I swallowed. Maybe if I hadn’t known he was dead, I would have prepared for this moment. If I had planned a confrontation, it would have been a spectacular one. But I hadn’t had a reason to. I didn’t know what to say now or how to react. I couldn’t even tell what I was supposed to be feeling.

“You broke my heart, Carrie.” His gaze locked with mine, and for the first time I saw nothing but honesty in the clear, blue depths of his eyes.

He leaned forward slowly, his catlike grace not lost to death and resurrection. Before I could think rationally—and it would have taken awhile, considering the totally bizarre circumstances of the moment—Cyrus kissed me.

The phrase “like riding a bicycle” came to mind. Though it had been two months, during most of which he’d been deceased, my body responded to him the way it had when we’d shared blood. Utter, uncontrolled desire that crashed over me like a tidal wave and stole every rational thought.

I didn’t touch him, but I didn’t pull away. He wrapped his arms around me. It was awkward because of the steering wheel, but he was still as good a kisser as he’d been as a vampire. My toes curled and I shifted on the seat, trying and failing to force away the tingling ache in my body.

He leaned back, his face flushed, beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead. His gaze fell to my lips, then rose to my eyes, then flitted to the windshield.

“Oh, look,” he panted, pointing dismissively to something beyond the glass. “That’s where I cut your heart out.”

It was so matter-of-fact, so remorseless. The pain of that night—my own, coupled with Nathan’s anguish, as well—sawed through me the way Cyrus’s knife had. Under the weight of the stress and worry I’d been carrying, the hurt was too much to bear. Tears gushed to my eyes and I slapped him, leaving a shocking white handprint that turned quickly to angry red.

I could tell from his expression he knew what he’d done. He reached for me helplessly, but I pushed his hands away.

“How could you do that?” I wanted to wipe his kiss from my mouth, to erase the feeling of his lips from mine. “How could you…”

I couldn’t finish. I didn’t want to say he’d kissed me. I hated knowing that he still had that seductive power over me, that it hadn’t all been because of the blood tie we’d shared. And I hated that whatever that sick attraction was, it had, for the moment, forced all thoughts of Nathan from my mind.