She dropped heavy lidded eyes to stare at the lifeless man before her, feelingly sated and satisfied. He had been the monster, not she. She had taken pieces of his mind, unable to block the images that had filled his mind, old memories, favorite songs, the p.o.r.no flick he had watched the night before.

The money he had taken from the b.a.s.t.a.r.d who wanted to f.u.c.k his sister.

He had taken the money and stashed it, planning to buy c.o.ke with it. He had planned to use blood money to get high while his sister was raped. He hadn't planned to actually rape her, but when she walked out of her room in just a T- s.h.i.+rt, he figured the s.l.u.t was just as good as any other, blood or no.

She rose, the buzzing in her ears and the swirling sensation in her head making her feel drunk.

Declan was nowhere to be seen, but she could hear him, soft shus.h.i.+ng noises while he calmed the distraught teen. Running water, a murmured apology before the girl gasped. Cleaning her wounds, Tori imagined, while she searched the yard.

Eli had the other man, the one who had been beating the girl when they arrived. He dropped his limp body to the ground when he felt Tori's eyes on him. Her eyes landed on the feebly moving man, a question forming in her mind. But her thought processes felt so d.a.m.ned slow, Tori felt like she was trying to see her way through mud, putting together a question in her fogged mind.

Eli smiled, a tiny trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth, but otherwise he looked as if he had just risen from the chair he had been sprawling in earlier. His golden eyes were glowing, though, with an unholy, feral light. "I do not need to drain a person any more. It is something that comes in time."

"He doesn't deserve to live," she whispered, her tongue feeling thick and awkward. Pressing a palm to her brow, she asked, "Why do I feel so strange?"

"You've been starving, and suddenly, you gorged yourself," Eli said with a shrug, stepping over the inert body at his feet as if it were a pile of dog s.h.i.+t. "Your body has started to accustom itself and now it is suddenly full and satisfied. You are satisfied, are you not?"

Her lids drooped and she pressed a hand to her belly, which felt warm and golden. "Yes," she drawled.

"Hmm, yes." She was aware that Declan had moved through the house and left the girl resting on the couch. How he had gotten her to sleep, Tori couldn't fathom, but she could hear the soft gentle snores coming from the couch.

"She sleeps," Declan said needlessly, moving to stare out at the yard. He turned his eyes to study Tori. "You have his blood on your mouth, Tori."

She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth and studied the red smear it came away with. Now that her belly was full, and that man was dead, the blood smelled and looked distasteful and she wiped it away with her s.h.i.+rt sleeve. She cast the corpse an evil look and echoed Declan's words.

"Some people deserve death."

Eli took the girl.

One moment he was by her side, lifting her up and then Tori felt a cool rush of air whip by her and he was gone.

"What-"

"He'll be finding someone to look after her," Declan promised. "And since he left so suddenly, we will have to do some housecleaning."

"Housecleaning?"

He flicked a glance to the corpse in the yard and then the man who lay unconscious a little further out. "Can't go leaving them to lie about in the sun all day, now can we? Pesky cops and their infernal questions," he said with a grin.

"And who better than to erase the evidence?" she mocked lightly, looping an arm with his.

"Not erasing. Rearranging," he corrected. "Too clean and it'll look even more suspicious. Eli has. .h.i.t this type before. The man you took had a record a mile long, I imagine. And I smell drugs. Cocaine, methadone, marijuana. I figure a little sleight of hand, so to speak, and this will look like a drug deal gone wrong."

When she asked exactly what kind of sleighting he was talking of, he flashed a toothy smile. "Darlin' girl, I'm not certain you've the stomach for what I am planning."

"I just killed a man in cold blood," she reminded him.

"That was heat, sweet. Not cold. Fueled by anger and hunger. Not necessity or planning." And with that, he left her standing on the porch. She watched as he used a kerchief from his back pocket to wrap around his hand as he rummaged through the dead man's clothes.

Moments later, he pulled out a b.u.t.terfly knife with a wicked six inch blade.

Tori was fast. But not fast enough.

By the time she had leaped across the porch and reached Declan's side, he had slashed the neat puncture wounds on the wounded man's neck and widened it.

Drastically.

She knew what a killing neck wound looked like. She had seen several, well, three to be exact.

Apparently Declan knew as well.

Because he had recreated one, taken two neat puncture holes and ripped them wide, ripping the throat open until blood gushed out. It looked like Eli hadn't taken much blood at all, because it splattered out in a fountain of deep red, forceful and pulsing. It would have been a weaker flow if he had been low on blood.

Tori instinctively stepped away as the blood flowed, eyeing Declan apprehensively.

