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Cyn unlocked the cuffs They fell aith a jangle of heavy metal Alexandra see her physical strength She stood and a shudder passed through her entire body Where soht have stretched their arms widely, or rolled their shoulders, the female vampire sort ofvibrated Then she looked at Cyn expectantly

Cyn drew a deep breath "Okay, let’s--"

"Cyn!" Raphael’s mental roar cut off her next words She spun around al toward hih the open door and around the back of the house, she found hirown yard like an avenging angel, his long coat billowing behind him, his silver-frosted eyes twin stars come to earth The very air tre ahead of him to brush obstacles from his path with mindless efficiency He was terrible in his beauty, and a painful longing squeezed her heart

"Raphael" She said it softly, but his gaze riveted to her at once, his long legs bringing him to her side in two strides

"Cyn," he took hold of her ar for injuries before he pulled her into his eainst his solid warmth "My Cyn"

"Raphael, I found--"

"Raphael"

Raphael stiffened and looked across the yard to where Alexandra stood like a pale shadow Cyn stepped aardly out of his embrace and watched as the s the vaht up to him and stood perfectly still Then her shoulders slumped and Raphael stepped forward to wrap his aran with affection and ended in a strangely formal embrace

Cynthia watched for awhile in silence, and then walked back toward the cottage Before she rounded the corner, she glanced back and aze over Alexandra’s head She saw sorrow there, and regret She didn’t knohat he sahen he looked at her She turned away at last, returning to the cottage only long enough to retrieve her gun, then climbed over the wall and disappeared into the trees

Chapter Forty-eight

Cynthia slept for the next two days, waking only long enough to go to the bathrooo back to bed She kneas unhealthy, knew she was avoiding dealing with real life and was probably deeply depressed Too bad The latest pill kicked in and she drifted into another dreausted with herself and, perhaps ot up

After a long, long hot shower, during which she actuallyunder the pulsing water, she dried her heat-reddened skin carefully, donned a comfortable robe and headed downstairs in her bare feet

Her first stop was the coffee maker, after which she sat and stared at the tiled countertop until the sh to pour a cup of the life-giving liquid With the second cup, she discovered she was also hungry, and microwaved one of her housekeeper’s one, she poured yet another cup of coffee and noticed the red light flashing on her answering ar and pushed the playback

The first threethe lines of, "We’re sisters, can’t we all just get along?" She deleted thee was fro her he’d be in town on Wednesday--she checked the calendar, that was today--and to give him a call if she was around She deleted that one too, but only after thinking about it for awhile She wasn’t ready for Nick yet Maybe eventually But not yet

Next was a call was fro her to call hie had come in the previous afternoon She frowned, picked up the phone and dialed

"Eckhoff," he answered

"It’s Cynthia"

"Yeah, let , heard more than one door open and close, and then the sound of traffic So, he wasn’t getting so somewhere he couldn’t be overheard "Are you okay? Where are you?" he asked

"I’ on?"

"Bad shit, Cyn, really bad shit They found Carballo’s body, and I thought" She heard him take a deep breath and knew he’d been worried about her

"I’m okay, Dean What happened?"

"Vampire She was completely drained, then du the freeway Some Cal Trans workers found her She’d been there a couple of days, looks like"

Cyn was surprised at the pain of loss, surprised at the tears that filled her eyes Benita had been a friend, no matter what had happened later But she had also betrayed Cyn to the va exactly what Albin and Pushkin planned to do to her A part of Cyn couldn’t help feeling that a certain poetic justice had been served