"I've touched your hair before." He lifted a clipping and pressed it to his nose. "I watched you-while you slept, and never intended to touch you, but your hair-" He breathed in deeply, closing his eyes. "You smell so pretty. Did he ever tell you that?"

I nodded.

"And it's not just your blood-it's you, your human cosmetics, your hair, your clothes. All of you." He considered the chocolate-brown curls against his palm for a moment, running his thumb over them. "This is easier than I thought."

"What?" I asked, feeling my shaky breath brush warmly across my salty, tear-stained lips.

"I was sure your beautiful face would force compassion within me, but-" he shook his head, dropping my hair, "-I feel nothing for you, as if you were merely a dog who had bitten a child. I just want to see you dead-in the worst way possible."

My crossed arms tightened over my chest.

"And, don't get me wrong; I do see this as a waste of life-beautiful life. I will not deny the fact that you are something special, Ara, but I cannot let you live. You understand this?" He lifted my chin; I nodded, sniffling. "However, I would like to dance with you one last time before I begin."

My body moved with his, close, circling like two birds falling mid-flight. The feel of his cool fingers at the ribbon of my corset and the softness of his palm against mine, made me wish only that I were his-his girl, for him to touch, to love, to hold. I wanted to be a part of him, as I once was with David.

He spun me out from his body gracefully, and I twirled back into his chest, completely intoxicated by his spell-and completely aware of it too. We swayed together in the cool breeze, surrounded by the trees, where no one could see us, and no one would ever find us-not until he was finished with me.

"Beg me not to kill you," he whispered, his lips against my brow like a kiss. "Beg me and I will show you mercy."

"I-" My throat tightened, eyes spilling with tears as I looked into his; he was just like David. But he was going to kill me no matter how much I begged. And the worst part was, it didn't matter to me, because, as if a thread of finely-woven silk had bound us, I was unable to resist. I wanted him to kill me; I wanted him to hurt me first-because it would be an honour to die by his hand.

"That's not a very convincing plea for your life, Ara," he said.

The faint blue sparkle surrounding my thoughts persisted like delirium consuming an otherwise rational mind. I smiled up at him, wishing we would dance this way together, forever. "What are you doing to me, Jason? Why does nothing make sense?"

"Hush now, sweet girl. I am making this easier by allowing you to feel safe with me. It is one of my many talents."

"But I-"

"Shh. This is an extension of kindness, child. Do not look a gift horse in the mouth."

My throat fought hard for its own vocabulary-for common sense. But he smelled just like David, and I missed him so much I just wanted to believe he was David; to imagine for one last moment that I was in his arms-that I still mattered to him.

"Close your eyes and you shall believe it."

"You can never be him. And you'll just be closer to becoming the monster he is by killing me-" My gaze delved deep into his hollow, shadowed eyes, "-but you will never have a heart like his, and I will never give you mine."

We stopped moving, his hands slipping from my body, an icy rush tearing away the cloud of my confusion, leaving behind a sudden explosion of terror. "I don't want your heart, you stupid girl." He peeled me from the closeness of his body, tossing me off to the side by my arm. But my dress caught under my toes, my hands flailing as I fell backward, stopping against the ground with a high-pitched surge of wind blasting from my lungs.

Before I could even find the source of the sudden pain I felt, blood gushed out over my fingertip.

"Ooh." Jason stood over me, wincing. "That looks nasty."

"Ah!" I pinched the edge of the partially detached nail, my hand shaking like glass in an earthquake.

"You'll need to fold that back, or it'll come right off," Jason said.

"I know," I yelled at him, trying to use my thumb to roll the nail back in place, but every time I touched it, it shifted and the pain intensified, closing in around me as if I were in a red box.

"Settle down." Jason took my hand, straightened my arm out to the side-away from my line of sight-and...

"Ah!" I screamed, but it reduced to a tiny whimper as the agony receded. When Jason released me, I doubled over, weeping breathlessly into my skirt. I just wanted to go home. I didn't want to die like this. Not like this.

"Ara, look at me."

I struggled to push myself up to my knees, falling on my elbows each time.

The killer just watched. I couldn't even look at his face to see if he was enjoying it. I felt pathetic and helpless, humiliated at my own whimpering. But I couldn't stop it. It just kept coming out.

"Why are you crying like that?" He grabbed my arm to help me to my knees.

I tried to speak, but the words had no shape-just distraught sobs, like a hysterical child. All anger had trickled away with realisation; he wasn't playing games. He really was going to kill me. This was real. This was no book or movie where the girl gets rescued. I was going to die here. Tonight. Even the distant sound of voices, having grown in number, coming toward us, couldn't be sounds of salvation for me-merely a cruel, cold reminder that there was life beyond this. And I would never know freedom again. "Please just let me go, Jason."

"I can't."

I wiped the tears and dribble from my chin. "Please. I had nothing to do with her death. I-"

"But your lover did."

