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“This was a mistake.” She grabbed her bag and was halfway off her seat when he grabbed her wrist.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, babe. Please.” He let go of her and sat back. “Stay and tell me what I can do for you, and I promise I’ll shut up.”

She sat reluctantly. “I won’t tell you anything that’ll help you kill anyone.”

He gestured “that’s okay,” but kept his mouth shut as promised.

Cassidy sucked down half the iced tea. Jackson waited. She fidgeted with the straw. “Well, this is awkward.”

Still he said nothing.

“I decided to see you only this morning…after sunrise. Dominique doesn’t know I’m here. He has nothing to do with it. And I’m definitely not compelled.”

He motioned her to continue; the chunky Rolex rattled on his wrist as he did.

She frowned. “You’re even more annoying when you don’t say anything, you know that?”

“I’m listening. Carefully.”

“Okay, well, I need you to start talking about what you and or the Foundation may know about…um…”

“Yes?”

“Er—erotic feeding.”

His brows shot up. “Don’t you have actual vampires you could ask about that?”

“Actual vampires are a bit of a mixed bag. Not the norm, I’m pretty sure. Either of them.”

“If they drink blood, they’re as normal as they get.”

“Humor me. Tell me what you know.”

He pulled a hunk of bread from the loaf sitting on the table, tore into it with his teeth, and chewed as though there were no conversation happening at all. Cassidy’s turn to wait.

“They feed on emotion as much as blood,” he began, gesturing with the bread. “Fear is one of the most potent. They lose control when they sense that. Which, of course, you know.”

She nodded. “No fear” was her motto for a reason.

“Anger isn’t so irresistible.”

“Which is why you use it to distract them.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “It’s a last-ditch defense mechanism, yes.”

“Is that why you fly off the handle at the drop of any given hat? You’ve trained yourself to be angry at the first sign of a threat?”

He looked like he might want to fly off that handle again right now. His jaw muscles worked as he ground his teeth, his fingers playing with the half-eaten piece of bread. “Do you want me to answer your question or not?”

“Please. Continue.”

Before he did, he grabbed the iced tea and lowered the level in the glass another inch. “They most enjoy emotions that reflect how they see themselves.”

“Huh?”

“Emotions that are about them, their prey’s reaction to them. Few people like making others angry, so a human who is angry with the bloodsucker attacking him won’t have the right emotional flavor, if you will. They won’t ‘taste’ so satisfying. But when someone is terrified enough to shit themselves, they’re feeding an ego that thinks it’s the most terrifying thing ever.”

“Huh. That makes a terrifying kind of sense.”