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But rather than feeling triumph, I instead scowled at the abrupt feeling of being alone. My body didn’t like it. And that wordless part of myself that had stopped me from feeding upon Michael earlier, the annoyingly emotional inner voice that belonged to this body, didn’t like it either.

I felt resistance bucking from somewhere deep inside my chest.

I ignored it, even though it made me uneasy. That part of me wasn’t nearly as faint as it should have been. No matter. It would fade with time.

Besides, shutting out my mate was entirely necessary.

Michael couldn’t know what I intended. Nor where I slept. He might say too much, perhaps without even meaning to. Or he might be foolish enough to let his pesky humanity get in the way of my fun. I wasn’t sure what I would do if that happened, but I didn’t want to run the risk of breaking him.

I would never break my favorite toy, after all.

We were going to have so much fun together. Once he had learned how to see things my way. We could do anything we wanted. Anything at all. We could—andwould—be together again, just like we had been all along.

Forever.

But first, shelter. Safety.

So, running at top speed, far faster than a car would have been able to travel, I made my way through the foothills, moving as far from civilization as I could get. The elevation gave way to seemingly endless flat, hard earth. And then, at last, just as the sun was beginning to rise behind me, I reached the edge of a forest. I ran deeply into it, only slowing down once the trees began to grow more closely together, the layers of canopy overhead causing the shadows to lengthen and deepen around me, despite the fact that it had to be well into morning now.

Finally, I came to a ramshackle cabin deep in the forest, so dilapidated, remote, and overgrown with moss that it was almost certain no one had used it in years. A good thing, too, because if I had encountered any human beings in my efforts to escape the others, I would have had to stop to feed and wasted precious time.

My throat was engulfed in flames and the pain I felt was obscene, like it might tear me into pieces. I could understandhow so many of the vampires Michael and I had hunted over the years were so sloppy. They were driven half-mad by thirst, willing to do anything to stop it.

I broke the rusted lock latching the door shut, snapping it in two effortlessly with a small display of strength. Then I pushed the door in and stepped inside. I made certain to close the door properly behind me. Any signs that the cabin had been disturbed might cause someone to come investigate. And I needed to be smart about my kills. I wouldn’t allow my base instincts to put me in the crosshairs of a hunter. Not when I knew better. A vampire is immortal. Not invulnerable.

The cabin was a one-room affair with holes in the roof, the inside just as mossy as the outside. It smelled strongly of mildew and decay. The floor was alarmingly soft under my feet. There was a broken wooden table listing to one side. In the corner, there was a bed made of metal, the mattress so deeply stained and overgrown with mold that it had turned almost completely black.

Charming.

I sighed, resigned, and settled down with my back against the wall opposite the door, my legs splayed out before me. I would wait out the day here, but the first order of business would be to find a foreclosed house, perhaps on the outskirts of some suburb, with few neighbors around to act as witnesses.

I smiled at the thought. The possibilities for the eternity stretching before me were endless and absolutely delicious. So long as I stayed smart, I could probably get away with anything. I knew how hunters operated, after all.

Oddly, no one had followed me. I had expected that Thierry might, at least. Then again, he was foolish enough to have feelings about things. Perhaps they were still reeling at what had become of me, even though that had been hours ago. Plenty of time to get over it and make a plan.

But then, they didn’t understand how absolutely freeing it was, tonot care.

Michael would have told them by now that I was still wearing the talisman protecting me from magic, which meant that any spell they tried in order to obtain my location would surely fail. But then, perhaps Michael was banking on being able to find me through the bond we shared. I knew that I was.

Or, again, perhaps they were simply licking their wounds.

Abruptly, I felt tempted to drop my walls for an instant, to check on Michael. The impulse was startling in its power. It came from deep within me, from a place that wasn’t cold-edged and rational.

I frowned.

That was an insane notion, after the efforts I had just taken to flee. It would likely ruin everything, it would tip Michael off to my location the moment I opened my mind to his. Even the briefest of check-ins would make it that much more likely that I would be discovered.

Michael was with Bryan and Tobias. Not to mention Thierry, who had proven himself quite lethal. No, he was fine.

Still, there was a nagging sensation in the pit of my stomach that felt suspiciously like worry. How strange. If his safety wasn’t in jeopardy, that could only mean that some part of me still cared about his feelings. That some dim part of me was worried about how he was handling what had happened.

But even that was natural, wasn’t it?

He wasmine. His wellness was my responsibility. Given that he still possessed human emotions—for now—it wouldn’t do for him to suffer needlessly. After all, I would never break my favorite toy. Not when he had already proven that he was so much fun to play with.

It isn’t that and you know it.

I froze.