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Penguin Group (NZ), cnr Airborne and Rosedale Roads, Albany,

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80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Copyright © Jessica Bird, 2006

All rights reserved

SIGNET ECLIPSE and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

ISBN: 1-101-12853-4

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PUBLISHER’S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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Dedicated to: You.

There will never be another like you.

For me…you are the one.

Yeah, I don’t have enough words for this….

Acknowledgments

With immense gratitude to the readers

of the Black Dagger Brotherhood

and a shout-out to the Cellies.

Thank you so very much:

Karen Solem, Kara Cesare, Claire Zion,

Kara Welsh, Rose Hilliard.

Thank you to the best dental teams in the world:

Robert N. Mann, D.M.D., and Ann Blair

Scott A. Norton, D.M.D., M.S.D., and Kelly Eichler

and their incomparable staffs.

As always with thanks to my Executive Committee:

Sue Grafton, Dr. Jessica Andersen, Betsey Vaughan.

With love to my family.

Glossary of Terms and Proper Nouns

ahvenge (v.) Act of mortal retribution, carried out typically by a male loved one.

Black Dagger Brotherhood (pr. n.) Highly trained vampire warriors who protect their species against the Lessening Society. As a result of selective breeding within the race, Brothers possess immense physical and mental strength as well as rapid healing capabilities. They are not siblings (for the most part), and are inducted into the Brotherhood upon nomination by the Brothers. Aggressive, self-reliant, and secretive by nature, they exist apart from civilians, having little contact with members of the other classes except when they need to feed. They are the subjects of legend and the objects of reverence within the vampire world. They may be killed only by the most serious of wounds (e.g., a gunshot or stab to the heart, etc.).

blood slave (n.) Male or female vampire who has been subjugated to serve the blood needs of another. The practice of keeping blood slaves has largely been discontinued, though it has not been outlawed.

the Chosen (n.) Female vampires who have been bred to serve the Scribe Virgin. They are considered members of the aristocracy, though they are spiritually rather than temporally focused. They have little or no interaction with males, but can be mated to Brothers at the Scribe Virgin’s direction to propagate their class. They have the ability to prognosticate. In the past, they were used to meet the blood needs of unmated members of the Brotherhood, but that practice has been abandoned by the Brothers.

cohntehst (n.) Conflict between two males competing for the