Show me.

The despair thickened and darkened around her, and suddenly she felt Ialdaboth's presence within it. It was part of the conditioning, that despair, part of what had made her so totally his, until Lorelei's interference had made it possible for her to question. It would, undoubtedly, not be the last obstacle.

But in another way, it was real. If Jarod knew who she had been, what she had done, how could he possibly accept her? How could he look at her again with desire, as he had on the plane?

That's my problem. His presence radiated gentleness. Show me.

There were no secrets here. She let it all go.

She had been born Catherine Gibson in 1760, in the Virginia Colony.

By the time the Revolutionary War started, she had very little to depend upon but herself. Following the armies from battle to battle, giving soldiers pleasure where she could, she eked out a barely acceptable existence.

Then she'd met the vampire. She couldn't even remember his name, wasn't sure he'd ever told her. He'd been among the soldiers, taking blood where he could, often from injured soldiers on the battlefield, where their deaths would be unremarkable. Even then, misguided as she was, she'd recognized the smell of evil. She'd decided it didn't matter.

He'd offered her gold for sex, which seemed like a good exchange.

But the sex had become brutal, and he'd Turned her in the process, unasked but not entirely unwilling. Not the rest. This much alone was too much.

Some part of her, distant, felt Jarod moving beside her. He was still asleep, caught in unconsciousness with her, but he put his arm around her.

There, in the darkness, where they were both together, he said, Tell me. You feed on my blood. I have a right to know.

The vampire had liked her. She had been a bitter woman, stripped of every comfort. Her mother had been a prostitute, her father a thief who'd eventually beaten the mother of his child to death.

"Would you kill him?" the vampire had asked her. "Would you kill your father, and anyone else who might belong to your family? Do you know if you have brothers or sisters?"

"Do I care?" she'd replied bitterly. "If they are spawn of his flesh, they deserve to die."

As I deserve to die. I deserved it then and I deserve it even more now.

Hush. Jarod's presence comforted her, then urged her to go on.

The vampire had told her there would be a great reward for her, a place for her in a community of vampires where she would be loved and accepted. All she had to do was kill her father. She had done it, and reveled too much in the killing. He'd had a wife she'd happily slaughtered, too.

And the vampire took her to Ialdaboth.

A hundred years of initiation. A hundred years of brainwashing, of committing the most hideous acts, killing humans, children, other vampires. Whatever I was told, without question. It's a testing period, and I passed.

Pictures passed through her mind, memories of atrocities she'd committed. Since her rejection of Ialdaboth she'd tried to push them away, into places where she couldn't find them, wouldn't have to feel them, but there they were. Clear as day and bright as blood. They spun themselves out in vivid color for her mind's eye to see.

And for Jarod to see, as well.

Inside, she wept. Whether she would awaken to find tears on her face, she didn't know, but here in this place of strange consciousness, her body shuddered and spasmed with horrible weeping.

Do you see? You can never leave me, because of what you've done. Ialdaboth's voice. Not his actual presence, but his voice, ingrained in her mind with the hundred years of indoctrination and, after that, the hundred years of loyal service. No one there can ever truly accept you. They all know you can't really change.

Despair clung to her like tar, dragged her down. She could sink Let her go! Jarod's voice, his thought-voice, shocking her out of the black despair by its intensity. Just let her the hell go!

It's not really him, Lilith responded automatically. It's just his voice, left behind in my head And suddenly she was awake, staring up at the ceiling of her bedroom in the Underground. Next to her, Jarod also gasped awake, his arms clutching at her, pulling her close. She pressed her face into his chest. Here, in the world of light and consciousness, there were no tears.

Seven.

"It can't be that easy. He can't be gone." She watched Jarod's hands moving down her arm, his gentle fingers as he pulled the IV needle free. He was Dr. Greene now, the touch quiet but impersonal.

He curled the tips of his fingers into the bend of her elbow, feeling the vague pulse there as she spoke.

He turned his attention to her face, lifting one of her eyelids to peer at her pupils. "Your blood carries markers from Ialdaboth, because one of his children Changed you. I think the collision between that blood and mine, which carries markers from Lucien, canceled out some aspect of the brainwashing."

"How?"

He looked into her other eye. "Beats the hell out of me. Most of this vampire shit makes no damned sense."

She laughed a little. He touched the pulse at her throat. It felt more like a caress, and there was warmth in his eyes.

"It isn't over," he said. "It'll be a process, and you just got it underway."

"A battle." She should have known that. Ialdaboth wouldn't give her up without a fight. A fight she'd brought right to the Underground's door.

"Julian should have killed me," she said. "It would have been safer."

He cupped her cheek, looking into her eyes with concern. "If Julian wants you here, then there's a reason. Trust him." He bent toward her, brushing her lips with his. "I do."

He made sure she was comfortable, then left her. Her heart lurched as she watched him walk out the door. Why was he so good to her?

There was such warmth in his eyes when he looked at her. It was too much to hope that he might actually care about her, especially after what he'd seen, what she'd shown him. He was just concerned for her, as her doctor.

She had to leave. If she stayed here, she would endanger everyone.

Perhaps Jarod most of all, because he was so often close to her.

What happened to her didn't matter, so long as this place was protected.

Sitting up in the bed, she swung her legs out from under the covers, touched her feet to the floor. She could still feel the brush of his lips against hers, their gentle warmth. She regretted that she would never get a chance to explore their mutual attraction any further.

