“Yes, but I’ll have a great time and take a hell of a lot of you with me. In the past few days, I’ve been threatened, teleported, drowned, starved, and locked in a cage while being forced to watch as people I care about died. I have so much rage in me, I’m having trouble keeping it inside. If you push me, you have my word that I’ll make it my personal mission to find you in the melee and slice your head from your body. I’d enjoy it. It would be fun for me. If you somehow manage to survive, you’ll have to go back to my father and explain how you had me in your grasp, but you were too clumsy and you failed, just like Hugh, and now a lot of vampires and I are dead. Somehow I doubt he would accept my head as a consolation prize. You’ll have my answer in the morning.”

I let go of the vampire’s mind, got up, and moved over to the fire. Curran still lay on his back.

“I know you’re awake.” I lay down next to him.

He opened his gray eyes and looked at me. I loved him so much, it hurt. I loved everything about him. The way his eyes lightened when he laughed. The way they shone with little gold sparks when he wanted me. The way his thick eyebrows came together when he was pissed off. I loved his nose that never healed right. I loved the stubble on his cheeks and the hard line of his jaw. I loved that he called me on my bullshit. I laughed at his jokes and I loved that he laughed at mine. I loved that no matter where I was he would come for me. That he would always be there, helping me cut my way through the mess that was life.

I leaned over to him and kissed him. I kissed him, trying to tell him all of the things I couldn’t put into words. I tried to tell him that I loved him, that he meant everything to me, and that I would fight for him. Nobody would take him away from me, because if they tried, I would carve a path right through them. He kissed me back, and tasting him was heaven. He was right here, alive, warm, and mine—but only until tomorrow. I held on to him. I’d just gotten him back. I couldn’t lose him. Not now.

“I love you,” I told him.

“I love you, too.” His gray eyes searched my face. “Something happened and it’s bad.”

“Yep. I got a visit from Landon Nez.”

“Who is he?”

“The Legatus of the Golden Legion. Hugh oversees the Iron Dogs; he’s Roland’s brute strength. Landon leads the Masters of the Dead. He is Ghastek’s boss.”