Alex snuggled with Cyprien until he fell asleep. The Darkyn actually didn't sleep as much as hibernate, but she could tell from the moment his pulse dropped from low to nonexistent. Hers wasn't going to do the same, so she eased out of his arms, dressed, and tiptoed out of the room.

The only other souls awake in Derabend Hall were Sacher and his grandson, Wilhelm, who were having breakfast in the kitchen. Alex tried not to drool at the sight of the big, fluffy waffles with golden syrup steaming on their plates. She was still struggling with the fact that she was on a liquid diet for the rest of eternity.

"Dr. Keller." Sacher got to his feet and introduced his grandson before asking, "Is there something you require?"

"I need to borrow a car, Sach." She knew where she had to start looking for John. "I'd like to drive across town to the hospital and see a former patient of mine."

"The sun has already risen." He nodded toward the window. "Perhaps you could visit tonight?"

"It's okay. I'm not as sluggish as the other vamps." As it happened, she could tolerate sunlight much better than Cyprien or Phillipe, another difference in her mutation.

Sacher sent Wilhelm to bring one of Jaus's cars around to the front of the house, and while she waited Alex checked the elderly tresora's hand.

"This looks a lot better this morning." She was pleased to see that the tissue inflammation had shrunk and a scab was forming. "We'll clean it up again tonight, but keep it dry and uncovered today."

"You are very kind," Sacher said. "Are you certain I cannot drive you? All I would need to do is drop Wilhelm off at his school on the way."

"It's okay." She smiled. "I grew up in Chicago, and I'm kind of sick of being driven places."

Alex had never driven a Porsche, but once she had gone zero to sixty in the time it took her to blink, she decided that she could get used to it. The dark-tinted windows kept the sun from irritating her eyes, so she didn't have to put on her shades until she reached Southeast Chicago Hospital.

She checked in the lobby to make sure Luisa was still on the burn ward and then took the elevator to the fourteenth floor. The four million dollars Cyprien had paid Alex for fixing his face and not dying of rapture and blood loss had moved Luisa into a private room and afforded her the best physicians Southeast had to offer.

Alex bypassed the nurses' station and went directly to Luisa's room. The young girl was out of the burn cradle and in a bed with an adjustable mattress that could be reconformed daily to prevent bedsores. The preliminary skin grafts that had been performed on her face and neck looked healthy, but her eyes were covered with a thick band of gauze. From the rise and fall of her chest Alex could tell she was awake.

"Hey, stranger." She took off her jacket and hung it over the back of one visitor's chair. "Long time, no see."

Luisa's head turned toward her voice. "I know you?" Her voice still sounded deep and husky from the damage to her throat, but repairs the reconstructive surgeon had made to her mouth had greatly improved her enunciation.

"I'm Alex, your old doctor. Remember me?" She went to Luisa's bedside and touched her hand. The fingers that had been fused together were now separated and covered with tiny skin grafts. "I was in town for a couple of days, so I thought I'd stop in and see how you're getting along."

"Dr. Killer. I remember you." Luisa turned her head away and moved her scarred hand out from under Alex's.

"It's Keller, actually." Alex sat down in the bedside chair so she could study the work that had been accomplished. Luisa's skin grafts were the color of dark chocolate, a perfect skin match. "Your face looks good, sweetie. They really grew some nice skin for you."

"Wouldn't know."

Alex had expected bitterness—Luisa had been through a continuous tour of hell, and the ride wasn't over—but the apathy was more disturbing. "Is there anything I can do for you while I'm in town?"

"Isn't it a little late to be asking her that?"

Alex turned to see a short, dark-haired woman with folded arms glaring at her. "It's never too late to be helpful. Who are you?"

"Jema Shaw. Luisa and I worked together." She came to stand on the other side of the bed, rather like a bodyguard. "Luisa gets tired very easily. You should go."

"You should butt out." Alex turned to Luisa. "Has my brother been to see you? He's the priest who came to read from the Bible to you when I was treating you here."

"No." Luisa's voice tightened on the word. "No priests."

"You've got some nerve, lady," Jema said. Her pale face flushed pink with anger. "You walk out on her in the middle of her treatment, and now you come back just to see if your brother's been around praying over her?"

"She gave my mother a lot of money," Luisa said, sounding very tired now. "Leave her alone, Miz Shaw."

