"Say what?"

"If it's what I think it is, it will help her."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa...shouldn't we be certain first? Or at least, I don't know, think about the possible effects of dropping this flippin' thing into her." I couldn't look at the hollowed canyon that used to be her arm. "I mean, I'm not a doctor, but I feel like there might be some sanitation issues."

"Sydney, please." He didn't look at me as he said it, his eyes on Soraya, on the black-rimmed gouges the sun had made across her otherwise beautiful face, on the pallor beneath her mahogany skin.

Malcolm could have been burned like that, or worse. Which Abel the b.a.s.t.a.r.d would have counted on. He rarely did his own dirty work, but the jobs he arranged were filthy as h.e.l.l. I dropped the crystal in at the junction of ruin and flesh, then wiped my damp palms on my thighs.

"What's it supposed to do?" I leaned forward, pulling a candle closer.

"Hendrick was commissioned once to steal a diamond necklace in Libya. Human owner by the name of Shrage. It was fairly simple. Dogs, a skylight. I went along to keep him company. The necklace wasn't in the safe. It was on his mistress, who was most enthusiastically on Shrage. Hendrick pa.s.sed the time with Shrage's bar and I pa.s.sed the time in the safe beside it. He had a collection of uncut stones and, beneath that, a case where he kept gems that seemed to have not met his expectations. Chips, flaws, and fakes. Two of those were like this pebble of yours. They emitted a frequency. It's not unusual for a vampire to develop an affinity with certain substances-gems and I are friendly-but Hendrick felt it, too. It is unusual for two vampires to develop the same affinity."

"Even though you were changed by the same maker?"

Malcolm nodded, still watching Soraya as though he expected her to wake up. I drew my knees up and wrapped my arms around them.

"We took them."

"Instead of the necklace?"

"No, we got that, too."

"You snuck a necklace off a naked woman?" Kevin asked in an awed tone from the doorway.

"She wasn't naked. She was wearing cowboy boots." The corner of Malcolm's mouth turned up. "Shrage liked Americans. Anyway, the diamonds had to be verified by a jeweler and, afterward, we asked him about the stones."

"Oh!" I nearly fell over when movement caught my eye.

The crystal was melting and Soraya was absorbing it like the blood Thurston had poured over her. Malcolm took a sharp breath, then let it out with an airy laugh. He took my hand and kissed it.

When nothing else happened for a moment, I asked, "What did the jeweler say?"

"Nothing, but he sprayed us with poison, shot Hendrick, and dropped a cage between us, then fled through a tunnel. We caught up to him three weeks later. He was ancient for a human. Maybe two hundred, kept alive by vampires who paid in drops of blood because he was useful. He was known for his encyclopedic knowledge and unimpeachable character."

"Shooting you seems pretty peachable."

"To be fair, Hendrick cut him first. But before that incident, it was all fair dealing. But that's not the interesting part."

"I'm going to go ahead and beg to differ there."

Skin flaked off of Soraya's face, leaving behind two shiny scars where before there'd been only holes. That seemed like an improvement.

"When we found him, he didn't look a day over fifty. Black streaks in thick hair that had been spa.r.s.e and white. A spring in his step. He'd played tennis the night we found him."

"How did you find him?" Kevin asked. He dropped to sit against the wall.

"His blood hadn't changed." Malcolm shrugged. "I'd gotten the scent, and Hendrick managed a taste before the poison got in the way. The informal term for these is blood pearls. They seem to stimulate regeneration."

"Where do they come from?"

Malcolm shrugged. "Neither of us had heard of it before and we were in the business of knowing about things of value. Shrage had been told it would act like a fountain of youth and it hadn't done anything for him. But the jeweler had researched it for a lifetime."

"And it worked for him?"

"Not at first. But he knew what we did not. He found the person who'd made it and gave him some sob story. The next one worked for him. There are all kinds of rumors of vampires and humans miraculously healing each other, but most involve contact, not objects. n.o.body I've met knows what they are or how they work." His lie was smooth, but I felt it beneath the convincingly delivered words. I glanced at Kevin. Yeah, not the audience for sharing secrets of rare vampire treasures.

"What's the official term for them?"

"There isn't one. I've known hundreds of rare-goods dealers, and I've yet to find anything more than the occasional whisper of their existence." His eyes searched my face, but I had nothing to give him. They were more of a mystery to me. "There's no known cure for badly injured vampires, other than time and luck."

