Midnight screamed again, thrashing as Tana pushed the weapon in deeper, using it like a spear. Then, abruptly, Midnight went limp. Her eyes were closed, but her mouth hung open, a terrible grimace distorting her features.
Tana slumped back, wiping her bloody hand on her dress, too stunned to quite process what had happened. She sat in the dirt, shaking with horror and cold.
Get up, Tana, she told herself. Get up and get out of here. You’ve got the marker. Go.
Quickly, without looking at Midnight’s body, Tana stuffed her things back into her purse and stood, leaning against the side of Lucien Moreau’s house. Light streamed out of the tinted glass window, shockingly bright. It seemed to smear in her vision.
Don’t think about it. Go. Just keep going slowly until you make it to the gate. You can sleep in your car. Go.
She took four stumbling steps, before she realized the problem with her plan.
Midnight had bitten her. She was infected. And this time it wouldn’t be something her body could fight off. There would be no resisting, no control. She’d be like Aidan was, or worse. Tana fell to her knees, all her thoughts a riot of denial.
Then the door opened and two vampires walked down the steps. They were dressed in ratty black jeans and dark jackets. One of them was smoking a cigarette, although he tossed it to one side when he saw her.
“Get up,” he said.
She started to laugh, but it came out more like choking. “I can’t.”
“You murdered a vampire,” he told her, pointing to a camera high up on the side of the house. “Lucien sees everything that goes on here. And he doesn’t like humans attacking his guests.”
“Well, good, then,” Tana mumbled, still grinning stupidly, “because that didn’t happen.” Lucien, being a vampire, might not see it that way. But it was hard to care much when everything hurt.
As the guards took her, she knew she ought to scream or beg, kick or cry, but she had no more fight left. She let herself be lifted and carried back to the party. They took her through an entrance she hadn’t seen before into a small hexagonal-shaped room, which was empty except for the built-in bookshelves that covered the walls and for an ottoman, where they dumped her.
Tana wasn’t sure how long she sat there before Lucien Moreau came in. He’d changed his clothes and was now dressed in a blue shirt and loose gray trousers, looking relaxed as ever. Up close, though, Tana noticed a rank smell clung to him like spoiled meat. Crouching down, he seized her jaw between three of his fingers and turned her face one way and then another. He smiled then, baring his fangs. She felt the iron strength in his hand and the terrible indifference of his gaze, as though she were an animal he was considering the best way to butcher.
“You killed a vampire at my party,” Lucien told her. He shook his head as though she was in a great deal of trouble and a very naughty girl.
“So did you,” said Tana. If she was going to die, she might as well die sarcastic. She’d seen a lot of old movies, and that was definitely the way to go out. As if she were Humphrey Bogart or Clark Gable not giving a damn. She wanted to make Pauline and Pearl and even her father proud when they watched the feed; if she could be a little bit funny before, maybe the dying part would be less horrible to see.
A corner of his mouth lifted, as if maybe he appreciated a little sass from his prey. “It’s my party.”
She thought of the walls of Lance’s farmhouse, streaked with blood. She thought of pink-haired Imogen with her pale staring eyes. “It’s all your fault,” she said muzzily. “You. You’re the reason.”
He gave her an odd look. “I like it when you humans don’t bother being sorry, but it’s a little much to say that it was my fault.”
“So what happens to me now?” She remembered the infected girls and boys shackled to the parlor walls, fed on by vampires. Maybe she’d become one of those. Or maybe he’d just kill her. Maybe she could try to kill him right back, if only she could make herself stand up.
Lucien looked at her, as though he was weighing that very question. Then he slid his hand down from her jaw to her throat, tipping her head with cool precision. Tana took a deep breath, waiting for him to strike, fumbling in the cushions for any weapon. It was almost over, she told herself.
Then his fingers flicked her garnet necklace, and his expression changed. “That’s pretty against your throat. Where did you get it?”
She didn’t hesitate. “Gavriel.”
His eyes widened fractionally, studying her as though he’d never bothered to really look at her before. Lucien stood and went out, slamming the door behind him. Fear washed over her, but she was so tired and dizzy from blood loss that she couldn’t even hold on to it. She stood up and then slid to the floor.
She thought of Gavriel as he’d been earlier that night, with his curved daggers and his mad song. She wondered if he would come and sing to her.
Tana fell into an uneasy doze, curled up on the carpet.
She regained consciousness lying on cold stone, something soft piled under her head.