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“See that you do,” Trista said. “But don’t dally.” No one spoke again until after the door shut behind Jasen.

Joe’s throat constricted with the echoing slam of the door. It rang through him like a reverberating drumbeat. Or a death toll.

Trista returned her focus to Joe. “You did well, Joseph.” She reached out and lifted his bloody, but uninjured, wrist. “Now, though, it’s you who needs to wash up I believe.” She offered him a small, victorious smirk as she released his arm.

Joe didn’t argue, or waste his time with a response. He wasn’t sure he even inclined his head before he stepped around her and made his way back to the bathroom. He fumbled with the faucet knobs, intending to turn on the hot water to scrub his wrist clean, but all at once his stomach rolled and forced him to first release its meager contents into the sink.

Maybe he’d been wrong when he’d convinced himself that not all vampires were killers.

He had already become a killer.

He finally turned on the hot water and, as the temperature built, he lifted his gaze to his reflection. He was paler than usual, with a vampire’s black eyes and a new, haunted expression he’d never seen in himself. He wondered if that would last.

****

Her arm hurt. She was fairly comfortable otherwise, but her arm hurt. That was the first thing Brianna became aware of as consciousness returned to her. It was a few seconds after that before she realized she wasn’t just waking up from a deep sleep. What…?

She drew a long breath and pried her eyes open, finding her lids heavy at first. The room wasn’t too bright and there was no chandelier overhead. There weren’t a lot of rooms in the building that didn’t boast obscene chandeliers. Her mother had a thing for them.

“Thank goodness, you’re finally awake.” There was a note of rare, sincere relief in her mother’s voice. It was the tone that drew Brianna’s attention more than the words themselves.

Brianna rolled her head a little to the side as Trista sat down on the edge of the mattress. “Your color’s almost back to normal, too. How are you feeling?”

Brianna frowned. “I feel…” Tired. A little disoriented. Weak. “Confused.”

Trista matched her frown, but the expression lacked any malice or judgment. “You were poisoned. Werewolf blood. You’ve been on a blood-drip for over half an hour, but you need to drink clean blood, if you think you can sit up.”

For a moment, shock washed over her. Then the memory rose from the back of her mind, pushing its way forward through the cobwebs. With the surge of adrenaline came clarity. She’d been waiting on Joe. “Joe, is he—”

A warm hand landed, lightly, on her shoulder. “Right here.”

As Brianna lifted her gaze to follow the comforting touch up to Joe’s reassuring smile, Trista spoke. “Joseph and Jasen were the ones who found you. Ill-advised though it might have been, it’s a good thing you sent him away, or you could both have died.”

He was all right. Whoever had poisoned her hadn’t gone after him. But just as she started to smile, she processed her mother’s words. “Wait, Jasen?” She glanced to her mother, then back to Joe. “What were you doing with Jasen?”

Joe shook his head, his hand falling away. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “It was nothing.”

Brianna didn’t like that answer at all.

“Joseph, be a gentleman and pour a glass,” Trista said, indicating something Brianna couldn’t see from her position.

Joe inclined his head and moved out of Brianna’s line of sight.

Trista stood. “Let’s get you a little propped up so you can drink something. Come on.”

Suddenly Veronica Hunter had moved into Brianna’s line of sight, angling around to the other side of the bed. “I’ll help.”

“Please, I can—”

Neither vampire listened to Brianna’s request for independence and instead Brianna was physically moved into a more lounge-like position. She wasn’t quite sitting up, or lying down, when the pair of women stepped back. But Veronica had taken care to squish another pillow behind her back, so at least she was fairly comfortable.

“There, that should do it,” Trista said, satisfied with herself.

Brianna sighed. “I could have done that myself.”

“Nonsense,” Trista said. “You’re too weak.”

“I’m not that weak—”