Declan hurled the knife away, watching where it fell with satisfaction before he stood and faced Tori. "He paid her brother money so he could rape her. Rape, Tori. They both knew it was rape." He surveyed the b.l.o.o.d.y mess at his feet before he leaped out of it, crossing a distance of ten feet with one bound, leaving the blood pattern undisturbed. "And neither of them cared. He was a monster, and we both know it. If he had lived, he would have walked away from this. Well, after spending a few days in the hospital and getting some O positive. Would you have wanted it that way?"

Reluctantly, she shook her head. "You're a cop, Declan," she said, her voice rusty with shock.

"Second. A cop second. I'm a Hunter first. That's one of the things we'll be talking about. Eli and I are both Hunters. Hunters of those who can prey on the weak, human or...not. Being a cop lets me do things the legal way, but they don't always stay put away, Tori," he said. "Their deaths, while definitely vigilantism, are final."

"So you're judge, jury and executioner?" she asked, her voice wobbling a little. This wasn't the first time, it seemed. He had done it before.

"We do not make mistakes, not the way a jury of humans could. I've never killed a man who didn't deserve the death I dealt him. And I'd wager Eli hasn't taken an innocent life, well, not once he pa.s.sed the madness of the first days after he had changed. We know the smell of evil, and even if we didn't, such a scene as this cannot be interpreted wrong. Eli doesn't pick his kills carelessly, and neither do I."

He flexed his hands and Tori saw, for the first time, his long, graceful hands weren't quite...normal. His nails had started to darken and lengthen, and as she watched, the muscles in his arms and torso started to ripple before smoothing out when he gritted his teeth and closed his eyes. "I do not like death, Tori. I do not enjoy killing, regardless of the circ.u.mstances. But I do like knowing that these men will never harm another creature."

Tori swallowed, her throat tight and her belly hot.

Tears had started to trickle down her face, but she recalled the young girl she had seen. "So do I," she said softly, das.h.i.+ng one tear away. She scrubbed her face with her hands, unknowingly smearing the blood, before she met Declan's eyes and asked, "What do you do now?"

He smiled and traced one hand down her cheek gently.

"Go back to Eli's. You need to rest, and you need to think. I will take care of this," he told her.

She caught his hand and tugged until he turned his face back to her. "Take care of it how?"

"His body needs to be disposed of. I'll hide the drugs, make it look like this one," he indicated the man whose blood had finally stopped flowing from his neck, "had taken the drugs and it was all a fight over that. Eli will take care of the girl. Rescuing the innocent is his favorite pastime. All neat and tidy."

"Tidy," she whispered faintly.

"Go back to Eli's."

She did.

The buzzing had returned and Tori wondered dimly if vampires could go into shock. She wandered down the midnight dark trail, following the signs of their earlier pa.s.sage easily and unconsciously, her mind in turmoil.

She stood on the porch later, staring into the night, watching as the horizon started to lighten. One of Eli's people had panicked and attempted to drag her inside and Eli had been forced to leave the safety of his home. They had remained outside as long as Eli had been able, trying to coax Tori inside before Eli had given up and led Nina in, promising Tori would be fine.

Fine, well, that may have been pus.h.i.+ng it. She didn't feel fine. "You will be fine," that old familiar voice whispered softly.

Tori had an image of an old woman settling down in her rocker for a long chat and she suppressed the urge to scream. This? Now? "Who are you?" she thought wearily, trying to direct her thoughts down the path where she sensed the old woman.

"A friend. Just somebody trying to help."

"Why didn't you step in before this happened?"

"I didn't know it was going to happen. Only after Manuel came for you did I know about you. He is the one I follow. His death is the one I need for peace."

"Manuel. He is the one who bit me."

"He is." A shuddering sigh filled Tori's mind and she felt the enormous weariness that rode the old woman. "Five centuries I have waited, Tori McAdams, five long centuries, waiting for one who would not only survive the change, but survive with her humanity intact."

"You know what I am, knew what I would be? That's why you came to me, isn't it?"

"Yes. You will find him. You will kill him. And I will finally be at peace."

"Who is he?"

A sad, mournful cry came floating along the path and the old woman said sorrowfully, "My son."

And then her presence was gone.

Tori stood in the predawn, struggling to find peace. She didn't know how to handle the emotions inside her.

She had killed. She had witnessed cold-blooded murder.

But she didn't feel wrong. She didn't feel guilty. And she was worried it was because she was becoming a monster. Her emotions hadn't seemed to change, but she was certain that killing a man, and watching while an injured man was killed, should have been wrong, should have been evil.

But it felt right.

She forced her mind to think back to how she would have felt if she had stumbled upon the scene before she was changed. And she finally came to the conclusion that she would have killed that man just the same. With a gun, most likely, but he would be just as dead.

And the other man deserved it as well.

Men like that weren't really men, but animals, sick animals. And Tori didn't believe in trying to rehabilitate a sick animal. Jail wouldn't have been good enough, even if they had been able to force such an ending. A jail term would have been too short, and too kind.

