here— and no doubt not for the first, or the last, time.

She refrained from asking anything more, mainly because she

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was acutely aware of Hannah standing there, and she really didn’t

trust Hannah at all now. She was loyal to Fallon, obviously, or she wouldn’t be holding the button for the shock collars. It wouldn’t

be wise to say too much in Hannah’s hearing, since everything

would end up reported back to the Daylight Foundation.

But she did turn to Hannah and ask her a question that seemed

perfectly obvious. “You can’t keep a bunch of vampires in here like this forever,” she said. “No matter what kind of little training devices you put on them. What are you planning to do with them?”

Hannah never once looked at her directly. She was watching

Amelie, Claire realized— watching for any sign of trouble from

the vampire queen. But Amelie didn’t seem to be inclined, yet, to

give any orders to her people. “We plan to help them,” she said.

“That’s all. We plan to help them get better.”

“Yeah,” Eve said. “You’re helping, all right. What is this, Vampire Reeducation Camp? Are you planning on helping them learn

to live without blood? Vegan vampires?”

The silence that greeted this was so deep that it made Claire’s

already tense muscles ache and tighten. There was something in

Hannah’s carefully controlled expression that made her feel sick

and scared. “It’s probably time to go now before this gets any messier,” Hannah said. “Wrap it up, kids.”

Eve raised her head from Michael’s shoulder. There were tears

in her eyes, but she wasn’t crying. She was too angry to cry. “I’m

not leaving him.”

“Eve, she’s right. You can’t stay,” he said in a gentle voice. He

brushed his hand across her sleek black hair, let it drift through

his fingers, and touched her lips just as softly. “You have to go,

Eve. You wouldn’t be safe here.”

“Why not? Aren’t they feeding you?”

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“They’re feeding us. I’ll be fine,” he said, and kissed her. “Eve,

I’ll be fine. Just go, okay? Claire, take her. Please.”

Claire didn’t want to, but she could see that he was serious;

when she hesitated, he fixed her with a calm, steady stare until she moved forward and put her hand under Eve’s arm to get her to her

feet.

“No,” Eve said. “No, I’m not going, Claire. I can’t— we can’t

just leave him here . . .”

“Maybe not, but we also can’t get him out,” Claire said. The

words tasted horrible in her mouth, like ashes and iron, and she

had to swallow hard to continue. “Not yet. But we will, Eve. I

swear to you, this isn’t over.”

Hannah said, “It is for now. Michael, you move back to the

line. Go on.”

He got up and walked back to where Oliver was waiting at the