“Nothing’s wrong with me,” said a man’s silky voice. “Nothing’s wrong with you either, so far as I can smell.”

“I don’t smell bad,” she retorted. “And it’s—your teeth—”

“What, you’re not going to be shallow, are you? Judge on appearances?”

I grabbed a stake from my purse and hurried toward the voices. Hopefully Lucas was also on this guy’s trail; if not, I wasn’t going to have any chance to reach him. My thong sandals slapped against the pavement, and I wished that I’d had the sense to choose something quieter and more practical for my only pair of shoes. But I also suspected the vampire was distracted.

When I reached the corner, I stopped and glanced around. They were silhouetted sharply against a nearby streetlight. Dusk had only just turned into night. The vampire was short but stocky and powerful, and the woman was tiny, hardly up to his shoulder.

“You’re making me nervous,” she said, trying to make it sound like she was flirting, though I could tell she meant it. She didn’t want to admit how scared she was. That was the number-one thing vampires used to their advantage—people’s refusal to believe that the worst-case scenario could really be happening to them.

The vampire leaned closer to her, his arms on either side, almost pinning her to the brick wall of the nearby building. “I’m trying to make you excited. Get that pulse rate going.”

“Yeah?” She smiled feebly.

“Oh, yeah.”

I’d had enough. Although I had no illusions about being able to scare the guy, I thought I could surprise him. That might do the trick.

Quickly I held the stake up in a fighting position, spun around the corner and said, “Back off.”

He glanced at me—and smirked. So much for the element of surprise. “Or what, little girl?”

“Or I’ll paralyze you with this. After that, you’ll be out of luck.”

The vampire’s eyes widened slightly; because I’d accurately described what staking did to a vampire, he’d realized I knew what I was talking about. That was the general idea. But it wasn’t nearly as intimidating as I’d hoped. “You might try.”

“Excuse me,” the woman said, “but do you two know each other?”

“We’re about to get real well acquainted.” The vampire took his arms from around the woman, and she wisely took off running. Her footsteps clattered against the sidewalk into the distance. He swaggered toward me. Though he was a short guy, his shadow from the streetlamp was tall and thin, stretching over me.

Lucas, I thought, this would be a really good time to step outside the bar and check on me.

The vampire stopped. “You don’t smell human.”

I raised an eyebrow. Finally I had his attention. Every other vampire I’d ever met was impressed by the fact that I was a born vampire, a rarity.

This one simply shrugged. “Hey. Blood is blood. Who cares where it comes from?”

Oh, crap.

Then a voice rang out, “You’re gonna care when it comes from you.”

“Lucas!” I cried.

The moment I saw him at the other end of the alley, Lucas started running straight for the vampire. I was forgotten. The vampire turned and sprang at Lucas, who dodged him and slammed his joined fists into the vampire’s back, sending him sprawling.

Well, if the guys had forgotten me, that didn’t mean I had to forget them. I grabbed a broken brick from the alleyway and threw it at the vampire as hard as I could. My aim had improved, thanks to my training with Black Cross; the brick caught him square in the gut. He turned to me, eyes reflecting eerily in the streetlamp, just like a cat’s.

“Get out,” I pleaded. “Get out of town for good. That way we don’t have to kill you.”

The vampire snarled, “What makes you think you could?”

Lucas tackled him, and they fell to the pavement. Those were bad odds for Lucas; short-range fighting always worked to a vampire’s advantage, because a vampire’s best weapons were his fangs. I ran forward, determined to help.

“You’re stronger”—the vampire gasped—“than a human.”

Lucas said, “I’m human enough.”

The vampire grinned at me, a smile that had nothing to do with the desperate situation he was in and was therefore even scarier. “I heard somebody was looking for one of our babies,” he crooned to Lucas. “One of the powerful ones in my tribe. Lady named Charity. Heard of her?”

Charity’s tribe. A jolt of panic shivered through me.

“Yeah, I heard of Charity. In fact, I staked her,” Lucas said as he tried to twist the vampire’s hand around his back. He left out the part where Charity got away and was still after us. “Think I can’t stake you, too? You’re about to learn different.” Yet Lucas couldn’t gain the advantage. They were too evenly matched. He wasn’t even going to have a chance to go for his stakes. The vampire could turn the tables on him at any second.

That meant it was up to me.

Can I really do this? Can I actually stake another vampire? It seemed so impossible, so savage. But if that was the only way to save Lucas, I would have to find the courage.

My hand shook as I came closer to them. Sweat had slicked my palm and made my grasp on the stake more tenuous. If I could just get a clear mark, a way to strike the blow—

Fear and nervousness added to my earlier nausea, and the world tilted strangely. I didn’t pass out, but I stumbled and had to brace myself against the wall to keep from falling. The stake clattered down; I couldn’t keep my grip.