She grew aware of the lateness, or rather the earliness, of the day when her skin started to itch. Glancing down, she saw her hands were lobster red, blisters forming, and a look at the sky told her it was probably close to seven. She retreated to the soothing, cooling darkness of Eli's home, and the wide, confused eyes of his people.

"The Master requested I care for you when you came in," Nina said hesitantly, staring with confusion at Tori's nearly burned face and the blisters that were starting to form. "Mistress-"

"Don't call me that," she said wearily, fatigue making her limbs heavy.

"Mis-ah, well. How can you take the sunlight?"

She grew aware of Declan's presence slowly, first his scent, which was ripe and hot with anger, and then his voice, which was harsh. "She's a hybrid, Nina. She can tolerate sunlight, but d.a.m.n it, Tori, did you have to bathe in it?" he snapped, appearing in front of her, the door behind him wide open and letting in more of the sun that was becoming far too painful for her sensitized nerves.

"She's not spoken, Mr. Reilly. Not a word since she returned and the Master said to leave her be. But how can she tolerate sun? Isn't she newly turned?"

"Nina, I don't have time for questions," Declan said harshly, gently lifting Tori up, taking care not to touch her face or blistered hands and forearms. "Go run a cool bath, and find me something to treat sunburn."

Tori giggled. "Sunburn?"

"Have ya seen yourself?" he snapped, carrying her upstairs and depositing her in the bathroom where Nina was indeed running a bath in the darkened room. Tori could see herself, even in the nearly dark room.

Her face was red and blistered. Studying her hands, she saw more blisters. And on her fingers, some of those blisters were turning black. "Silly little fool, what were you thinking?"

She made an attempt to tug her clothes off, craving the soothing, cool water, but her vision grayed, and then darkened.

And she was out, unable to resist the heavy pull of sleep with the sun riding higher and higher in the sky.

In sleep, she bore more resemblance to the vampires Declan knew. Her heart slowed and her breathing was minimal. But the sleep and the nourishment she had finally taken were working magic and her reddened, blistered skin was clearing and smoothing with every slow beat of her heart.

He shouldn't have used the methods he had used. Tori hadn't been ready and he knew d.a.m.n good and well it had been shock and confusion that had caused this. He should have had Eli deal with cleaning up the mess and brought Tori back here.

Hindsight, after all, was twenty-twenty. Grimly, he hoped her hunger had been sated. He wasn't certain he could get her to feed again tonight. He was also certain that tonight she was going to be full of questions. And he doubted he had the right answers.

It was nearing twilight when he heard Eli wake.

A great shuddering sigh left the old vampire as he climbed from his bed, his current companion still snuggling there, snoring softly. Declan could hear the woman's soft, sighing breaths, and even her heartbeat, beyond the sounds of rus.h.i.+ng water as Eli showered.

Later, the vampire appeared in the room, padding on silent feet to stare down at Tori. "Nina and I tried to bring her in before the sun rose, Declan. But she wouldn't leave. I was worried that she might remain out there but I couldn't stay any longer. And I did not think she would let herself burn to ashes." He traced a gentle finger over a nearly healed blister and said with a sigh, "I should have forced her to come in."

"She has had a little too much forced on her of late,"

Declan said, shaking his head. "Do not blame yourself.

I should have come back with her, but I went about cleaning up as usual and didn't think ahead to what it would do to Tori."

"She is still human in her heart," Eli said softly. "I do not know if that is a weakness, or a strength."

"Neither do I," he echoed. "I do not look forward to the coming night. She will have questions, and she may be angry."

"Ah, I wouldn't count on it," Eli said, stifling a smile.

"And...well, her mind was troubled when I first went to her outside. I sensed none of that turbulence when she crossed my threshold, only weariness. And then pain. I couldn't understand that, but now I do. I would dare say that she was working this out in her mind. It would have been less painful if she hadn't chosen the early morning sun as her confidant, but I believe she is at peace with last night."

"Maybe with her feeding, but not with me killing a man who was unconscious," Declan muttered.

"Hmm. Well, that aside, I recall when I was younger, after gorging, there was only one thing I wanted."

"More blood?" Declan drawled sardonically. "It may be mine she's after."

"Well, she will be after you. But it is f.u.c.king she will want, not feeding. She is starting to wake. A word of advice-she is going to want to dominate. If you were human, you'd have no choice. But to let a vampire near mad with the urge to f.u.c.k dominate isn't going to set a good precedent for your relations.h.i.+p. If I were you, and I rather wish I were, I'd do the dominating tonight."

"I don't relish the master and servant role, Eli," Declan said, watching Tori's still face. How could the vampire sense she was waking?

"It isn't a role you need to play, and I am not suggesting a new lifestyle. But do not let her take you, Declan. These first nights are integral for who she will become. No matter how human her heart is, she is vampire, and her ways will be that of a vampire. If she gets used to taking and taking and taking, it will not be easy to change that."