“Hello, August.” Jude is in his ripped jeans and denim jacket, a stubby cigarette pinched between two fingers. Belatedly, my skin prickles to life, and I dig my crucifix out of my pocket as the door bangs shut.

“Don’t come any closer!” My voice shakes a little. It’s still technically daytime, but the sky is so overcast I’m not sure it matters. I don’t totally know how that rule works.

“For the hundredth time,” he begins wearily, dropping the cigarette and grinding it under his boot, “I’ve no intention of hurting you—no matter what your friend had to say. The Brotherhood of Perseus has its own agenda, and I’m sure—”

“She saved my life.”

“From another human,” he adds promptly, his gaze not wavering from mine. “In fact, no vampires at all have attacked you yet. Have they?”

“I was jumped in the middle of a crowded café,” I remind him. It bothers me that he already knows what happened in the parking lot.

“By a vampire that did nothing but look at you.” His tone is calm. “I have no hidden intentions here, August. I’m not your enemy.”

“You had … henchmen watching my house last night!” I exclaim, not sure what else to say. His not wanting me dead is great—it’s what I like most about him, actually, aside from his pretty face and sexy knees—but I still don’t trust him.

“I have been watching your house for three weeks.” He produces a pack of cigarettes, drawing one out with practiced finesse. “Just me. I would have been shadowing you in the parking lot, too, to make sure you were safe, but after the way things ended, I didn’t want to provoke your guard dog.” Flicking open a silver-plated Zippo, he lights up. It’s all very Bad Boy Vampire cliché. “At the risk of repeating myself—again—I’m the Syndicate’s only representative in Fulton Heights.”

“There were two vampires in my neighborhood, I could sense them,” I shoot back imperiously, my sense of righteousness at catching him in a lie thwarted immediately by the realization that I’ve just handed him an update on my Corrupter abilities.

“Actually, there were three.” He wiggles as many fingers. “That’s the reason I’m here. We didn’t get a chance to finish talking yesterday, and there’s more you need to know.”

“I’m not interested.” The words come out automatically, and they’re absolutely true. I don’t want to know any more—I don’t want to know what I know already. What I want, with every molecule of my being, is to wake up from all of this. I want to run until this can’t see me anymore.

But I stay where I am. You can’t escape the prophecies. There’s nowhere to hide.