Perhaps no one else in the city would get the novelty of a psychic musician and the most powerful vampire in Texas sitting together in an ice cream parlor, but Miranda’s creeping sense of the absurd had plenty to take in tonight.
Amy’s Ice Cream was the foremost chain of its kind in Austin, staffed by the young and hip—smaller versions of Kat, for the most part, and teenage boys with floppy hair and sleeve tattoos. It was decorated with cartoon cows and piped punk and metal over the loudspeakers, a study in contrasts that was typical of their fair city.
It was the only ice cream chain open past midnight, and also the only one in town that had a rotating selection of alcoholic flavors as well as the standard, mashed up with your choice of toppings from chocolate-covered Gummi Bears to granola.
Miranda took the waffle cone full of Mexican vanilla and fresh raspberries that she’d asked for, and licked the dripping edges off while David paid. She found an empty table and grabbed a handful of napkins before sitting down.
It always surprised her how many people craved ice cream when the weather was cold. Amy’s was never without a crowd even in the nastiest part of winter, and here at the leading edge of spring with a northern front about to hit, there were still half a dozen people occupying the tables in the middle of a Friday night.
David sat down across from her, resplendent in his black leather with his Signet glowing from his throat, holding a polka-dotted cup full of chocolate ice cream smothered in caramel praline sauce and hot fudge.
With sprinkles.
“I guess you’re not worried about diabetes.”
He ignored her and took a bite; the look on his face, one of unexpected bliss, made her forget how cold it was.
“I can’t believe you’ve lived here fifteen years and never been to Amy’s,” she said.
“God, neither can I.”
She smothered a giggle; she’d never heard him talk with his mouth full before. It made her think of the night she’d seen him sleeping—he probably would have been mortified at the idea of being adorable, but there were moments that he was almost human, and rather than lessening his allure, they intensified it.
They ate without talking for a while, but this time the silence was companionable, not strained. She pretended not to notice how his eyes lingered on her when she licked a stray dribble of ice cream from her cone, and he paid no heed to the way she kept catching herself staring at his mouth.
Finally, he couldn’t seem to stand it anymore. “So this Drew . . .”
She nearly inhaled her ice cream, recognizing the tone as one she’d never thought she would hear from him of all people. “Are you jealous?”
He met her eyes. “Insanely.”
Now it was her turn to blush. She suddenly found her napkin intensely fascinating. “It’s not what you think,” she said. “Kat was trying to fix us up, but I didn’t want that. When you got here, he’d just tried to . . . push the issue.”
Outrage bloomed in his eyes, and there was a hard edge in his voice. “Are you sure you don’t want me to kill him for you?”
“I can take care of myself,” she replied with a little flare of anger of her own. “I’m not your damsel in distress, David.”
He stared down into his ice cream. “I am aware of that.”
“Tell me why you’re here. After all this time, why now?”
David sat back and folded his hands in that molecular-level noble way he had, choosing his words with care. “Last night we destroyed the insurgents’ base.”
She nearly dropped her ice cream. “That house fire. That was you?”
“Yes. I tracked them over the citywide sensor network, and we killed them.”
“God . . . you mean it’s over?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know if it will ever be over, Miranda. There are still more of them out there in hiding. We’ve found a few, but evidence suggests we got two thirds of the total membership in the raid. Their leadership is gone, but they may still regroup and start again, this time even more aggressively out of the desire for revenge. There may also be other factions outside Austin waiting to be called in.”
“What you’re saying is that I’m going to be in danger for the rest of my life.”
“Probably.”
She shrugged and bit off one side of her ice cream cone. “So?”
He stared at her in open disbelief. “Aren’t you at least a little concerned for your own safety?”
She looked around the room, gesturing at the other people eating their ice cream in peace. “Look at all of them,” she said quietly. “They’re in as much danger as I am, but they don’t even know it. They don’t even know what’s sitting right next to them. Worry about them, David. I do. I see all these people living their lives, and I wonder which of them is next. But I don’t worry about me, not anymore. I’m strong and I can fight for my life. I know what’s out there. And I’ve lived in fear—I spent months jumping at shadows and crying myself to sleep. I’m not doing that again. Let them come and kill me—no, let them try. I think they’ll be surprised how hard it is.”
He was still staring, but now with wonder, and something like pride.
“Maybe you have the time to spend your life afraid,” she concluded. “I don’t.”
She went back to her ice cream, letting him take in what she’d said in stunned silence for a minute. “I guess I’ve changed,” she observed between bites.
Now he smiled. “No,” he said. “I always knew this was who you are. Now you know it, too. And now you know why I refused to give up on you.”
“Thank you,” she replied with a smile.
Another ice-cream-filled moment passed, and then he noted casually, “You look like you’ve been working out.”
“I have been. You look like you haven’t been sleeping.”
“I haven’t been.”
She took the last bite of her ice cream and wiped her mouth, then reached over and squeezed his hand lightly. “I’m sorry it’s been so hard,” she said. “How many Elite did you lose altogether?”
“Seven total. Eight, counting Helen. And forty-five humans. There was even . . .” He set down his spoon, pushing the cup away, saying, “There was a little boy. He and his mother were killed together. There were at least three other children as well, but I never saw their faces. This one . . .”
She held on to his fingers more tightly. “He reminded you of your son.”
“Yes. Not physically, really, just that innocence. They lose it so young, even without monsters in the night coming to rip their throats out. There’s no reason for it. We don’t have to end lives to survive, let alone the little ones. Despite what I am, I’ve never understood destruction for its own sake.”
She knew, hearing him speak, that he hadn’t told anyone what he was telling her. “But you stopped them,” she said. “At least for now. And if they know what’s good for them, they’ll leave town and not look back.”
He smiled with sad irony. “They never know what’s good for them.” He toyed with the spoon again, letting the mostly melted ice cream drip from it into the cup. “I failed them, Miranda. Fifty-three people died under my watch.”
“There could have been so many more,” she told him, trying to reassure him with both her words and her energy. “Not even a Prime can be everywhere at once. There’s only one of you to watch over all of us. Not even you can be perfect.”
He sighed. She had heard that sigh before. “I think I’m finished,” he said. “Do you want a bite before I throw the rest away?”
“Sure,” she said.
She started to reach for the spoon, but he lifted it first and held it out with a small mouthful captured in its bowl. She leaned forward and opened her mouth, lips closing around the spoon, but she barely tasted the ice cream; all she could feel were his eyes, and something in them made her shiver inside, a dark liquid heat spreading from her belly all the way down to her toes.
“Let’s go,” he said softly.
They walked back to her apartment close enough to touch, but not touching; Miranda tried not to let that make her insane. It felt so good just to talk to him again; she put that moment of heat between them out of her mind and fell into the rhythm of conversation.
He asked about her music and listened attentively as she recounted the crippling anxiety of her first few performances and how she had learned to use her gift to enhance, but not violate, the audience’s experience. She could gather up surface emotions and shift them little by little. It had taken a lot of practice.
They talked about the new Elite trials and Faith’s frustration with the new recruits, who weren’t nearly good enough to truly replace the dead. Miranda told him that Faith came to see her every week or two, and he didn’t seem surprised.