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I shudder. I’ve seen humans who use other humans as currency, as experimental fodder. It is a fate I saved others from—but that was long ago, and the act was simple, if harrowing. Get them to safety, away from evil people. There was an ocean between my charges and their destruction.

Would I be able to protect this young lady if evil were hunting us in our own backyard? “Murder is murder, whatever the purpose. The police should handle this.”

“But to the police, there is nothing to connect Delgado to any of his kills. He doesn’t have to kill any specific type of person or in any particular way. He travels around the world, a stabbing here, a strangling there, a murder in Venice one month and Montreal the next. Without Therese’s evidence, there would be no way to connect a series of random deaths to one man.”

“But Therese caught him?”

“Indeed, she did—with her own eyes. Once she talked to her grandmother, her eyes were opened further. She saw that one death was not the end of his crimes. She was able to find out a lot about his activities before she left him in Rome. She called the American police, who, for once, managed to handle things with some degree of success and connected her with Interpol. Interpol agents in Rome were able to get Delgado into a cell on something minor. Now, they must collect evidence before springing a murder charge on him. The odds are slightly in Therese’s favor. He’s killed so often and in so many locations that he will not automatically assume his ex-wife was the witness. But once his lawyer sees the witness list and the evidence against him... Well, you can understand why a lot of people would keep quiet and say they didn’t see a thing.”

“I admire her guts, but—”

“Marie LaFontaine, Therese’s grandmother, kept her grandfather’s journals, specifically the parts about meeting you and me in Pine Ridge. Specifically, the parts about you, how you were made, and your oath to protect Arthur’s family and the families of the men who created you.”

I try not to curse out loud.

“Marie told Therese to contact us, that the town could protect her—and specifically thatyoucould protect her. She is the family of one of your creators.”

“I know, but not by blood.”As if that ever mattered to me before.

I can hear the snicker and picture Jakob’s weary expression. “Listen to a vampire, dear boy. Blood doesn’t matter.”

“I... Don’t want to get involved. I want this to end.” The words come out faster than I can think them. “You’re powerful. You know the ways of our people.”

“That’s true, but—”

“Unmake me. If I do this thing for her, unmake me.”

“I can’t! Only someone with the sacred incantations would... The journals.” Minegold’s voice grows ponderous. “I suppose if he wrote about your creation, there’s a chance Arthur Sloane recorded or hid the words of life and the words of ending in his journal. They’d be useless without you there, but he might have left them in writing as some sort of failsafe.”

“Or some kind of mercy,” I whisper. I think back to the days on the boat, the days where I watched Yvette and Artie start to form some sort of bond and realized I would never have it for myself. “Whether the words of ending are written down or you have to make them as you go, you are powerful. You could do it. I don’t want to go on like this. Over eighty years, and still empty.”

“I know that pain, but there are things to fill it. There are friends, family, hobbies—”

“Not for me.”

“You won’t even try! Lately, you hide away. I never see you in town. Do you even eat these days?”

I skip the questions and criticisms. It’s different for Jakob. He was human once, and he’s never killed an innocent. He still has his human soul. Our positions are different, however similar he may try to make them. “I have tried long enough! Promise me that if I help this woman, you will set me free.” I resist the urge to punch the mirror as I watch my face working, breaking down. Sometimes I wish I would turn to dust, but I haven’t, and I won’t. They built me far too well.

“I am going to pray that you change your mind. But if you do not—then yes, I will help you. We must help Artie’s great-granddaughter first. If Delgado’s goons don’t believe she’s moved on and is living a happy little human life, he will stop observing her and send Hellhounds to finish the job.”

“Where is she now?”

“I spoke to her last night. An undercover Interpol agent will have her on a plane this morning. Early this evening, you and I will meet her at the Binghamton Airport. If she’s not being followed, we will hurry her to that little fixer-upper on Ridge View Way, and you will be the plumber who is there doing a full overhaul on the house. If she’s still got a tail, we will do anything in our power to convince Delgado that she’s moved on and has no interest in him any longer.”

“Well, what does he think now?”

“Therese didn’t tell him the real reason why she was leaving. She left after staging a big fight and storming out of their hotel in Rome. When she got to the airport, she called him and said that she was done with him, that she married him because she wanted a rich, glamorous life of jet-setting around the world with her playboy husband, but she didn’t realize how lonely and empty it would be. Then, she told him—well, she panicked, I believe.”

“Oh, no. What did she say?” I try not to groan. I value honesty except in extreme circumstances. Artie and I told many lies over the course of the war. I suppose Therese is in a war for her own survival.

“She told him she had met someone else, a sweet, small-town guy. She met a man with a blue collar and a big heart who would start a family with her and put her before his career, who would let her settle down in one place and not drag her around the world.”

“Ooh. And she didn’t think that would make him mad?”

“She knows him better than we do.”

“Apparently not. She was living with a killer.”