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Birth

She pushed with a silent scream and it was born, the child that shouldn’t exist and that she would love with all her being But when she opened her ared-for child, she saw that the healer hadn’t picked up the babe fro off toward the door

Fury a savage storh her, she sat up to rescue her helpless childand saw

1

Holly hugged her sister good-bye one final ti “Shoo,” she said when Mia hesitated at the entrance to the security line “You’ll be late for your flight if you don’t get going”

Mia sank her teeth into the fullness of her lower lip, her chin-length bob glea inside the ter “I miss home already”

“You’ll be fine” Though Holly was going to miss her elder sister—and best friend—desperately, she took Mia’s face in her hands, met eyes as brown as hers had once been, and said, “You’re the smartest person I’ve ever known You’ll knock this out of the park” Her newly ious residency at Massachusetts General in Boston

“I’ll be so far from everyone”

Holly didn’t point out that her sister’s new base of operation was only a few hours’ drive fro She knehat it was to be homesick She’d felt that way in the vibrant city her family called ho ed her into a being asn’t human, but asn’t vampire, either

Thankfully, she’d gotten over that stupidity—and her faive her Of course, her ot, but that was par for the course Daphne Chang also reminded Holly of the time she’d snuck out of the house at seventeen, only to have to call home for help after her asshole date abandoned her on a dark street in Queens

Holly still had to keep soer brothers, and Mia, but those secrets were for their protection: el As far as Holly’s parents and siblings were concerned, it was a deranged mortal who’d abducted her friends and her, and who’d infected her with a dangerous virus An angel had saved her by atteone smoothly because of the virus in her blood

They had no reason not to believe the story

“I’ll drive up and see you anytime you feel alone,” she said to Mia, this sister of hers who’d loved her with unflinching stubbornness even when Holly didn’t—couldn’t—love herself “Just call”

“I love you, Hollster” Another crushing hug, Mia’s body a sweep of soft, womanly curves

Holly, in contrast, was still hoping her breasts would grow a little bigger if she wished hard enough In the silverlining department, at least she didn’t have to waste h a throat that had gone thick Not because Mia was heading off on a new adventure, but because Holly was horrifyingly aware of how life could change without warning, how a person could be laughing and living one instant and, in the next, be a bloodsoaked corpse

She had a serious psychological probleht Which hy she forced herself to release Mia; she wasn’t about to steal Mia’s drea her hands on the soft gray of Mia’s cardigan, she gave her sister a little push

“I’onna hold you to your proed her little roll-onboard case in between the ropes that led to the screening area

That area was visible through the glass, so Holly stood and watched until Miaher impulse to jump the barriers and wrench her sister back to where Holly could watch over her, protect her S waved one last tione, lost in the strea out of a city Holly loved and hated in equal measure

Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!

“Ashwini, I swear to God” Holly muttered as she scrambled for her phone

That was not the ringtone she’d programmed