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Her own blood, whatever it was, had hindered her in her youth Now it seemed that Ty’s blood would deprive her of the only man she’d ever connected with on so deep a level She would fight it if she kne

He lightly stroked the back of her hand, a quick, tender touch that reverberated throughout her entire body

"Lily," he said again "I--"

The knock on the doorsound "Who is it?" he asked roughly, and Lily knew that the moment had been broken, irreparably and completely

"It’s Jaden," came the familiar voice But even with two si it

"Rogan wants to see you And he’s got some… rather odd company you may want to speak to"

Lily looked at Ty, who seemed as perplexed as she was He shook his head

"Would you rew testy

"Yeah, I would I think you just need to coets with the pacing It’s driving o Just come down"

Then there was silence, and Lily felt sure Jaden had stalked off as quickly as he’d arrived It was then she realized that Ty’s hand had stayed on hers The weight of it, and the sy

"You know aboutthat if there was any ti to tell me what happened to you?"

"It doesn’t ht squeeze, but she saw hioing to let her get so close And in a bitter irony, he was one of the only people she’d ever felt she could get close to

Ty rose s on a shirt Then he padded to the door, barefoot, and turned once he reached it to look over his shoulder at Lily In that ly beautiful And he looked like he alking away

At some point, he would That was a reality she had yet to deal with

"You ready?" he asked

Lily nodded "Ready as I’ll ever be," she said But inside, she ached for what could never be Ty had closed himself off frooing to allow her to breach the walls he’d built around his heart

Chapter EIGHTEEN

THE SAFE HOUSE was an ugly shell, Ty thought as they ht enough that it htly claustrophobic But that didn’t stop it froenius

The safe house was cleverly located on a dilapidated street of row houses Junk cars parked on the street, and garbage spilled into the gutter A block farther down, crack houses and cri, and no one but an immortal should have dared to venture into this part of the city if they valued their an was a itives, along with a bit of illegal this and that for fun and profit And the construction of this particular safe house was perfect On the outside, there appeared to be separate ho walls, but on the inside, a warren of interconnected rooth of the block It was siet around in, but only the proprietor hian didn’t share his ht that was fairly emblematic of his old acquaintance’s business philosophy: "When push comes to shove, it’s every man for himself"

Ty didn’t trust hiht, he needed hiet a kick out of that