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Maybe I was pushing my luck trying to get over the razor-thin boundaries that still rested between us, but the longer I found myself in Vi’s magnetic presence, the harder it was to remind myself why I was trying to avoid her in the first place.

“You’re really good,” she commented, lacing our fingers.

“You’re better,” I conceded, closing my cool hand to leech the warmth from hers.

“You let me win,” she accused.

“You caught that, huh?”

Vi laughed, using her free hand to punch my arm.

“Okay, okay!Stop hitting the driver, you'll make us crash! I won’t let you win next time. You’re damn good anyway, even without me pulling punches.”

“Damn right I am,” she said, leaning into my personal space so the faint saline of her sweat and overpowering honeysuckleand vanilla met my nose with every lungful of air. Her free hand fell to my knee, tracing patterns into my lower thigh. “Am I distracting you?”

“How is your wrist? Good?” I asked, mostly to avoid thinking about how badly I wanted her to kiss me.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” she teased. “Good. Ren healed it for me.”

Where else did Ren have her mouth last night…?

Pushing those heatlessly jealous thoughts from my mind, I shook my head.

“I should’ve been there. It should never have happened. I’m so fucking sorry, Vi.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” I said, meeting her eyes briefly before looking back at the road. “We’re supposed to keep you safe.”

“I ended up being fine in the end,” she countered airily, waving her hand like it’d been a minor inconvenience she could sweep away as easily as a spilled cocktail.

As if Juniper hadn’t walked her to the car, nearly comatose.

As if I hadn’t had to hold Ren back from committing a murder in the middle of our club.

As if Elsie hadn’t had to do the same for me.

I made an irritated noise. Vi didn’t need to downplay the truth to make me, or anyone, feel better. But if she didn’t want my apology, I wouldn’t force her to carry my guilt.

“Alright.”

She was quiet for a moment, seeming to mull it over in her head.

"I just hate that I feel so fucking powerless against you,” she said bitterly. "Vampires, I mean. I know that physically I don't stand a chance, but I can’t even trust my own mind. It's sick."

I remembered, however far away and hazy the memories were, when I’d felt like that. Lost. Adrift. Like I wasn't in control of my own life.

The world had been different then, and meeting Cherie had changed a lot of things for me. Eased the nightmares when they came. Turned the long, lonely nights into something I could look forward to. Chased away the hurt and anger I’d let fester like an infection for far too long.

She taught me a new way.

Made me better.

It fucking pissed me off that her loser of a brother felt entitled to even a cent of the legacy she’d built.

Before O, the clubs in the Lower City were slaughterhouses. Humans and vampires went in, only vampires came out. They were treated like a food source, like cattle. It had never sat right with me. So when Cherie had shared her dreams with me of a place where humans would be respected, where the transaction would be mutually beneficial, I hadn’t hesitated.

But I could still remember the old days. The people I’d killed because I didn’t know any other way. The things I did because I thought I needed them to survive.