She shook her head. “You’re different. You’re not like the others.”
He arched a brow. “Because I didn’t try to kill you?”
Her head continued to wag back and forth as her gaze skipped over him. “You’re different.”
He frowned. She didn’t seem to be checking him out. She seemed to be studying him.
Did she see something that set him apart from the others?
“How am I different?”
“You tell me.”
Not bloody likely.
She mimicked his frown and took another step back. “Why have you been following me?”
She’d caught that, had she?
Well, curiosity had driven him to watch her. And she did prove to be a very good vampire lure. He hadn’t killed this many vamps on a daily basis in quite some time.
He should have turned her name and address over to Chris Reordon. But there was something about her. He couldn’t get her out of his head.
Not that he would admit it.
“You make good bait,” he stated just to rile her.
Her face flushed with fury. “I what?”
Damn, she was beautiful. “You make good bait. Hunting vampires has never been so easy. I just follow you and take out the dullards who can’t resist you and slink after you.”
“You . . . I . . . Is that an insult? Are you saying only dullards would be attracted to me?” she sputtered.
If that’s true, you’re standing before a big-ass dullard, he wanted to say. “Of course not. Only dullards would want to kill you.”
“Oh. Well, you can’t do that. You can’t just follow me and take out any vampires who fall for my trap.”
He shrugged. “You can’t really stop me, can you?”
“The hell I can’t.”
“Well, you could if you ceased hunting and left the slaying of vampires to me,” he suggested.
She stared at him. “Seriously, what are you?”
“What are you?”
“What do you mean? I’m human.”
“Your brother isn’t.”
The tip of one of her swords nicked him as she pressed it to his throat. “What do you know about my brother?”
“That he’s a healer, a gifted one.”
“I don’t know what a gifted one is, but you leave him the hell out of this,” she snarled.
“As long as he aids you in your quest, I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
“I’m not kidding.” Her expression fierce, she pressed forward. “Stay. The hell. Away from him.”
“If you fear for his safety, you have only yourself to blame. You led me to him.”
Alarm and self-condemnation flitted across her pretty face.
“It’s only a matter of time before you lead vampires to him as well,” he pointed out, “if you haven’t already.”
“I haven’t. I’ve been careful.”
“Are you sure? Did you know I followed you?”
Fear suffused Krysta.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.
She’d been so stupid! She’d been so confident! She’d been so sure that she had gotten away clean after each hunt.
And she had led this vampire straight to Sean?
Worse than that, she wouldn’t have even known it if he hadn’t told her.
Her hand began to tremble.
How many times had Sean begged her to stop? Told her it was too risky? Admitted he feared losing her? And now she could lose him because of her own hubris and carelessness.
She lowered her sword. “Don’t hurt him. If you’re going to kill one of us, kill me.”
“Why not kill the both of you?” he posed.
“Because I’m the one with the quest.”
“And what quest might that be?”
“To kill every bloodsucking vampire in existence.”
He pursed his lips. “That’s quite a quest. I’ve been killing vampires for two hundred years and have barely made a dent.”
Shock struck her speechless.
Two hundred years? She didn’t know what stunned her more. That Étienne was that old—he didn’t look a day over thirty!—or that there were really that many vampires on the planet.#p#分页标题#e#
“Are you serious?”
“Quite.”
“I had hoped . . .”
“That vampires were a regional thing?” he finished for her.
She nodded dumbly. How had he guessed so accurately?
“They aren’t,” he said, and there was kindness in his voice. Sympathy. From a vampire.
One who had, if she could believe him, spent the past two centuries—two centuries—killing other vampires.
Abruptly, the song “Squirrels in My Pants” from Phineas and Ferb filled the air.
Étienne fumbled in his pocket and withdrew a cell phone.
She hadn’t even noticed until then that his weapons were all sheathed. Not once, in this entire conversation, had he threatened her.