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“Did he tell you yet?” the lesser said to her as he pointed that muzzle at the archway.
“Bruce, I’m ordering you to put down the gun—”
“Ask him what he is. Go ahead, ask him.” More with that laughter. Then he cocked his eyebrow. “Not going to? Okay, fine, have you checked out his front teeth? Have you asked yourself why you’ve never seen him during the day? Do you wonder why he’s so secretive about what he does, where he goes, who he knows?”
“I will shoot you, Bruce—”
“He’s a vampire,” the lesser announced. “And hey, I’m just learning more about his kind, too. Maybe it’s something you and I can do together. After all, I told you I would better myself—and I got my leg up in spite of you and what you did to me. In spite of that asshole Charlie Byrnes.”
“Bruce, stop—”
“I killed him, you know, and Charlie didn’t stand a chance against me, the pussy.” The slayer took a step forward, toward her. “Guess what, neither will your vampire. And when I decide it’s your time, neither will you.”
The slayer’s arm swung back around, the gun now pointing at Darius. “You’re twice the abomination of nature I am—”
The discharge of the gun was loud as it echoed around the kitchen, and Darius threw his hands up to the center of his chest, certain it was a mortal wound—
Except the lesser was the one who fell into a crouch and went for his heart with both hands. Not that there was anything left behind his sternum anymore.
The former Bruce McDonaldson dropped the gun, fell to the floor, and landed on his side, clutching his pecs. And still he laughed, black blood speckling his mouth.
“The joke’s on you, Anne. You can’t kill me like that anymore.”
Darius glanced down at himself. His abdomen was still pumping out bright red blood at the site of the stabbing, but he didn’t appear to have been shot, and that was all that—
No, that wasn’t all that mattered. As he looked back at Anne, horror was dawning on her stark face, her mind making all kinds of mental connections that he wished like hell he could prevent or undo. Except the lesser had gotten it right. Darius had lied by omission.
About what really counted.
And the fact that Darius had been on the verge of telling her everything wasn’t going to matter. Not at all.
The lesser let out a cough. Then he wheezed as he drew in a breath. “He’s a vampire, Anne. Your lover’s a vampire—I can smell him on you. You fucking slut, you fucked him.” Laughing, laughing… crazy laughter as black blood bloomed on the lapels of the slayer’s bright blue suit jacket and the front of his white t-shirt. “You were fucked by an animal and he didn’t tell you, did he—and you thought I was a liar.”
Darius’s dagger hand locked on the steak knife. Gritting his teeth, he braced himself for the pain that was coming.
“He’s worse than I am, Anne.” Bruce didn’t seem to notice all the black oil coming out of his mouth. Didn’t appear to care about the fact that his breathing was getting more ragged. Then again, he wasn’t going to die—and clearly hadn’t yet done the math that the suffering he was in was going to be perpetual. “He lied to you about the very thing he is. At least when I was human, I only lied on the surface—”
Darius yanked the blade free of his stomach, and in a single coordinated lunge, threw himself forward, raising the knife over his shoulder, every ounce of his strength trained on a stabbing motion he was going to have to make at just the right time, in just the right way.
And he did.
On a vicious strike, he hit the lesser’s chest just to the left of the sternum with the stainless steel blade, and as he felt the knife penetrate, he prayed that his momentum was great enough to pierce the empty cavity where the heart had been—
The pop! was every bit as loud as the shooting had been, and the flash was as blinding as the overhead light when it had been turned back on.
In the aftermath, Darius collapsed backwards, his skull bouncing on the hard floor, a sudden nausea racking him.
Curling onto his side, he retched a couple of times. And then he concentrated on breathing.
God, the burn smell. The baby powder stench. The—
“You’re bleeding.”
Shifting his eyes up, he saw Anne standing over him. She looked like she’d been through a hailstorm, except for the fact she wasn’t dripping wet: She was utterly wilted, her robe hanging loose from her shoulders, the gun she’d taken out of his jacket lax at her side, her face so pale he became worried she was going to lose consciousness.