Maybe she should leave him a note. But, in the end, she decided against it.

Getting out of the Underground proved more complicated than she'd expected. When she'd infiltrated the place before, she'd had Ialdaboth's abilities on her side. Now she had only her own. While formidable, they paled next to her erstwhile master's.

So she wandered the corridors, following the flow of strange, vampiric magic, going toward the places where the magic waned and the smell of vampires was fainter. And, finally, she found an exit and let herself out into the dark New York City night.

She allowed herself one look back, one pang of regret, but no tears.

Jarod was looking forward to seeing Lilith the next evening. Exhausted from lack of sleep and blood loss, he'd spent the day mostly unconscious, and had awakened with thoughts of her crowding everything else out of his mind. He was looking forward to talking to her, touching her, even if only in a diagnostic manner. Or maybe she would let him kiss her again. It seemed a fair bet.

But she was gone.

He stared blankly at the empty bed for stunned moments, unable to comprehend what he was seeing. Where could she have possibly gone?

"She left."

Julian's voice startled him. He turned abruptly.

"Where did she go?"

"Topside." Julian settled a shoulder against the doorframe. "She's trying to protect us all from the danger that is Lilith."

A stab of pain went through Jarod's wrist, and he grimaced. What was it about vampire bites, that they kept hurting, as if he were being bitten again?

"I want you to go fetch her."

Jarod blinked. "Me? Why me?"

"You might be more convincing." He smiled a little, then sobered.

"She's wrong about her bond with Ialdaboth. We need her."

"Do you know where she is?"

He nodded. "I'll take you there."

She had set up temporary housing in an abandoned apartment building, in the windowless basement. The rooms above had all been boarded shut, but she didn't trust them to be sun-tight.

She didn't trust anything at this point. Skulking the streets of Newark, New Jersey, she'd had the distinct feeling someone was following her.

She'd seen a shadow out of the corner of her eye that had sent her senses tingling. Her first thought had been that Julian had noticed her missing and sent someone after her. But no vampire from the Underground would need to behave so furtively only for her sake. No, whatever the thing was she'd sensed, it had a dark feeling to it.

Could Ialdaboth have agents here?

The minute the question occurred to her, she realized how stupid it was. Of course, he did. That's why she'd left Manhattan, wasn't it?

If they could trace her through her blood, they could follow her right to the depths of the Underground, regardless of any safeguard Julian had engineered. And they could track her; they'd proven that in Romania.

Yet they hadn't been able to do it while she'd been full of Jarod's blood The shadow she'd seen could have been anything-a mugger, a stray dog, her own imagination. It didn't matter, though. Even if her worst fears were true, she'd had to leave the Underground. Her presence there endangered the entire community.

She didn't doubt for a second that if she stayed in this dismal hellhole, they would hunt her down and kill her. Jarod's blood would only keep her safe for so long. But maybe, if all they wanted was her, her death would protect the rest of them.

A shudder ran through her as she took in her surroundings. The place, like her thoughts, was miserable. She ached from the day spent in Sleep on the concrete floor. It was cold, and she heard rats from time to time. Not necessarily a bad thing, the rats. At least she could eat them.

She might have to. Hunger twisted her gut, and she really didn't want to hunt. Not now. The thought of human blood repelled her, but it also called to her. Yet if she went outside, into the place where the shadows stalked, she might not survive long enough to feed.

Stay-go. Feed-starve. She couldn't think clearly enough to work through any of the conundrums facing her. She didn't want to kill, but "Lilith."

She spun, staring. Jarod stood at the doorway to her new lair. He lifted a bag of rich, garnet blood.

"I brought breakfast," he said.

She started to smile, then pressed her lips together, hard. "Why are you here?"

"Julian sent me."

"Why?"

"He wants you to come back."

The flutter of hope that had leapt in her heart died. "He wants me to come back. He wants me to."

"Lilith . . ."

"Go away. If Julian wants me, he can come and get me himself."

She turned her back to him and knelt on the floor, straightening the nest of blankets she'd slept in.

She heard Jarod take a step closer but refused to turn around.

"Lilith . . ."

The pleading in his voice made her angry. She surged to her feet, spinning to face him. He blinked, but didn't retreat. "Would you have come after me if Julian hadn't told you to?" Her voice was bitter and mocking.

"No, because I wouldn't have known where the hell to look for you." He held up the bag of blood. "At least eat something. Maybe you won't be so bitchy."

She jerked the blood from his hand, let her fangs slide free and sank them right through the plastic. If she had thought to shock or disgust him with the display, she failed. He only stood watching, impassive.

She drained the bag and threw it to the floor, irritated at his lack of reaction. Then again, he was a vampire doctor. She should have known a little blood-drinking wouldn't faze him.

"Feel any better?" he asked.

"A little. You should have brought more."

"It was all I had left of mine."

Of course. "So you came to medicate me."

"No. I came to ask you to come back."

"Why? Because Julian needs me?"

"No. Because if you don't, we may not be able to stop Ialdaboth from slaughtering us all." Her lip curled into the beginnings of a sneer before he added, "But most of all, because I need you."

Her gaze met his. She could neither deny nor resist what she saw there-pain, need, desire. Love. She swallowed, surprised at the intensity of it, more surprised at the intensity of her own reaction. Blinking, she gathered herself.