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Then, all at once, he was awake.

He wasreallyawake.

He sat up sharply, moving so fast, his upper body was erect before those thoughts had meaningfully gelled. He stared down at a pair of blue-green eyes, a soft but nearly heart-shaped face, small pale hands that had already unfastened most of his shirt and unbuckled his belt. She had her hand on his cock and he was horrified to realize he was hard, that he hadn’t dreamed that part, and he still hadn’t moved away––maybe in shock, maybe in some lingering hope hewasdreaming, that something would indicatefor certainthat none of this was real.

She smiled at him, eyes liquid and pupils black, and something finally jolted him out of whatever the fuck had paralyzed him.

“Jesus fuck…”

He blurted the words out as he threw himself up and backwards. He half-vaulted over the armrest of the couch and fell over the other side, in what was maybe the least dignified thing he’d done physically since becoming a vampire.

He crawled backwards as she moved, snake-like, towards the same armrest to peer over at him on the hardwood floor. He was breathing too hard, now dazed, and staring up at her… at the face of a seerchild… feeling like he would probably be throwing up if he had the physical constitution of a seer or a human.

As it was, he felt sick, disturbed, revolted.

He crawled backwards, his eyes on her warily.

Once he was back far enough, in his muddled mind, at least, he flipped over and got back to his feet. He immediately began to button up his shirt. He had it done up and was shoving it back into his pants and buckling his belt as he continued to back away.

“How the fuck did you get in here?” he growled.

She didn’t speak.

She watched him with those shocking, blue and green eyes, eyes that were somehow both older and younger than they should be. Something about the way she looked at him made him feel like he was losing his mind. It wasn’t only the blown-out pupils, which were disturbing enough on a damned child… no, there was something familiar in that look.

She stared at him like she knew him.

Worse, she looked openly hurt, even heartbroken, by his rejection.

21

THE POSSESSION

Nick walked stiffly over to a table by the apartment’s door, where he and Jem used to place their keys and other things they used day-to-day. He nearly tripped over something curled up on the floor, and stared down in shock when he realized it was Panther.

The big, black wolfhound had wound himself up into a fluffy ball not far from the door, almost like someone left him there, and told him to guard it.

Nick glanced in the direction of the girl.

“Someone” probably had.

Miri wouldn’t be happy about that. She didn’t like people pushing her dog.

Nick didn’t much like it, either.

The dog whined, thumping his tail at Nick as if apologetically. Nick rubbed the dog’s head, then scooped up the earpiece he’d left on the small table when he walked in. He fitted it to his ear, pausing only to rub the dog soothingly again.

Then he straightened and activated the comm with his mind.

He keyed in Black’s ID and switched to sub-vocals.

He didn’t want to upset the kid even more.

“I’ve got a situation here,”here, he said, the instant he heard Black pick up. He spoke vampire-soft, a bare vibration in his throat.“I need some help. Me and Jem’s old room. The kid’s here. And before you ask, I have no fucking idea how she got inside, but she’s obviously disturbed…”

The girl blinked.

Gods-damn it. Did she hear that?