Instead she tipped her head upward so that she could breathe against his ear. “The next one,” she said hoarsely. “When you take the next one, I want to go with you. And it won’t be some aging pole dancer who works for dollars stuffed into her thong! It has to be someone smarter, cleverer, more vital. Not someone whose life has already been drained from her. I should never have agreed to your ‘lessers.’ If they are indeed less, I don’t want them.”

“There are only so many I can take from the school,” he protested.

Her beautiful features twisted into a sneer. “Do I have to do everything myself?”

“Of course not.”

But she wasn’t dissuaded. “I will come out with you; I will see that she’s worthy.”

“You’ve already helped me pick them,” he reminded her. Elizabeth, too, had sorted through the pictures of the students at All Saints.

“I should never have agreed to the lessers.” She was seated upright now, glaring at him as the bloody water drained over her exposed skin, running in red rivulets from her shoulders, over her breasts, to the dark pool surrounding her.

Oh, how he longed to lap up that tangy sweetness.

But she wasn’t in the mood. “Don’t you get it?” Elizabeth demanded, hands rising from the scarlet depths. “That’s why this isn’t working, why my skin hasn’t improved. The blood of those whores is tainted, lacking life.”

“They weren’t whores.”

“Then where did you find them?”

His jaw tightened but he bit back a sharp retort, not allowing her to bait him about his previous life, one that she knew intimately. Only she knew his real identity, only she could ruin him.

Only she could make him complete.

“Of course you can come,” he said.

“I wasn’t asking! It’s not your decision. Remember that!” Mollified, she settled into the bloody water again.

This was new. She’d never ventured out for a kill. But then she was always evolving, never content to let things stagnate or become routine. And truth be told, he was a little concerned about the girl who would next give up her life. Once she’d been so avid and zealous about being a part of their inner circle. He’d approached her and she’d leapt at the chance to belong, to connect with someone. Now, however, he sensed she was nervous. Wary. Unsure.

He might have to change his routine a bit to ensure her compliance. Elizabeth wouldn’t like that. It would be best if he acted alone.

“You’re certain about this, that you want to be a part of it?” he asked again, and Elizabeth smiled cruelly up at him, her eyes in this half-light dark and unreadable.