"Go!" Sean thundered, and the pair fled.

Sean had his father in his arms. He carried Daniel to a sofa, laid him down. He looked at Maggie. "Where has Aaron gone?"

"I don't know."

"Will he die yet?" Sean demanded. No. He thought back to his encounters with the vampire. He hadn't died in the morgue, and he hadn't died in the cemetery.

She shook her head. "No," she said softly.

Deep, eerie laughter seemed to fill the whole of the house.

Maggie's beautiful gold eyes were on his. His features were taut. She was afraid. Not for herself. For him. He wanted to stroke her cheek. a.s.sure her. How in G.o.d's name could he do that?

"He's not gone at all!" Maggie breathed. "Barely hurt!"

From outside, Sean heard the gunning of a motor. The girls, at least, had escaped.

Then he felt Carter.

Though he was crouched down by the sofa, Sean was suddenly picked up by what seemed to be a gust of black wind.

He struggled, trying to strike the force that held him in a death grip. Arms were around him, arms so tight he couldn't breathe. He couldn't see at all. He could only smell something foul, something like decay. He was stifling.

"Dead man, you're a dead man!" Carter roared. "But I'm going to take you apart piece by piece!"

He was thrown then, thrown hard. He landed with a cracking thud against the wall.

Desperately, he tried to clear his head, to rise.

He saw Aaron then. Form and ma.s.s rather than shadow.

"Aaron! I'm the one you want to hurt!" Maggie cried. She was backing away from Aaron, trying to lead him away from Sean.

Then she changed tactics. She cried out suddenly, throwing herself against Aaron. But he started laughing again, the sound rising to mingle with an explosion of thunder from outside. "Do you think you'll destroy me again, my love? Do you think I went away to heal for all that time without making sure I was stronger than you could ever hope to be? I've gorged on blood, Maggie, bathed in blood, swum in blood. I have a power you'll never take, never in a thousand years ..."

He was lifting her. Her fingers were around his throat and she was screaming and tearing into him. But her cries were fading away, and all her fury seemed fruitless.

Sean managed to get to his feet, took aim, and fired again. Rapidly. Careful not to hit Maggie. d.a.m.n, but he couldn't get a clear shot at the head or heart ...

Maggie screamed again, clawing at Aaron as the bullets jerked their way into him.

He dropped her.

And suddenly, once again, he was gone.

A rush of foul, evil darkness swept around Sean. Arms encompa.s.sed him, bony fingers tore at his flesh, icy, cold, they lifted him ... threw him again. He thudded to the floor. In pain. Arms wrenched, back, head, shoulders ...

He lay in darkness. He saw Maggie trying to stagger up. With tremendous force, he crawled his way to her.

"Where is he?"

"I don't know. But he'll be back."

He dragged her into his arms. Met her eyes.

"Maggie, you have to do it. Make me one of you."

She shook her head wildly. "No, Sean, let him take me, let him take me out of here.

Maybe you'll be safe then!"

"No, Maggie. Don't you see? Nothing you do will change him. If he beats us, he'll just be stronger."

"Please, Sean, I couldn't bear it if I brought about your death ... again. I love you, Sean, please-"

"Do it, Maggie."

"You can't kill him as a vampire, Sean. You'll have lost your soul, and when you die that way... there is no forgiveness, no escape from eternal d.a.m.nation."

They heard the laughter again. Soft at first, growing louder. Looking beyond Maggie's shoulder, he could see a huge shadow beginning to form on the wall.

"Do it, Maggie! I beg of you!"

"No, Sean-" she pleaded, kneeling before him.

"d.a.m.n you, do it, or we're dead, and dozens more will pay, as well. Maggie, for the love of G.o.d!"

He drew her against him, hard. He felt her tears fall on his flesh.

"Now, Maggie!"

"No!"

"Maggie! Don't drain me, just taint me. I'll have the strength, but I won't be a true vampire."

"Sean, I don't know. When men have been tainted, they go insane. They become killers themselves-"

"It's our only chance!"

Then he felt her teeth. Cold, hard, like steel needles, sinking into his throat. He was filled with a rush, like ice water cascading through his veins. He held her, and held her, as he weakened at first, as he felt his life force washed away in a cold, rushing river ...

Then suddenly, there was a strength in him. A strength like fire. And when he felt himself plucked up again, he strained hard against the force, bursting free of it.

A moment later, shadow formed to substance. Aaron stood before him, whirling his deadly knife. He beckoned to Sean with both hands. "Come on, big boy. Come on, copper, come on, pig!"