"I apologize, Luisa. I didn't realize she'd left some conscience money for you." Jema stalked over to the window.

Alex imagined shoving the other woman through the plate glass for a delicious moment, but then she saw how thin and frail-looking Jema was. Probably another patient who got discharged. "I'll come back to see you another time, sweetheart."

"Good," Jema said without looking at them. "Make it next Christmas. That's when they expect to discharge her. You can wave good-bye and Luisa might see it this time."

God, what a nasty little bitch. "You take care, okay?" Alex touched Luisa's forehead, just as she had in the old days, and found scarred fingers around her wrist, urging her down. She bent close.

"Don't come back," Luisa whispered in her harsh voice. "Don't you never come back here." She shoved Alex's hand away from her face.

"All right." With one last glance at Jema Shaw, Alex picked up her jacket and left the room.

She should have expected Luisa to be upset, Alex thought as she rode the elevator down to the lobby. She had abandoned her at a critical point in her treatment, when Luisa had been fighting everyone and everything except Alex. John had done the same thing to her, leaving a wound that would never heal. It didn't matter that in Alex's case it hadn't been by choice, and that her mutation made it impossible for her to treat humans anymore.

Luisa had counted on her, and she'd bailed.

I could treat humans. Alex walked out of the elevator and smiled wanly at a security guard. I treated Sacher's hand without wanting to sink fangs into him. All I'd need to do is feed well before I saw any patients—

Kill this bitch quick.

Alex staggered to one side, almost blundering into a new mother being wheeled out to the valet parking area. The woman shrieked, clasping her newborn close, while her husband tried to get between them.

"Sorry." Alex stumbled away, groping for a handhold, finding the security guard. "Sorry."

Black jacket. Red rose corsage.

"Miss? Are you all right?" Hands tried to steer her.

The flood of murderous thoughts pouring into Alex's mind prevented her from responding. The thoughts weren't obsessive or out of control. They were as precise as sculpted ice, formed and formulated, a glistening tower of controlled hatred ready to shatter and fall like a hail of glassy razor blades.

"I need to sit down," she said. "I… I'm pregnant."

"Right here, ma'am." She was guided to a chair and helped into it. "I'll get a doctor."

"No. I'm just a little dizzy. It'll pass." She directed a blind smile toward the voice. She wanted to smash her hands to the sides of her head, but she held on until the guard retreated.

Nausea and reaction had her trembling like a leaf. The emotions she sensed were never good ones, but this killer was consumed by hatred. It was all he felt—hatred for his target, hatred for himself, hatred for life—and he reveled in it. He was a machine running on evil.

Hit her once. Back over her.

He was going to use a car to do it. Alex's mind shrank, not wanting any more, not another single thought, not another split second of—

Could take her back. No one there now. Images of a basement, and other women screaming and writhing on the filthy table in it flashed across Alex's wide eyes. He'd used power tools, knives, electrical current, anything to inflict maximum pain. Slice her, dice her, do her up nicer…

Across the lobby, a tall, broad-shouldered man walked through the main entrance. He wore a shirt and tie and carried a jacket, but Alex would have known him anywhere.

"John?" She fought through the killer's thought stream and got on her feet and raised her voice desperately. "John."

Her brother heard his name and looked over at her.

Pop it like a balloon. The killer was imagining his target's head bursting under the rear wheel of his car. Black car, late model, specially outfitted. Trunk lined in plastic. He was going to take the body. Even after they were dead, he toyed with them. He liked fucking the dead.

"Get out of my head," Alex whispered.

He was looking at his reflection in a car's rearview mirror. Not his face, but his eyes. An arrow-shaped stud set with three diamonds pierced the center of his right eyebrow. He'd taken the stud from one of his victims. He'd ripped it out of her—

Alex felt her fangs emerge and used them to bite her tongue, hard. As her own blood filled her mouth, the thoughts and images retreated—just in time for her to see her brother make an about-face and stride out of the hospital.

"No. No, John, wait." She jerked on her jacket and hurried after him.

She couldn't see outside; the sunlight nearly blinded her. She fumbled in her pocket for her shades, swearing when she found the pocket empty. She must have left them in Luisa's room. If she squinted, she could see well enough to get to the car, and she'd just drive around until she could spot him. She stepped out into the circular valet drive.