"Luck," Soraya rasped, grabbing all of our attention, "is not on our side." Her eyes opened, slits through which no light shone.

"How are you?" Malcolm murmured, stroking her face.

"I imagine death...isn't much worse...than this."

The crystal had melted completely and her flesh had pinkened. That was probably a good sign.

"Oh, Sora." Mal rolled up his sleeve and gently tipped her head back. "You need to drink now." I looked away when he tore into his own wrist. My gaze remained stuck on her arm, and I startled when a trickle of blood ran from her whole flesh to the ruin below. It sank in, and for a second I thought my horror-movie-cured brain had imagined it. Then she screamed, and every hair on my body stood up. Malcolm held her tight, forcing her to continue feeding while her body rebuilt itself from the inside out.

"We need to go," Malcolm said.

I pointed at Kevin without looking up from where I was sorting weapons and money on a sheet. "He's going, too."

"There's no need to complicate things," Mal said. "We'll deal with him later."

"He's going." Bronson wanted him back today and, after all this s.h.i.t, I needed something good. Something positive.

"And why is that, Syd?"

I raised my head so that he could see that it was my conviction rather than a compulsion. His eyes narrowed as he worked it out.

"I hope you asked for something valuable in exchange."

"I did." I clipped a knife to my belt. "I'm going to procure us transportation." I waved Thurston off when he showed me a bus schedule he'd picked up somewhere.

"Get something smooth," Kevin said at the same time Mal said, "Get something old."

And that's how I ended up buying a rattly van with a panorama of a desert sunset-complete with a towering cactus menacing a mostly nude woman in a headband-painted along both sides. There were fewer delicate electronics in old vehicles, and this one had enough room to hold a bunch of blankets and pillows and other c.r.a.p that would hopefully keep Mal's energy from killing the thing before we got to Tenth World. The owner talked me up to twenty-five hundred bucks, but I got him to throw in a Journey 8-track and half a bottle of Febreze. So it was a pretty good deal.

I backed up to the door of the motel room. A cloud of greasy lilac-tinged dust wafted out when I yanked open the back doors and, inside the motel, Thurston sneezed. In case they hadn't heard the cough of the compromised m.u.f.fler, I knocked twice before opening the door.

"Honey, I'm home."

The door b.u.mped against something and stopped, then one of the polyester comforters was shoved into my hands.

"He wants you to make a shade," Kevin said. He'd been excited after the attack-understandably-and was now sullen. It was difficult to dredge up sympathy for him.

I rigged the comforter over the doors and climbed onto the back b.u.mper to wedge one end into the overhang from the second-story walkway. The s.p.a.ce between the door and the van covered, I jumped down.

Kevin came first, making three trips with arms full of blankets and pillowcases loaded with box spring and mattress bits, and what sounded like metal pipes. Improvised vampire-proofing. So maybe we'd owe the hotel a little more than a good housekeeping tip.

He clambered into the van, rubber soles squeaking against the floor. Malcolm came next, tall and tucked in. Like he hadn't spent the past hour fighting off a killing squad and digging dead flesh out of his friend's body, then nearly draining himself so that she could regenerate her arm.

When had this become a regular day in the life?

"Ah, we're moving up in the world," he said, eyeing the van.

"You specifically requested old, and you know how I aim to please. At least this one's running." I reached for him, hesitating at the last second. He ignored the way my hand fisted without making contact, and wrapped his arms around me. Because I could, I leaned my forehead against his chest. His chin brushed the top of my head.

The plan was to get to Chev and alert her to the fact that one of her guests was causing destruction near her territory. There were phones at Tenth World, or numbers that would end up getting messages to her, but somebody had called off our posse and there was no telling where that person was. Chev's arrangement with local human government was a sensitive work in progress. Protocol dictated that she would impound Abel while she investigated and, with Kevin's a.s.sistance, Mal would have time to convince Bronson that Abel was up to very bad things. I wanted Abel gone. Eliminated, and never to reappear. But it was hard to make myself believe that was anything but wishful thinking.

"Is this going to be dangerous?" I asked.

"No. Bronson will call him out and Abel will respond with posturing and flamboyant rhetoric. It won't matter. He played his hand poorly. The situation will resolve itself."

"Mal, he sent a squad to burn you guys to death. Why would you think he'll backtrack from that to speeches?"

"For the sake of pride, he'll puff up but he won't act. He can't. He's pledged himself to a vampire that could end him with little effort, within the territory of a powerful female who prohibits violence. Plus, she despises him. He has no more moves."

