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I drew a little away from Jean-Claude, still touching, because I was afraid to stop touching him. If the doubts were this bad touching, I couldn’t imagine what they’d be like if we weren’t touching. We’d just die. “My cross still works for me, Richard. It still burns with holy light. God hasn’t forsaken me.”

“But he should have,” Richard said. “He should have, don’t you see? If what I believe is right, if what you say you believe is right, then your cross should not burn. You have broken so many commandments. You’ve murdered, tortured, fucked, but your cross still works. I don’t understand that.”

“You’re saying I’m evil, so God should have turned his back on me?”

Even with most of his face hidden, I saw his face convulse with emotion, tears finally falling. He nodded. “Yes, that’s what I mean.”

I just looked at him, and knew that it was partly vampire powers messing with his head, but that perhaps Columbine’s powers only brought out what was already inside you. Some part of Richard believed what he was saying.

“Ma petite…”

“No,” I said, “no, it’s okay.” My chest felt like a piece of it had been carved out, not bloody and warm, but cold and icy. As if the piece had been missing a long time, but I hadn’t wanted to see it, feel it, know it. “Maybe God isn’t the sex police, Richard. Sometimes I think Christians get all hung up on the sex thing because it’s easier to worry about sex than to ask yourself, Am I a good person? If as long as you don’t have sex with a lot of people you’re a good person, that’s easy. It’s easy to avoid that. It’s easy to think, I’m not fucking anyone, so I’m good. It makes it easy to be cruel, because as long as you’re not fucking around, nothing you do can be that bad. Is that really all you think of God? Is he just the sex police for you and Malcolm? Or is it that sex is easy to worry about, easy to avoid, and the whole love-your-neighbor-as-you-love-yourself thing that’s hard? Some days it’s so hard, I feel like trying to take care of everyone in my life will break me apart. But I do my best. I do my best for everyone in my life every damn day. Can you say that, Richard? Do you do your best for everyone in your life every damn day?”

“Do you include yourself and Jean-Claude on that list?” he asked, his voice so quiet, so full of emotion that it was strangely empty.

“Do you not include us?” I asked. I could feel the tears pushing in my throat, at the back of my eyes like heat. I would not cry for him.

Those true brown eyes stared at me. I watched the pain in them, but finally, he said, “No, I don’t.”

I nodded, a little too fast, a little too rapidly. I fought to swallow past the tears. I thought I’d choke on them. I cleared my throat twice, so sharp it hurt. I wanted to accuse him, say, “Then what were you doing in my bed today? Why did you sleep with Micah, Nathaniel, and me? Why did you have sex with me today? If I’m not a person in your life, then…” I swallowed the words, because they didn’t matter. He’d have had some answer for everything I said, or he’d have felt bad about it. Either way, I didn’t want to hear it, or see it. I didn’t need to hear more explanations from him. I didn’t need to see him agonize over his moral quandaries anymore. I was done.

“I’m not angry, Richard. I don’t hate you. I’m just not going to do this anymore. You think I’m evil. You think Jean-Claude is evil. You think what we do to keep everyone safe is evil. Fine, fine.”

“I didn’t mean…”

I held up a hand. “Just stop, don’t. The hand on your arm that’s keeping the doubts from eating you alive was forged through sex, Richard. That calm was won through centuries of pain and sex and servitude. Jean-Claude, the evil bastard, saved Damian, ransomed him from hell. They didn’t even like each other, but Jean-Claude wouldn’t leave anyone with her, not if he could save him. Evil bastard.”

“Anita,” Damian said, and his face held—fear, something, as if he knew what was coming.

“You benefit from our evil, Richard. You count on us being willing to do your dirty work. Hell, I’m the Bolverk for your clan. Literally,