“Ow!” I yelp. My eyes pop open and I jerk up into a sitting position, automatically reaching for my now injured leg. “You kicked me!” I accuse as I glare angrily at my attacker. I still in disbelief as I find myself once again face to face with the same boy I had encountered only days before.“I had to make sure you were alive,” he states simply, an edge of amusement coloring his words, as he shrugs unapologetically. “It’s not like I find a lot of girls playing dead in the woods.”

“But now you can't find me or reach me or hurt me ever again and once I tell the words I am going to kick you off my porch and learn to breathe again.”

“He gave the body a final kick and then turned to face me.“You and I need to talk, Kitten.”“Now?” I asked in disbelief, gesturing to the dead vampire near his feet.“It’s not like he’s going anywhere, so yeah. Now.”

“I must have bitten Angus Young too, because his brother Malcolm walked up to me in a rage. I was wearing platform boots, and Malcolm's face was eye level with my belly button. "You fucking bastard," he roared at my navel. "You can bite my brother, fine! But if you fucking bite me, I'll bite your fucking nose off, you dog-faced faggot."I think I said something like "you and what stepladder," because before I knew it, he was attacking me, climbing up my leg and clawing at my face like a crazed cat.”

“You and me,” he echoed, tilting my face up to his. I stared back into his eyes. They were clear of sleep and nightmares now. “Always.” I told him, my lips curving into a smile. That had been his line once, now it was mine. “Always,” Balik murmured against my jawbone the words grazing my skin as I arched my neck backwards. “You and me, always.” His whisper mingled with the kisses he brushed along my throat. I closed my eyes and drifted away with him.”

“When I call his name, it’s a sound almost entirely out of my control. It soars over the crowd and hits him. Even from where I’m standing, I can tell that he recognized my voice. Hastily he unwinds himself from the girl, stands to attention like an animal sensing danger. And I try to call him again, but that word, that name, was all I had the energy for. I barely have the strength left to stand.I wait helplessly for him to find the sound, and when he does, when his heterochromatic eyes meet mine, my mouth forms the word again, but just barely. The girl at his side disappears. The crowd blurs into senseless shapes and colors. I can’t feel my heart or my body or the heat of the flames.I can only see his face—his bewildered, beautifully familiar face.”