“Thirty nerve-shattering minutes passed before Cadeon returned. “What happened? Tell me!”“Everything’s taken care of.”She frowned. “You smell like beer.”He rolled his eyes. “Oh, yeah, Holly, like me and the cop were downing a beer together.”Of course, he and the cop had completely been downing a beer together.”

“Cadeon, can you hear me?"He didn't open his eyes. "Nothing wrong with my ears.""Of course not." She laid the cloth on his forehead. "So . . you and Tera seemed close.""Been through a lot.""Was she your girlfriend?"He gave a laugh that sounded like a grunt. "Not at all.""And you really didn't sleep with Imatra?""Bloody hell, noooo, I didn't . . . She's a slag.""Then why did you kiss her?" Holly asked."Directions. . . and to see.""To see what?""That it wouldn't be all that bad without you."This was interesting. "Did you make a determination?"He gave a bitter laugh. "It'll be all that bad."Oh, Cadeon. "You've known I was your female for a year?" He nodded. "Why I would be chosen for you?""Fate decides . . . who I can be most satisfied with."Nibbling her lip, she asked, "Have you slept with anyone else since you knew it was me?""Gave a halfhearted try for a witch . . . she wanted a werewolf instead."There was no getting around it--Holly was jealous of the witch.But then Cadeon said, "And I wanted you.”

“Holly's forgiven you?" "Almost mostly. But she still gives me slack about it when she's sick. I take it as a husbandly badge," he said, puffing out his chest. "Sick? You told me she was fully immortal." "Yeah, but she still throws up some, because, well, the thing of it is... Ah, fuck, Rydstrom, I knocked her up." "You're going to be a father?" Gods help the world. I'm going to be an uncle? "I got Holly, like, on the first shot. Nix is calling me Bull's-eye and the Womb Raider.”

“Then realization had dawned. "Oh, my God, you're the one who hurt Davis, the boy I was with. You saw us together, and you threw him down a gully. He broke both of his legs!""He lived?" Gaze narrowing, Lothaire had murmured, "Not for much Longer.”

“She laughed, and drank more beer. “Take a long trace off a short bridge, vampire.”

“When you got captured, I didn't know..." He trailed off, had to chug whiskey before he could continue. "If it'd be like...""What?""Like it was with Clotile.""Oh, Jackson, no. I was okay. I'm unharmed.""Didn't know if I'd get there too late," he said with a shudder. Then he crossed over to me, until we stood toe-to-toe. "Evie, if you ever get taken from me again, you better know that I'll be coming for you." He cupped my face with a bloodstained hand. "So you stay the hell alive! You don't do like Clotile, you doan take that way out. You and me can get through anything, just give me a chance."--his voice broke lower "just give me a chance to get to you." He buried his face in my hair, inhaling deeply. "There is nothing that can happen to you that we can't get past."..."When you say we...?"He pulled back, gazing down at me, his eyes blazing. "I'm goan to lay it all out there for you. Laugh in my face--I don't care. But I'm goan to get this off my chest.""I won't laugh. I'm listening.""Evie, I've wanted you from the first time I saw you. Even when I hated you, I wanted you." He raked his fingers through his hair. "I got it bad, me." My heart felt like it'd stopped--so that I could hear him better."For as long as you've been looking down your nose at me, I've been craving you, an envie like I've never known.""I don't look down at you! I'm too busy looking up to you."..."The corners of his lips curled for an instant before he grew serious again. "You asked me if I had that phone with your pictures, if I'd looked at it. Damn right, I did! I saw you playing with a dog at the beach, and doing a crazy-ass flip off a high dive, and making faces for the camera. I learned about you"- his voice grew hoarse -"and I wanted more of you. To see you every day." With a humourless laugh, he admitted, "After the Flash, I was constantly sourcing ways to charge a goddamned phone--that would never make a call."I murmured, "I didn't know...I couldn't be sure.""It's you for me, peekon.”

“..., It'd taken her several seconds to react to the sight of them together. She'd been almost hypnotized by the scene as Lothaire drank. Chase's masculine face had been tense, his gray eyes focused on the ground. Lothaire's face had been starkly beautiful, his pale blond hair brushing Chase's shoulder.Light and dark. One terrible, one tragic.And Lothaire had been... hard. "Oh, gods!" She cried as she ran back along the trail. Hot poker for my eyes! Hot poker!”