Silver.

I looked down. There was a small silver knife buried in my right side to the hilt. The skin was starting to smolder and burn around it.

Eve was breathing hard now, and there were tears rolling down her face, but she looked tough all the same. Unyielding.

“I can stop you,” she said. “I can always stop you if I have to, Michael, damn you. I could have put that in your heart because you weren’t ready for it, because you’ll always be vulnerable to me even if you don’t want to be. So we’re even. Because I’ll always be that way to you, too. That’s called trust. It’s called love.” She grabbed the knife and pulled it swiftly out, and I choked and collapsed sideways on the sleeping bag. God, it hurt. Badly. I shuddered and writhed as the silver’s influence continued to punish me, but it wasn’t a fatal wound—not even close. She’d picked her spot, and the duration of the blow, very well. And in a weird way, I loved the pain. I needed it.

I deserved it.

“You hear me, Michael? Don’t even try to think you’re the only badass in this room. I will not let you do that to me again, ever, so you can stop obsessing about how damn powerful you are and how weak I am. I am not weak. Screw you for even thinking it. Get over yourself, your vampire angst, and your power trip.”

She pushed up to her feet, staring at me for a moment, then walked away with the silver knife glinting in her hand.

I pulled in just enough breath to gasp, in genuine surprise, “Is it crazy right now to say I love you?”

She didn’t even pause. “Given that I just stabbed you? Seems a little weird, yeah.”

“I do,” I said, and put my head down again. “God, Eve. I do so much it’s killing me. I just don’t want it to kill you, too.”

I watched her walk away, slow and steady steps, a woman totally in control of herself and what she was feeling.

I just didn’t know what that was, but I was afraid … afraid that it wasn’t love anymore.

I collapsed on my back and closed my eyes, and tried to heal.

CHAPTER THREE

CLAIRE

The unfamiliar weight of the shotgun made Claire feel awkward. She’d fired guns, but she’d never carried them around, not like they were a normal, everyday kind of thing. Like a book bag, for instance. She deeply missed her book bag. It had symbolized everything important in her life, and suddenly being a poster child for the National Rifle Association … didn’t.

Around her waist she had added a belt Shane had dug up in the back of the armory—it held small sealed bottles on hooks that she could pull free easily. Silver nitrate. Very dangerous to vampires, and draug. She was now about as loaded down with advantages as she could be.