“It’s not as bad as it seems,” he says, taking my hands. “Eventually, you’ll get used to it. In fact, you might even prefer it.” He lets go of my hands and stands. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. But I know you enough to know you’d take it hard. I mean, you were always so into the fighting thing, you know. More than any other Bellator.”

“Is that why the vampires are afraid me?” I ask. “Will that change when my heart starts again?”

“No. That I was honest about. No one, at least as far as I know, has ever walked with them like you do.” He pauses. “Kayla, I think we should keep that a secret. I mean, you saw how Dominic reacted to it—he tried to kill you over it.”

No he didn’t. He tried to kill me because, for some reason, he thinks I’m a Higher. That’s what I should have said at the moment; I should have put it out there and gotten the worry off my chest. But all I do is nod, locking the secret deeper away.

“We need to get out of here.” Aiden changes the subject as he peers over the table through a crack, staring out into the street. “I think whoever’s tracking us is gone, for now anyway.”

“You never said who’s tracking us.” I move to the side of him and peer out. “Or do you even know?”

He pauses, like he was hoping I’d forget. “The ones who decided not to let their hearts start beating again.

My mind frazzles. “That just goes against everything you just told me.”

“No it doesn’t.” He backs away from the window. “Your heart will start beating again. These guys, they just chose not to.”

“How? How do they keep it from starting?”

“I have no idea,” he says, but I’m sure he’s lying because the inside of him is a nervous wreck. “What I do know though, is you wouldn’t want to be like them.”

My eyes narrow. “Like who?”

“Hopefully, you won’t have to find out.”

He doesn’t say anything else and I consider throwing him down and threatening him until he spills whatever it is he’s withholding, but the winking of darkness warns us that it’s time.

“Where are we going to hide for the night?” I ask. “In here?”

He darts off for the back of the store, which is a torn up kitchen with shelves that hang crookedly across the faded walls and pots rust away on the chipped tile floor. He rummages through the cupboards and drawers, tossing out whatever he comes across.

I lean against the doorway, watching him. “So we’re just staying here for the night,” I assume.

He pulls out a can of food and shakes it. “It’s as good a place as any.”