"She did strike me as having good taste. It just seems too easy."

"Sometimes simple is most effective."

"But he's got all this energy, coiled up and frustrated. His hive was supposed to win. He only revealed himself now because he can't stand feeling cornered. He's like a rope stretched to its limit, fraying and fraying, and he's close to snapping."

"You know him so well?" Mal's tone was off, a light question delivered on a barbed stick. I pinched his arm.

"He told me things. That's it." And he'd made me tell him things, not only about Bronson and Mal. Personal things.

What are you most afraid of, Sydney? Abel asked, his hand relaxed against my throat, my body paralyzed, flat on the floor.

This.

You're in a nice house, with nice clothes. I'm taking care of you. Why does that scare you? As if he were truly curious.

Because I have no choice.

I shook my head and blew out a breath. "Spend five minutes with him and you'll come to the same conclusion. I just wonder if it's smart to tease him."

"Oh, sweetheart, I have no intention of teasing." Malcolm kissed me, a hard kiss that sparked a hunger that had gone too long unfed. I gripped his hips and pulled him against me. My reward was a deeper kiss, the slow, hot entrance of his tongue, the press of a hard body molding me against it.

Directly beside us, a throat cleared. "s.h.i.t, that's hot."

Mal shot an arm out and slammed the door in Kevin's face. Begrudgingly, I unwrapped my limbs from him, but couldn't quite bring myself to let go of the fistful of shirt I had. I was scared and that p.i.s.sed me off, so I scowled at the middle b.u.t.ton on Malcolm's shirt as if it was to blame. The bloodstains beneath it weren't helping.

"Are you sure I should go?" I asked. "I feel like I'll be in the way." And I was afraid-afraid that when I saw Abel, I'd lose myself again.

"I need you near me. I won't be able to think if I can't see you, not after all this." His hands smoothed down my arms and caught mine. "And what if I told you that everything will change tonight? That you'll be able to walk freely in light and dark. Like you did before we met?"

"That sounds like a dream."

"Consider it a very real possibility." His eyes gleamed, and the light had nothing to do with vampire power and everything to do with an almost vicious antic.i.p.ation.

This went beyond rea.s.surance. I scowled. "How?"

"Do you trust me, Syd?" He sobered, his eyes dark with intent focus, his lips parted as though additional words hovered inside his mouth.

I answered instinctively. "Yes."

"Then, shall we go for a drive?"

I trusted him, but he'd done impulsive things before, things that injured him. "You'll be with me the whole time, right?"

"I love you, Sydney." His fingers ran down the side of my face and curled around my jaw. He smiled, a lazy grin that made my toes curl. "Being with you is all I'm thinking about."

He stepped into the van and closed the doors behind him while I stood there, alternating between giddy and shocked.

Shaking myself, I pulled the blankets down and climbed into the driver's seat. The idea of things being like they were before, of not having to be afraid, was beyond a dream. It would be like I'd never been exposed to this nasty vampire business. Except for the part where Malcolm Kelly loved me. I wouldn't give that up for anything in the world.

Chapter Twenty-Two.

We pa.s.sed Mickey shortly after we got on the freeway. The Skylark roared along in the fast lane on the other side of the median. I caught a flash of her bare arm and flapping hair through the rolled-down window. Her mouth was moving. If we'd been closer, I probably would have heard her singing. Even though I was driving toward vampires instead of away, the tension in my shoulders eased a little. She'd be safe with Thurston and Soraya, and she'd get them somewhere secure. We'd take the road trip we'd been talking about. Put a bow on this c.r.a.pfest, punt it into the past, then drive away in style. We just had to get through tonight.

My van, the enemy of style, started conking out as we entered Phoenix. Frankly, it was farther than I'd thought it would make it, even with all that padding jammed between the cab and the hold. Malcolm climbed out in the deep shade between two dark brick buildings and I parked across the street. A van like this backed into an alley would only attract attention and the last thing we needed was to have to deal with the police. I didn't like him out in the open even if there was no chance the sun would touch him. He seemed less concerned. He stood with his hands in his pockets, leaned against one wall like he was pa.s.sing the time. I squinted toward the horizon. The sun would set in a matter of minutes.

"What're we waiting for?" Kevin said as he climbed over the pile of MacGyvered insulation and dropped into the pa.s.senger's seat.

"Night. The van can't handle an undead pa.s.senger anymore so he'll go the rest of the way on foot."