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She stood on the far edge of the pier, staring down into the still, black water below It looked cold, cold enough to nuht All she had to do was jump and it would be all over What did she have to live for, anyway? She had no family, no lover or any prospect of one, no friends to speak of No job, nowould it take to drown? Not long, she thought, since she couldn&039;t swim Would it hurt? At this ti shock and she would probably be unconscious As a child, she had been afraid of the dark, terrified of dying She had slept with a light on until the surandmother came to stay with them Grandolden-haired Angel of Death who came to earth to escort the spirits of the dead into the next world

As she grew older, she had stopped believing in angels There were no such things as heavenly escorts

There was no heaven, and surely life was hell enough for anyone She found it strangely co after this e to her death and find peace in the endless black void of eternity No more pain, no more tears, no more heartaches She had achieved success once, and blown it big time She wouldn&039;t fail at this One last success - and oblivion

Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and let herself go Just let herself go And then she was falling, falling, the wind rushing against her ears, her arht, al

Ra down into the ocean, his expression thoughtful The moon was reflected on the face of the dark water, a brilliant yellow that rippled and shimmered He cast no reflection at all But that was to be expected He was one of the undead he had hunted all his adult life Yet he could still see hi how odd it was that a looking glass reflected his i no reflection in the er existed A fitting irony, he thought, that he should spend eternity as the very creature he had spent his life destroying

He grinned ruefully In point of fact, he didn&039;t exist anynize Perhaps the natural world - free-floater, the glowing moon - mocked his peculiar existence now It was all like a bad dreahtmare from which he would never awake

But did one feel that throbbing hunger in theit was just the sort of sardoniche had come to expect from Chiavari He shook his head at the irony More than just his wardrobe had changed in the pastjust then of his new Porsche, or of the new house he had acquired, all in this relatively short tiht it would be difficult to convince the real estate people to coht to close the sale, but he hadn&039;t reckoned with his neers of persuasion

His rinned into the darkness His new house, located near the end of a quiet street in an old neighborhood, looked like soh, with an attic and a baseh and arched There was even a turret on the southeast corner It was, he thought, the perfect abode for a valy through hi night, each feeding, his qualrow Perhaps one day he would be as powerful as Chiavari

A sudden movement on the far end of the pier interrupted his reverie

With his preternatural senses, he had been all too aware of the young woht

Now she was cli toward the water, arht, she looked like a raven-haired angel plu to earth

She hit with a loud splash, disappeared for a moment, then bobbed to the surface like a cork, her hair spreading across the rippling water like silken seaweed The tide was coing her under He left the pier and went around to the steps that led to the sand Hurrying now, his gaze swept the dark water At first, he saw nothing, and then he saw her, her body tu her toward the shore

Wading into the water, he grabbed her by the shoulder She was unconscious, no doubt froid water There were dark sed with blue She was far too thin Kneeling, he laid her on the sand, took off his coat and wrapped it around her, then gathered her into his arain

He stared down at her He had not yet fed The Siren call of her blood whispered to the hunger within hie, pleased by his power to do so She was unconscious, weak, her life force feeble To feed nohile she was unconscious, was sonant More important, it would put her life at risk Thus far, he had left all his victims with their lives This frail ould be no exception He gazed at the planes of her face, bared and vulnerable in the ainst his ar at her filled hi tenderness He would take her hothen her And then he would feed, at his leisure

She woke slowly, reluctantly, surprised to find she was still alive Where was she? It was tooon a bed not her own

In a room Not her own

Panic slithered down her spine when she realized she was naked beneath the covers Jackknifing into a sitting position, she glanced around the roo There was a large walnut dresser against the far wall, a rocking chair in one corner

She frowned as she swung her legs over the edge of the bed She didn&039;t knohere she was She didn&039;t re Now

She stood, the covers clutched to her chest, swaying as a wave of dizziness passed over her What had she done? How had she gotten here?

Pills She re the squalid boardinghouse where she had been staying Walking for what see? And then she re to her, the wind in her ears as she tumbled over the end of the pier

With a faint cry, she fell back on the bed, suddenly too weak to stand The pier She had jumped from the pier She had wanted to die Still wanted to die Why wasn&039;t she dead?

She gasped as the overhead light went out and the rooh her when she realized she was no longer alone "Who - who is it? Who&039;s there?"

Pulse racing, she peered into the dark, but she saw nothing, heard nothing but the frantic pounding of her own heart Was it her iainst the back of her neck?

"Do you really want to die?"

"Yes No I don&039;t know" She jumped as an unseen hand brushed her cheek "Who are you?"