him away.

She quickly continued, “Michigan is my old life, and even if my mother knows about me, I can never go back to my old house and job. Besides, you and I still have to deal with Ryan.”

Marcus smiled at her. “We do still have to deal with Ryan,” he agreed.

“He could hurt someone else,” she pointed out.

Marcus nodded. “Just so we’re clear, you staying has nothing to do with me?” He smirked.

Gena grinned back at him. “Definitely not. Mostly Ryan.”

He walked over to the cell phone that had been left lying out on the counter and picked it up. “We should give this back. He’s probably missing it by now.”

Gena rolled her eyes. “I’d bet you anything that if he had his phone the past couple of days, the police would have already caught him.”

Marcus smiled at that. “All the more reason to personally return it to him.” He put the phone in his pocket.

“And when exactly are you planning on returning it?”

“We will have to see how tomorrow goes, but we should have time in the next couple of days.”

Gena raised a brow. “Do you think he’ll kill me again? I don’t really have a good track record with him. Last time I saw him, he accused me of being a demon who killed the other me that he stabbed.”

Marcus gave a little laugh at the ridiculousness of what she said. “I’ll be with you the whole time, and I would love to see him try to hurt you again.”

Gena felt butterflies in her stomach. It was hard to be afraid of anything when you had a vampire promising to protect you. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

“Don’t most women like the idea of men fighting over them?”

“Most women? I probably wouldn’t mind a punch being thrown, but I have a strong feeling that if you and Ryan got into a fight, only one would make it out alive, and it would most definitely be you.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

She tried to think of something witty to respond with, but a knock at the door stopped her.

Marcus met her eyes. “Expecting someone?” he whispered.