He whirled toward Sean, and leapt up. His feet caught Sean in the head, sending him flying once again. Sean quickly staggered up, refusing to lose the fight when he had equal power.

Aaron came toward Sean again.

Maggie rose, flinging herself on Aaron's back. Her nails ripped down his back, tearing his shirt and his flesh, but he swung her off, hard, and kept walking. He stood in front of Sean and threw a backhanded blow against his cheek that sent him reeling again.

But Sean was quickly up, praying that his own power would come.

Again, Aaron came at him.

This blow sent him flying all the way out to the hall. He landed against the wall, right beneath a painting of the Sean who had been slain during the Civil War. He heard Aaron's laughter in the distance.

Someone was beside him. Lucian hunkered down by him, fierce and determined. He had pushed Sean's duffel bag into the hall where they now stood.

"Your sword. You've got the strength now. End it. Use your sword, Canady."

Lucian pressed the duffel bag toward him. Sean nodded, reached into it, and took out the Confederate-issue cavalry sword.

Aaron called to him from the library. "Come on, big boy, come on, come on!"

Sean rose, the sword at his side, and walked back to the library. Aaron was staring at him, smiling, tossing his knife from hand to hand as he approached him. "I'm tired of playing, pig. Time to dine on pork."

Sean waited. Until Aaron was almost upon him.

Then he raised his sword.

And ...

Swung. With all his newfound strength.

There were seconds, just seconds, when he saw the alarm in Aaron's eyes.

Then steel bit into flesh and muscle, blood and bone.

And Aaron's head went flying, severed from his body.

"Sean!" Maggie cried out, racing toward him. She pitched herself into his arms. He held her. Tightly. Nearly smothered her. Encompa.s.sed her. Weakness pervaded him. They sank to the floor together.

"Oh, G.o.d, Sean!"

"Well, we have the murderer!" he whispered.

"Oh, G.o.d, Sean, but you don't understand ..."

"Maggie, we're alive now. We've the killer in the house; there will be no more slayings.

We have to live the best we can now, and be ever wary!"

He staggered to his feet. He could hear police sirens. Mamie hadn't been able to sit tight after all. He went out to find Lucian.

But Lucian was gone.

Within a moment, officers were filing in. Jack, a bandage around his head, was among them; even the chief. Sean tried to talk, to explain. His head suddenly seemed to kill him.

He pitched forward, blacking out.

Maggie had never told him that vampires could pa.s.s out.

Time pa.s.sed quickly.

Daniel was fine after a few nights in the hospital-he did have a concussion.

So did Sean. He shared a room with his father.

The papers-and the police force-hailed Sean and Maggie as heroes. They had stopped the New Orleans Ripper.

The case ended more bizarrely than it had begun. The killer's corpse was taken to the medical examiner's office. Someone, however, stole it-and replaced it with a decapitated skeleton. But then, Pierre LePont, the most fierce and fastidious of the medical examiners, had been in the hospital with a concussion as well. Strangely enough, he wasn't furious that the real body had been stolen.

The incident was intensely investigated, but there seemed to be no answers as to what had happened.

The real corpse was never found.

The bones, when investigated and carbon dated, proved to be well over two hundred years old.

Still, New Orleans was a strong city. Days pa.s.sed, then weeks. The murders and the bizarre incident of the disappearing corpse no longer appeared on the front pages.

Sean looked at himself in the mirror every day. He didn't seem to change.

He still liked garlic.

And yet...

He had to admit to being slightly afraid that he would soon become a madman. He was only able to function at his job because he knew that both Maggie and Jack were watching him.

Maggie moved into Sean's apartment little by little. They spent a lot of time at Ashville, and Montgomery Plantation as well. They healed.

They waited.

One afternoon, about a month after Aaron's death, Sean met Maggie at Montgomery Enterprises. When he entered the shop, Cissy was on duty, and told him that Maggie had had an appointment and he should wait for her upstairs in her office.

He was sitting in her swivel chair, idly looking at her handsome sketches on the wall, when he suddenly turned around to discover that he had company.

Lucian De Veau sat relaxed and composed in one of the chairs before the desk.

Sean felt a cold sweeping over him. He had killed a vampire after Maggie had drunk his blood. Had Lucian come to tell him that he was about to face a fight he couldn't win?

"Lucian," he managed to say.

Lucian grinned. "Ah, yes, Lieutenant! You look well."

"Am I well?"