snap any moment now, and things would be okay, all okay. None of this was…real….
Then I saw Claire.
She was standing outside the cage by the bleachers, and Myrnin was holding her arm like he was trying to keep her from going full-out Eve and running for the cage, but I didn’t think she was trying. Like me, she was paralyzed, trapped in her nightmare, and those dark eyes were looking at me, seeing me, and I saw myself, too. Sweating, bruised, feral, angry, cruel.
It made me sick.
I rolled away from Michael and curled into a ball, facing Claire, staring back. Maybe it was the pain from my hand still tearing through me; maybe it was, finally, my own brain waking up and screaming.
Maybe it was seeing that horrified look on her face. I didn’t even care that she was with Myrnin; I was glad she had someone to protect her here. And I knew he would. He’d better. Him, I would kill if he let anything happen to her, and he knew it.
I saw her lips shape my name. Shane. I couldn’t hear her, but I knew how it would sound, how heartbroken and disappointed and scared. I’d let all this get away from me. I’d hurt her and she’d hurt me, and we had to fix it. We had to. Because I couldn’t let this destroy the people I loved.
That included Michael, the jackass. I flopped over on my back, breathing fast, and saw him sitting up. Too-pale-to-be-normal blood ran down his chin and dripped on his bare chest. Without a shirt he looked buff but very, very pale, almost ghostly. Still Michael, though.
Still my friend.
Always my friend, even when I was the biggest dick on the planet.
He was looking at me with a frown, checking out whether I was still in that other, scary place, and I nodded to him and wiped sweat off my face. I felt cold now, not burning hot like I’d been. When I flexed my hand, the pain from the broken bone sliced through me like a clean red knife, driving away all the lingering ghosts of anger.
“You didn’t fight,” I said. “Jesus, man, I could have killed you.”
“Don’t think you could have, not for a long time,” he said. “Anyway, you didn’t.” He looked around and saw Eve. His smile was real and full of delight, but there was something else mixed up in there, too. Something almost scared. “I’m okay, Eve. No permanent damage.”
She was clinging to the bars like she intended to force her way inside with sheer fury. “Shane, if you hurt him, I’ll kill you!”
I waved at her wearily. “Yeah, thanks. I’m the one with a broken bone.”
I exchanged a quick look with Michael, who was making plans. “Get away from the door,” he said.
“Why?”
Michael stood up. “Because I’m kicking it open.”
It took seven sustained, vampire-strength kicks to snap the lock and send the thing flying back; Eve moved off, but not far. I was watching the outside, the crowd. Vassily had, no surprise, disappeared. He’d never intended to be around for long, just long enough to grab the betting receipts and catch his ride. But I wasn’t worried about him. He was a greedy ass hat; no big deal.
I was worried about Gloriana, because I could still feel that subtle gray tension inside me that meant she was around. Not focused on me, not right now, but definitely……
I saw her a second before she grabbed Eve by the throat and yanked her backward, holding her tight like a Gothic human shield. Eve’s weird hat got crushed in the chaos—and now it was chaos, because the people in the stands were figuring out that things weren’t going according to the standard fight-club plan, and they wanted out. Only there wasn’t any way out of here. The doors were locked. Most of the vamps had already bolted, leaving Myrnin and Michael and Gloriana behind.
Glory’s blue eyes met mine over Eve’s shoulder, and I froze in the act of getting up. My mind clicked over and blanked into a perfect, smooth whiteness, and I felt that fury boiling up again, hot and crazy and perfect. She knew me. She knew just where to push, and what would cause me the most pain. I didn’t even have to think about it consciously anymore for it to hurt.
Hurt. Of course……
I slammed my right fist down into the floor and sent another jolt of agony through my body. The fury shattered and melted away, and I gave Gloriana a smile. A nice, big one. “Guess not,” I said. “You wanted to make me kill Michael, didn’t you? Kind of an if-I-can’t-have-him-nobody-can stalker thing, right? I’m just your weapon. Man, girl, get therapy.”
She smirked at me. “That’s all you’re good for, Collins—being a weapon,” she said. “That’s all you’ll ever be good for. Taking out enemies.”
“Good enough for me,” I said. “But you just made the top slot on my enemies list. Too bad for you. Don’t you think?”
She squeezed. Eve’s eyes got huge and she gave me a pleading look, then cut it toward Michael, who was coming down the stairs out of the cage, heading for her and Glory.
I felt Glory’s power, her glamour, slam into him like a freight train, and he slowed down…and stopped. He reached out for Eve, moving like he was underwater…and Gloriana laughed a little, one of those sweet, innocent little laughs that had seemed so pretty before, and said, “I hate it when you look at her that way, you know. Such a waste. She doesn’t deserve you, Michael.” And I knew right then that she was going to kill Eve in front of him.
And there was no way Michael would be able to stop her.
He didn’t have to. Eve was fumbling at the pocket on the side of her über-Goth dress, and I saw a flash of silver a second before she plunged it under her arm, across her own body, and into Gloriana’s chest.
“Damn,” I said. Because she must have gotten it right, first try—no easy thing, even when you’re facing a vampire and able to see your target.
Gloriana went down, dragging Eve with her. Her mouth was open in a silent scream, and her eyes were bright and red and running over with fury. She was still trying to close her hand and crush Eve’s windpipe.
Michael lunged forward and slammed the silver stake down harder into Glory’s chest, all the way in, for all I know, all the way into the cement floor beneath her. Then he dragged Eve away and put his arms around her and held on like the world might be coming apart, but the two of them never would.
It was kind of beautiful.
And I watched Gloriana—the prettiest vampire I’d ever seen, and the most dangerous—go still and quiet as the silver began to burn and discolor her body, killing her from the inside out.
She was all done.
I let just a little bit of the rage back out. Just a little, and felt it evaporate into a warm, scary satisfaction.
And God, it felt good.
“Shane?”
Claire hadn’t seen what had happened for the past few seconds—too many running, screaming people, and she’d lost sight of Eve. When the chaos thinned a little she saw Eve sitting on Michael’s lap on the concrete. And Gloriana lying next to them, staked half into the floor. Silver, Claire realized. She was well on her way to totally deceased.
And Claire decided she couldn’t care too much about that. What she did care about was that Michael and Eve were okay, and that Shane was still standing inside the cage, staring out at Glory’s dying body. He looked…blank, except for his eyes. They were full of something hot and wild and strange, and then…peaceful.
Myrnin was still hanging on to her. “Hey!” she said, and shook her arm to try to throw him off. “Let go already! I’m fine!”
He was frowning and trying to look everywhere at once. “I think we should leave,” he said. “I can easily break a hole in the bricks over there. Yes, we should go now. See, your boy is fine. Everything’s fine. Except Glory,
