time. Of course I’d still kill you right about now anyway, so I don’t suppose it matters much.”
Sebastian just stands there, eyeing Roberto and me. He’s moved the dagger from palm to palm a couple of times. He’s trying to think it through, figure out how to get me out of this.
Roberto sees it, too, and presses the blade a little deeper. “Do you want her back?” he asks. “Drop the dagger or I’ll kill her. Let me end this now and I’ll let her walk.”
Sebastian eyes both of us, then he gives a little shrug and says, “I never intended for her to walk out of here, anyway. Go ahead and get her out of the way and you and I can keep at it. This time you won’t have the advantage of the longer blade. Good luck with that.”
I suck in a breath at Sebastian’s words. I try to meet his gaze, but he’s not even glancing at me. It’s like I’m not even here.
Like I don’t exist. I feel a wash of cold fury. I’ve spent too much of my life with people not seeing me as I really am. That’s not how I’m going to die.
Roberto pulls the dagger away from my neck long enough to glance down at the handle. “Hmm . . . You picked Bagnoli’s,” he says in an offhand voice. “Interesting choice. I would have gone with one of the Spanish blades myself.”
Before he can press the blade back to my throat, I drop down, spinning out of his grasp. I pull two wooden stakes out of my pockets as I kick out his legs. He goes down. I pounce before he even hits the ground. The stake goes all the way through his chest and sinks into the ground beneath him.
I leap back before he can move. Even staked through the heart, I know he’s still dangerous. I move quickly, using the other stakes to pin his hands to the ground as well. Only then do I stand. I grab the katana and stalk over to his body.
“You may be smarter and faster than I am. But I talk less.”
I raise the sword. I’m already swinging it down in a wide arc toward his neck when Sebastian grabs my arm.
There’s fury and battle rage in his eyes. Emotion like I’ve never seen from him before. Guess he got a dose of that vampire berserker rage, too.
He just shakes his head. “He’s mine.”
I snarl at Sebastian, driving my elbow back into his chest. The air goes out of his lungs in a whoosh, but he doesn’t release my arm. In fact, his grip tightens to the point that he’s crushing the bones of my wrist.
“I’ve hunted him for two thousand years. You don’t really think I’m going to let you kill him, do you?”
His fingertips dig the tendons in my wrist against the bone and the katana falls out of my hand. Again, I do the drop-and-kick maneuver, but Sebastian trained me and he’s ready for the move. He follows me to the ground and wrestles me beneath him. We’ve fought enough that I can tell he’s not really trying to bring me down. His heart isn’t in it—either that, or the fight with Roberto has worn him down. Even I can feel the strain of being so deep in Roberto’s territory. He braces one arm on the ground beside my head. His other forearm is pressed against my chest.
I look up into his eyes, trying to see past his bloodlust, but all I see is his need for revenge. There is nothing of the man I thought I knew. Nothing of the man I wanted him to be.
Maybe I just hoped that a person could still exist inside a bloodthirsty vampire.
I can’t imagine why I’d want to believe that.
“Tell me something, Sebastian. Would you really have let him kill me so you could have your revenge?”
Something flickers in his eyes. “You’re fully vampire now, Kit. Haven’t you figured that out? You’re not my responsibility anymore.”
“But you would have let him kill me?”
“I would do anything to stop him. Yes.”
“And Genexome? Is it really your company? Are you really responsible for the Tick virus?”
This time there’s not even a flicker of emotion in his gaze. “Yes. I’m responsible.”
“Why?”
“Why do you think?” he gasps.
It isn’t a hard question. Why has he done anything? Because he thought it would help him kill Roberto.
It’s all I need to hear.
I buck against him, rolling him under me. It’s a move that would never work if he was at his full strength. If he wasn’t already exhausted. It’s a low blow. But no lower than what he’s dealt me.
Once he’s under me, I pull my arm up over my head and plunge the stake into his heart.
I do it without thinking about it. Without looking at him. Because it’s the only way I can manage to do what needs to be done.
I hear him gasp in surprise, but I ignore it.
I hop up, adrenaline, vampire berserker rage, whatever it is, I’m shaking so badly I can barely hold the sword in my hand as I stalk over to where Roberto still lays, pinned to the ground. He stares up at me, shock writ clearly on his face. I swing the sword up, but I’m shaking too badly.
Tears are pouring down my cheeks and when I feel a hand on mine, I cry out in alarm and whirl around sword at the ready. But it’s Carter.
I drop the sword and scramble away. Because I almost just killed my friend. And because I just killed a man I thought was my friend.
“Let me,” Carter says. He’s holding out his hands, palm out in a gesture of surrender. I nod mutely and back away.
I don’t look as he slices Roberto’s head off. I’ve had enough of death for now.
Instead I move over to Sebastian, who is still alive. Barely. And gasping for breath. Suddenly, my fury, my rage, is gone. Not vanished, but fading. I look down at Sebastian, at the stake that I’ve driven through his heart, and something inside of me clenches.
I lean over him. “Is there really a cure?”
He’s looking back at me, his expression strangely soft in a way it never has been. Death has softened him. He nods. “At Genexome. The underground storage. If Sabrina hasn’t taken it yet.”
“Sabrina?” I gasp. So, that’s what he traded my freedom for. In exchange for letting me go, he told Sabrina that there was a cure and where it was hidden. It was a risky move on his part. Why bring me to Sabrina in the first place? Why trade his most valuable asset for my freedom? Had he really wanted me to have a choice? Or had he been setting us both up?
Whatever his intentions might have been, he came on this suicide mission knowing that at least one person on the outside knew the location of the cure.
He reaches one trembling hand up to my face and brushes back a lock of my newly short hair. He holds onto the lock and rubs it between his thumb and forefinger, looking at it like he’s confused. “I liked it better long,” he says. A trickle of blood seeps past his lips, making them appear bright red in the dusk. Then he meets my gaze and smiles. “I always knew you had the killer instinct, Kitten.”
I choke on a sudden burst of grief that I don’t even understand. Why? Why would I be sorry that I’ve stabbed him? Why regret killing the man who has risked everyone and everything I care about to satisfy his own lust for revenge? The man who has lied to me, tricked me, and made me a killer? The man who stole the music from me? Why would I mourn him?
But he’s also the man who has given me more choices than anyone else. The man who has always respected my wishes. And who in the end, tried to do the right thing to save humanity.
My hand hovers above the stake. If I pull it out, will he survive? Will his heart start beating again, pumping out the healing powers of vampire blood?
Then Sebastian’s eyes flicker closed, and a wail of grief is torn from my chest. It’s not even out of my mouth when Carter grabs me by the shoulders and pulls me away.
“We gotta go!”
I look around, almost surprised to find myself in the town square. It’s chaos. People are running everywhere. Ticks howl and yip, but the sound is too close. They’ve breached the fence. Carter is dragging me toward a car. A way out. We have to take it now because if we don’t, someone else will. The Ticks are here. En masse. I could see three, four. Maybe as many as six. But there are far more than that. When I listen for them, I count more than twenty distinct sounds. Far more than I could handle.
