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I got to my feet and fell a second time. It wasn’t lack of energy. It was almost like being drunk. But it wasn’t a downer. It was defiantly an upper. “What is wrong with me?”

Shang-Da answered, “I’ve seen vampires do this. If they drink someone powerful or drink too much . . . power.”

“Shit.”

“I’m feeling pretty damn good, myself,” Verne said. He touched the bite on his neck. “I’ve never let a vampire do me before. If it feels that good, maybe I’ve been missing out.”

“Better,” Nathaniel said. “It can feel much better than that.”

“It wasn’t vampire,” Richard said, “it was power. Verne’s power, mine, Anita’s, and Jean-Claude’s.”

“Sort of a preternatural suicide cocktail,” I said and giggled. I lay on the floor, hiding my face behind my hands and fighting an urge to roll in the afterglow. I wanted to take the feeling and wrap it around my body like a blanket. And down the long, glowing warmth, I felt a darkness. I felt Jean-Claude like a black hole sucking in all our warmth, all our life. And in that moment, I knew two things. One, that he’d known when Richard and I made love. That he’d felt it. Two, that as he ate from our lives, we ate of his darkness. We drank that still, cold death as surely as he tasted the sun-warmed flesh and pulse of our bodies. And we all drew power from it. The light and the dark. The cold and the hot. Life and death. As the marks drew us closer, the lines between life and death would blur. I felt Jean-Claude’s heartbeat earlier than it had ever beat in over four hundred years. I felt his gladness, his joy in it. At that moment, I hated him.

31

TWO HOURS LATER , Richard, Shang-Da, and I were tramping through the woods in search of biologists and trolls. We had until dark to get out of town, and since we really weren’t getting out of town, we might as well continue with our original plans. We left everyone else behind scurrying like ants, packing, packing, packing. We would pack and leave. In fact, we were supposed to call the sheriff when we were ready to leave. Wilkes had kindly offered us an escort out of town—before dark. After dark, I think the offer was a bullet and a hole somewhere.

I followed Richard through the woods. He moved among the trees like he could see the openings or as if, as he moved forward, the trees moved around him. I knew that wasn’t true. I’d have felt the presence of that much preternatural energy, but Richard made it look easy. It wasn’t being a werewolf. It was being Mr. Outdoorsman. His hiking boots were nicely broken in. His T-shirt was blue green with a picture of a sea cow, a manatee, swimming on front and back. I had the identical T-shirt at home, a gift from Richard. He’d been disappointed that I hadn’t packed mine. Even if I had, I wouldn’t have worn it. I wasn’t much into the Bobbsey Twin look for couples. Besides, I was still angry with him in a vague sort of way. I should not have been the only one of the three of us who didn’t know what it would mean for Richard and me to have sex. I should have been told that it would bind us all closer.

Of course, it was hard to be mad at him when the T-shirt clung to his body like a thin, second skin. His thick hair was tied back in a loose ponytail. Every time he passed through a bar of sunlight, his hair glowed with streaks of copper and gold. It was hard to be angry when the sight of him made my chest tight.

Richard moved smoothly ahead of us. I followed in my Nikes, not doing too bad a job. I’m okay in the woods. Not as good as Richard, but not bad.

Shang-Da, on the other hand, was not a woodsman. He moved through the woods almost daintily, as if afraid of stepping in something. His black dress slacks and fresh white shirt seemed to catch on things that didn’t bother either Richard or me. Shang-Da’s shoes had started the trip black and polished to a fine sheen. They didn’t stay that way. Dress shoes, even men’s dress shoes, aren’t meant for walking in the woods. I’d never met a city werewolf before, but no amount of physical grace made up for his total lack of familiarity with