"No." I covered my ears, shaking my head. "David's not to blame, either. It's you. You loved her-you brought her into your world-you didn't protect her!"

"You know nothing!" I felt only a sharp jolt, nerves stinging in the base of my skull as he grasped a handful of my hair, pulling my face closer, his shaky breath coming through his teeth in three short words. "You. Know. Nothing."

"I know what you are," I said, arching my neck to stop my hair from coming out. "I know the things you're capable of."

"Then you can imagine what I'm about to do to you."

I tried to shake my head. "I'm not afraid of you. You won't hurt me. Emily told me that you're swee-"

"You shut your mouth, you horrible little human." His fingers knotted tightly in my hair, moving the flesh over my scalp, making my forehead higher.

"Jason, please." My fingertips slowly reached for his arm. "Please, look at me. I'm not the enemy. I'm not the-"

"One does not have to deserve the misfortune they suffer." His anger landed in my face in dots of saliva. "You were to die by torture for his crimes, but now you will endure it more slowly for your own mouthy impudence, you stupid, stupid girl."

"Ara-Rose!" Voices echoed off the shallow valley. Jason's grip on my hair eased until he untangled his fingers gently from the loose remains and removed his hand.

I looked up at him, my scalp burning like the rage rising within me. "Go ahead. Do what you want. It will never change the fact that Rochelle's dead-and all it will achieve is your own pain when David takes revenge on you."

Jason just sat beside me on the ground. "Actually, my dear, the laws of our kind prevent he should seek retribution for the death of a human." He grinned, seemingly pleased with himself. "The unlawful changing of one to a vampire, yes-but not death."

"What?"

"I have the right to mutilate my kill in any way I see fit-as long as I eat you. The law will not side with David this time. There is nothing he can do, and he will have an eternity to reflect on the horrific way in which I hurt you. Oh, Ara-" He rolled his head back. "It will kill him inside; the images I will savour for him shall be etched into the iris of his minds-eye for all time."

"No-that isn't fair."

"Life is not fair. But you refuse to believe that, don't you?"

I shook my head, the anger becoming a physical form of hatred inside me. "I won't let you destroy my faith in-"

"I don't need to destroy it," he yelled. "I will destroy you instead, then David's hope, his faith in life, in love, will be lost forever."

"No. You will let me go. I will not be the victim in your family feuds," I said with an unsteady cry, trying to sound strong.

"You know-" he stopped and listened as the hunters came closer, "-you only make this more of a game for me-to see how long I have to hurt you until your faith breaks."

"And all that will do is prolong my life, because I will never lose faith. Love will prevail. David will come for me, and I will go home and live my life, and you-" I spat the words out, "-will suffer for eternity without Rochelle."

He reached sideways and knocked his forearm across my chest; I yelped out an odd sounding whimper as I fell to the ground with my hands across my ribs, unable to find my breath for a second. "Keep up this haughty attitude, and I will see to it that death is not the worst you suffer."

I snickered miserably to myself, pressing my hands to the ground, stretching my arms to lift myself up. "What could be worse than death?"

"Many things," he scoffed. "How 'bout if I ensure your replacement lover finds his precious baby girl in such disgrace that he will suffer the nightmares of your naked, mutilated body, for the next fifty years?"

"Please! No!" I jumped to my knees and grabbed his sleeve. "Kill me, do what you want, but don't let Mike see-I'm begging you."

"Begging?" he asked, cold amusement oozing through his voice. "I gave you the chance to beg, but you were too proud. Now I will give you no such fortune. Curious though-" He rubbed his chin. "You care not for what I show your true love, but for Mike-you wish him to be free of this detest. Why?"

"He's good, Jason." Hysteria turned my words to hiccups. "He doesn't deserve this. It has nothing to do with him. Please just don't hurt him like this."

"Shh, hush now, sweet little girl. It will all be okay-for you. You will be dead in a few hours, and all of this-the cold, the dark, the fear of what his last vision of you will be-will all be over." Jason softened then and stroked my face, so gently. "How's this sound? Now that I know how much Mike means to you, perhaps I will make sure that he finds you revoltingly displayed."

As his laughter filled the silence, images flashed in my mind of so many horrible possibilities. I shook my head, trying to find words in the back of my closing throat. I didn't want Mike to see. I didn't want his last memory of me to be something horrible.

"Let me paint the picture for you." He knelt beside me, tracing his finger slowly from my chin to my collarbones as he spoke. "I could tear a line down the centre of your body and peel you apart, leave your legs spread, intact, so that when he finds your adulterated corpse, his heart will give out, and he will fall to the ground beside you-and die."

I crossed my hands over my chest and focused on the brown and green stains discolouring my ball gown, blocking out the roar of his hilarity. Mike would break. He would die if Jason did that to me. Already, my mere death would destroy him more than anything in this world ever could.

I had to escape-I couldn't let him do this to Mike.

