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“Not as blurry with speed as usual, are you?” I asked innocently. “Bet you’re not as strong, either. What do you think?”

“Fuck you,” he snarled, lurching forward with his arms outstretched like a classic movie monster. With the powdered silver sapping his strength and speed, he was about as powerful as the average human. I was betting he’d never bothered to learn how to fight properly, either. Most vamps didn’t. They always thought they were invincible, right up until they very much weren’t.

I rolled my eyes, sidestepped his attempt to grab me, and ended up behind him.

Years of training as a hunter kicked in and I swept his feet out from under him. He hit the ground with a thud.

I wrenched the waistcoat open, popping buttons in the process, and plunged the stake up into his chest, going underneath the ribcage to pierce the heart. My father had taught me that—why try to shatter the breastbone, if you didn’t have to? My dad hadn’t been good for much, as far as parenting was concerned, but he’d been a damn good hunter.

The vamp gasped once, then twice, his body convulsing each time, before it finally went limp. He stared at me, totally bewildered, as though he hadn’t quite registered the fact that he could die—for real, this time. Then, an instant later, his eyes went blank and staring. All the tension left his expression. A thin rivulet of black blood—vampire blood—trickled out of his mouth and down his chin.

In a matter of moments, his skin turned greyish blue and began to wither, collapsing in on itself. Whatever animates vampires and lets them lead unnaturally long lives, it doesn’t stick around long after they’ve been slain. Their bodies return towhatever state they would’ve been if they’d been dead all along. And yes, in the case of newly turned vamps, that’s every bit as unappealing as it sounds.

My stomach turned. It never had before, but since meeting Bryan and realizing that some vamps were still people, it had gotten harder to kill even the bad ones.

I didn’t even hear the female until she slammed into me, sending me sprawling onto my back.

Her face contorted with rage as she grabbed me by the lapels. “You killed Jake!”

The vampire’s name had been Jake? Somehow, that didn’t surprise me.

I brought my hand up—still coated with silver—and tried to smear some onto her face.

She dropped me so fast that the back of my head bounced on the concrete, causing my teeth to slam together. I tasted blood in my mouth.

Then someone in the van screamed—which meant that her compulsion spell had finally broken—and I heard the sound of three helpless and abruptly terrified humans attempting to flee to safety.

I heard the female swear under her breath.

“Lenny, get them!” she called, clearly talking to the driver, who hadn’t seemed to realize anything was amiss. “I’ll deal with the boy.”

What the fuck was up with everyone calling meboytonight? Sure, I was a year younger than Michael, but I was twenty-seven. That was pushing thirty, for fuck’s sake.

I tried to shove myself up, but the female was too fast.

In a blur of speed, she launched herself back to me and held me down with one hand. I brought my hands up again, trying to get the silver on her, but she batted them away.

I expected her to try to bite me. Instead, she shoved her wrist against my mouth. Sweet copper tang filled my mouth, and I felt my eyes widen as they locked with hers, shock tearing through me. She had bitten her own wrist. She was trying to force me to drink her blood.

“You hate vampires, little boy?” she hissed, her face cold and merciless. Her dark eyes locked with mine, nothing human in them at all. Not even anger—not really. Just pure, unadulterated malice. “You want to hunt us? Kill us? Well, you’ll change your fucking mind soon enough, won’t you?”

I tried to move my head, but she held me still. And I couldn’t breathe. Blood poured out of my mouth as I tried to cough it up, to fight her. But her grip was like iron. And the instinctive panic of a drowning man took over, causing me to thrash uselessly against her.

And then, against my will, I swallowed some of her blood.

Horror flooded through me.

No. No, no, no, no—

“Good,” she muttered. “Find us when you wake up. Or we’ll find you.”

I heard footsteps approaching. Cautiously, at first. And then at a run.

The female hissed. Her inhumanly strong hands darted up, grabbed both sides of my head, and there was a split second where I heard Michael scream out my name, his voice hoarse and ragged with panic. My heart shattered inside my chest as I realized this was really happening and there was nothing that I could do to stop it.

And then there was only darkness.

CHAPTER SIX || MICHAEL