I clutched the photograph harder.
“Kara?” Thomas pressed.
“Why hasn’t he changed her into a vampire?” I asked, ignoring Thomas.
Gabriel took the picture from me. His eyes froze as he stared at the photograph.
“He doesn’t want the bloody fate he forced on Lucy to be her burden. He wants her to have a normal life. . . . He wants her to have a life as a human,” Gabriel said quietly.
“She is not Lucy,” I told Gabriel inside my head before turning to Thomas. “Gabriel is right. Elias would have changed her had he wanted to be with her. He made it clear that she was to stay out of his life. Instead, he keeps his distance and watches her from afar. So that means yes, Thomas. She is going to die.”
Both of them looked at me hesitantly, but Gabriel’s uncertainty was washed away by my determination.
“She is going to die because I’m going to turn her into a vampire,” I said.
Chapter 13 Irony
The world we lived in was truly a frightening place. Everyone’s information was for the taking. Names, addresses, occupations . . . You could find anyone just by using a computer, and when you did find out where someone lived, who was to stop you from going to them and doing whatever you wanted? Their fate was in your hands.
It had only taken thirty minutes. Snooping through Elias’s room probably had not even been necessary, but at least we knew exactly what she looked like because of the photograph.
Her name was Olivia Bishop. She was twenty-seven years old, and she lived near the coast in North Carolina. She was a registered nurse, and she was engaged to a phlebotomist named Harry Neal.
Her life was about to be completely changed, and it was going to be because of me.
Later, Gabriel and I lounged under the stars. The dew seeped through our clothes, and the sounds of crickets and owls echoed around us. The stars twinkled overhead, innumerable and mesmerizing, the immortal friends who watched vampires live out their endless lives.
“Such beauty I missed because I was scared of the night,” I whispered.
Gabriel squeezed my hand. “Their beauty pales in comparison to the light of your eyes.”
I smiled. “Charmer. You should write poetry.”
“You would laugh at anything I wrote.”
“Probably,” I agreed.
It was nearly impossible to differentiate his breathing from my own.
“You don’t want to do this,” I said after a few minutes of silence.
“It is not that I don’t want Elias dead. I do, more than anything. But . . . I do not want you to do this because I do not want you in danger.”
“I’m much stronger now. And calmer, thanks to being connected to you.”
“None of that will be enough,” he said. “If Elias finds us near Olivia, you will be his target. Even if we have others with us, it will not guarantee your safety. He is stronger and faster than you. All it would take is for you to move the wrong way by an inch, and your heart would be vulnerable.”
I sighed. Images of Lucy and Olivia flitted across our minds.
“If I go through with this and hurt him this way, does that make me . . . evil?” I asked hesitantly.
Gabriel traced my wrist where my fang scars used to be. “I could never think that you are evil, Kara. You are, without a doubt, the most compassionate person to ever walk this planet. But you are impulsive, and you often lack common sense. You have a temper, and you are horrendously impatient—”
“I wanted assurance I wasn’t evil, not an exhaustive list of my flaws!”
He grinned. “You are many things, dearest heart. But you are not evil. I know my view of you is just a little biased, but I do find it strange you would involve an innocent person. Your choice was taken from you by me. Are you willing to take that same choice from someone else the way it was stolen from you?”
I cracked my knuckles. “We have no idea where Elias is. But if we take Olivia and bring her here, he will eventually notice. He will come to us. We have the coven. They will kill him on sight.”
“So why change her into a vampire?” Gabriel asked.
I drummed my fingers against his chest. “Because it will hurt him to see her that way,” I said honestly.
Gabriel said nothing, allowing me to process the words I had just spoken.
I sighed. “What have I become? How could I even think to . . . Ok, I’ll only change her if he doesn’t care enough to come and get her. After she is changed, I’ll let her go. He will see her eventually, and that anger will make him seek us out. Either way, he will come to us and die.”
Gabriel kissed my temple. “She will be scared, heart. Scared the way you were scared.”
“No, she won’t. I will Control her to not feel fear during this. I know you hate Control, but I won’t have her sick with fear the way I was. I don’t want to do this, Gabriel. I don’t want to involve her, but Elias has to die. You know he does.”
He brushed his lips against mine. “Your guilt over this will never go away. You know that, don’t you?”
I nodded. “I have accepted that. I guess I really am different now because I feel almost no hesitation about doing this.”
“You are in predator mode right now,” Gabriel said. “I don’t have to tell you that things can change once the hunting haze fades. You know from experience.”
I put my head against his heart. My heart.
He knew what I was going to ask, but he also knew I needed the answer. I knew his answer, but I wanted to hear it.
“Will you love me no matter what I do? Will you love me no matter how I handle this?”
He moved quickly. He got on top of me, pressing my body against the