"Now, who says I'm merciless?" He continued to laugh, relishing in self-amusement, while I gauged the distance between his hands, sitting loosely over his parted knees, leaving open the one place no man was immune to pain. Then, with every ounce of force I could muster from my weakened body, I lifted my foot and slammed it down into Jason's groin.

A balk of anguish rang out into the night. The vampire folded in, clutching his weak spot, and as I spun onto my hands and knees and jumped to my feet, his fingers wrapped my ankle. I screamed, kicking them off, but jerked away too fast, losing the grip on gravity. A wicked jolt sent me down to kiss the grass a few feet away from him, and as the blow wore off, I pushed up on my hands, spitting lawn clippings from my mouth.

"Get. Back. Here," Jason grumbled, so strained with agony I knew there was still time.

I got back up, stumbling onto my fingertips for a second before finding my feet-and ran. Just ran, ignoring the sear of pain in my nail as I hoisted my skirt above my knees, fighting for each step I took. I wanted to look back. Wanted to see if he got up-see if he was behind me. But I'd watched enough movies to know that would be my final mistake. So I ran-my legs hot, shaky with adrenaline, making them move faster than I knew possible but not fast enough; I pictured the face of anger on the vampire behind me, feeling the crawl of my skin as I imagined him rising to his knees, watching me run-giving me a moment to believe I'd escaped.

Hope filled my chest as I reached the border of the trees, my feet slipping for a second on the skinny dregs of pine needles, and searched the darkness for a shadow-a figure, a person that might have wandered away from the hunting party. And the beat of my heart thumped so ferociously I could hardly breathe, but I took a gulp of the icy night air, shaping it to scream, "Hel-"

"Nice try."

My body shot backward, like a lasso had snagged my neck. The iron grip of the vampire cut any hope of rescue, muffling my scream; only a whimper escaped, lost to the empty silence of the dark night. No one would hear it. I was too late.

I dropped to my knees, trying to loosen his hold around my throat.

"You cannot outrun a vampire. It is pointless to even try."

A series of consonants rolled from the back of my tongue, trapped by his stranglehold, my nose and cheeks pulsating with blood-like they were about to pop open.

"I want to kill you, right here, right now," he said through his teeth, his voice quivering. "But I will not show you such mercy."

Nearby, the hunters finally came so close that I could hear their private chatters and the instructions being called out to each one from the voice of my fiance. If they'd only been there two seconds ago they might have heard me.

Jason squeezed my throat tighter as I wormed my fingers under his.

Please, Jason, I thought, You're hurting me.

"Do you think I care? If I had any compassion for your adversity before, you just destroyed it," he said, his grip easing. "Your blood will no longer be enough to satiate my thirst for revenge."

He moved quickly, folding my chest across his arm while the other hand tore the back of my dress open, leaving my skin bare to the prickly grass beneath it as he threw me down onto my back.

"No!" I coughed the air from my lungs, nudging my elbows into his chest, but he separated my hands in his tenuous grip and forced them onto either side of my head.

"I wasn't going to do this to you, Ara, but I need him to see you suffer, and this is the only way."

"Please-please don't!"

"Keep begging, human-" He slipped my dress quickly down my waist, jolting my hips upward as he tore it past my legs and tossed it away. "It turns me on."

I wedged my knees tightly together. "This is rape, Jason. This is worse than murder."

"I thought you said death was the worst one could suffer," he said cynically, winning the battle to compress me into stillness.

I shook my head, panting heavily beneath his weight, my teeth so tightly knitted I felt a chip come loose and fall under my tongue. I never even contemplated this. I never even imagined he would be capable.

I searched the grounds for a distraction, digging deep for the training Mike gave me-for the times he laid on me just like this and wouldn't back down until I broke free. But it was gone-all of it. I couldn't sidestep the paralysis of fear enough to think straight.

But I wasn't about to let him have me, either.

I kicked my heels into the ground, rocking my whole body from side to side.

"Stop struggling." Jason jammed the full force of his elbow onto my shoulder. I cried out, my upper body locked into submission. "Shut up or they will hear you."

"I don't care," I cried. "I don't want you to do this to me."

"I know." His palm forced me into silence; only a weak sign of terror survived in the back of my throat. "But I promise, if you lie still, I will only hurt you enough to make you cry. After all-" He pushed his knees into my thighs, forcing my legs up and open, "You are a virgin. There are bound to be a few...rips."

My soul drew away inside me; Oh, please, no. Please don't. I closed my eyes-tried to escape to someplace else in my mind.

"I'm going to enjoy this." He repositioned himself, then froze, looking up as a yellow beam of torchlight flashed across my face for a single second. "Shit."

"Look over here," called a stranger. "I thought I saw something."

"Ara?" Mike called.

My heart skipped. I looked up just as Jason looked down at me. Please don't kill him, Jason. Please don't. Oh God. I wished he'd just taken me far away. I couldn't die knowing Mike would too.