“Oh,” Myrnin said, clearly taken aback. “Well, yes, all right.”

Claire stared at Shane. How could he say leaving him was smart? And yes, okay, she’d gotten reinforcements, and maybe that had been smart, but she’d have come back all alone, and he knew it.

“Hey,” she said. “You’d have done exactly the same thing if it was me.”

“Yeah,” he said, and shrugged. There was even an attempt at a smile. “But I never said I was smart, did I?” The smile—not convincing—didn’t last long. “We can’t afford to fight like this. Not right now. He’s on Team Us. Don’t kick him off. We don’t have enough players on the field as it is.”

“You’re seriously going to go with a sports analogy right now?”

“Yep,” he said, and sipped his coffee. “Just like normal.” But there was a shadow in his eyes, a flash that made her wonder just how deep the fractures went inside him. “Theo cut me loose. I’m topped up and ready to go.”

Myrnin was watching him with a guarded expression, and then he finally said, “I suppose you need rest, then.”

“Not really. I slept, and I got a transfusion. I feel … pretty good, actually.” Physically, that might be true, but Claire doubted he felt at all good inside. She remembered that whisper in the dark. Are you really there?

Always, she thought. I’ll always be here.

“Did you have some kind of mission you wanted to send us on?” Shane asked. “Seeing as how brilliantly the last one turned out?”

“The last mission killed enough draug to prevent their singing,” Myrnin countered, “and we lost no one.”

“No thanks to you,” Claire muttered. She saw his back stiffen.

“Oliver would like us to consider more … scientific approaches. I will need your assistance for that, Claire. I will expect you in the laboratory in—” He darted a glance from her to Shane and back again. “In your own good time. Good day.”

He clasped his hands behind his back and walked away. For the first time, Claire realized what he was wearing: crazy lab coat. Cargo pants. And his vampire bunny slippers, bedraggled but still flapping their red mouths with every step. She wondered if he’d just thrown it on, or if this time he’d dressed to make her think of him as … helpless. Inoffensive.

There was a lot more to Myrnin than just the pleasantly crazy mayhem; underneath it, there was calculation, and a cold, still monster that he kept mostly caged.

She didn’t realize that she’d shivered, again, until Shane put his arm around her. He was warm now, and she turned and put her arms around him. She rested her head on his chest and listened to the slow, steady beat of his heart. Alive, alive, alive.

“Hey,” he said, and tipped her chin up. “I didn’t get to say hello properly last night. Sorry. Mind if I—”

She lunged upward and captured his lips in midsentence, and the kiss was fierce and sweet and hot. His mouth felt soft and hard at the same time, and he sank into a chair and pulled her onto his lap, which was a relief from standing on tiptoe to reach him. It was a long, needy, almost desperate kiss, and when she finally broke it, it was to gasp for air.