a gift. It was a burden. I staggered backward a few steps to one of the chairs and fell into it.
Nathan pulled in a shuddering breath, but he still couldn’t speak without tears clouding his voice. “Where are you?”
I didn’t hear Ziggy’s answer, but I felt Nathan’s sharp shift in emotion. He was afraid. Terrified. “You have to get out of there, now. The Soul Eater will be looking for me. I don’t want him to find you instead.”
“He’s at the apartment?” I whispered. Of course he would have gone there. But why hadn’t he gone home before now?
“I don’t care if you think you can handle yourself, get out of there now!” Nathan growled. It was a little comical, the way he lapsed into full-on dad mode so quickly.
Something horrible pulled at the back of my mind. Some vague, terrible knowledge that wouldn’t come readily to the surface, as though I wasn’t ready to know it. “Nathan…”
“I’m going to give you directions to somewhere we can meet up.” He ignored me. “What do you mean, you can’t come right now?”
“Nathan, something about this isn’t right.” I held out my hand. “Hang up the phone.”
He covered the phone with his palm. “No, I won’t hang up!” Returning the phone to his ear, he demanded, “Stay right where you are, I’m coming to get you.”
I watched with growing dread as Nathan folded up the phone. No goodbye. He couldn’t tell his son goodbye, when he’d done it more permanently once before. Turning to me, he said, more gruffly than he probably intended, “Stay here. I’ve got to go get Ziggy.”
As he brushed past me without waiting for an answer, I grabbed his elbow. “Nathan, wait!”
“What?” He jerked his arm back. It hurt me to see the impatience in his eyes, knowing I would have to tell him that I sensed a trap.
“This isn’t right. Why didn’t Ziggy contact us before now?” I wasn’t sure I believed it wasn’t Ziggy, but I wasn’t sure I believed it was him, either. “Please, think about this!”
“The only thing there is to think about is that my son is alive!” He stalked up the stairs to the second level of the library, where the doors were.
I followed him, pushing words past my puffing breaths as I ran after him. “Exactly! Why do you think he’s alive? There were two other vampires in that room besides us when Ziggy died. Why do you think he’s alive now?”
“I know this!” He whirled, catching me off guard, and I stumbled. He didn’t see it, though, too focused on the time that was slipping away from him. “Do you think I didn’t realize it the moment I heard his voice? But I’ve got to go, Carrie. He’s my son!”
I couldn’t argue with that. But it still wasn’t right, still didn’t make any sense. Why now, after all this time? “Please, don’t go. There are other ways of contacting him. But going alone, when you don’t know where he’s been or what he’s been doing…that’s crazy, Nathan.”
“You think he’s going to betray me?” His expression grew colder than I’d ever thought possible. “Do you think my son is going to stab me in the back?”
“I think,” I began, choosing my words carefully, “I think that you know as well as I what a sire’s influence can make a fledgling do. We know that Dahlia was somewhere on the grounds being turned. She would have been too weak to make another vampire. Cyrus didn’t make him. I would have seen it when I sired him. So that leaves the Soul Eater. You said yourself he forced you to do things you didn’t want to do.”
The war between dying anger and acceptance raged for a few seconds in Nathan’s eyes. I prayed common sense would win, but some primal, protective instinct in Nathan forced a curse from his lips and he stalked out of the room.
Something desperate welled up inside me. I didn’t want him to go to Ziggy. He could get killed. And I didn’t want another person in Nathan’s life.
Do you hear yourself, the way you’re thinking? I scolded myself. It’s his son. His son!
But I didn’t care. All I cared about was the sadness, the crushing sadness I felt at the thought of him choosing someone else, anyone else, over me. I didn’t know where it came from, and I knew better than to try and justify it. I was acting like a big baby. I knew it—anyone who was privy to my deranged thought process would know it—but I couldn’t stop myself. And above everything else, I hated being out of control.
I caught up with Nathan in the foyer. He didn’t look at me, focusing instead on opening the coat closet and rifling through it. “I have to get on the road.”
“On the road?” I glanced up at the shuttered window.
“Once I get a few things together. I don’t want to leave unarmed.” He pulled out a crossbow, one of the weapons we’d spirited across state lines hidden in a spare tire. “I’m going to get Ziggy.”
I fought back the urge to tell him one last time not to go. I had to curb this ridiculous jealousy. I’d lost Nathan once—okay, probably countless times by now—and I didn’t feel like doing it again.
“He asked me to meet him. Back in Grand Rapids. I’d ask you to go, but as you said, it might be—”
“A trap?” I forced the hands I’d placed on my hips firmly down to avoid appearing too confrontational. “You think?”
“My son is alive. And I’m going to go get him.” His eyes were hard, daring me to argue with him further.
I don’t respond well to dares. “Don’t be stupid! Nathan, how much time has gone by? Why didn’t he contact you before now? You know that if you go after him, you’re going to end up dead. You’re not thinking!”
“No, I’m not thinking about you!” He threw the crossbow down and it bounced with an earsplitting clatter on the marble floor. “You’re pissed off because for a moment, my focus isn’t on you. I’ve been Carrie-centric nonstop since the first night we met! How much longer do you expect me to hang on to you while you punish me?”
“Punish you?” The shrillness of my voice startled me. “Why am I punishing you?”
“I don’t know! But ever since you came to Chicago with Max you’ve done nothing but punish me. I’m sorry, okay? Does that end this asinine vendetta you’ve had against me? I’m sorry that I couldn’t love you at first sight and give up my memories of my wife and give up my love for my son. I’m sorry I couldn’t get myself together for you on your time!”
“That’s not what this is about!” I followed him as he stalked into the kitchen, barely caught the door before it swung back to slam into my face. “What have I done to you?”
He spun, face contorted in rage. “You slept with Cyrus! I’m not an idiot, and I can read your mind. You slept with Cyrus while I was possessed, then you left for Chicago because you thought we needed time apart. And when I came back, ready to tell you that, yes, I love you and I want to be with you, you ran off and you fucking sired him!”
“I didn’t have a choice!” The fight had become like some sick exploratory surgery,
