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"But you already knohat I’ e those lines, even when I was hu a vampire, my ability to read the emotions of others is nearly perfect And, as I told you e first uage that goes with those e"

His fingers were still playing along her upper ar for her reaction She frowned, thinking about what he’d told her, about what it sabout him That she loved him Emma knew she should be embarrassed, but on the other hand, he knew she loved hi So, okay, then

"Hardly see the small hairs on his chest

"Ow! What’s not fair?" he asked, rubbing his abused follicles

"That I can’t tell what you’re feeling, too"

"You kno I feel, Ehed softly Maybe it was a va-up "So, who do you think the wo the subject "The one Violet heard yelling that night"

"Tammy Dietrich seems likely," Duncan said "Powerful et into trouble And it ht explain why she was at Lacey’s service Grafton would have been too obvious, but Dietrich could show up to check things out, and no one would notice"

"But ould she sign the mourner’s book? It would have been smarter not to leave a record like that"

"Who knows? Force of habit? Maybe there was soht it would look odd if she didn’t sign it Besides, who looks at those things afterward? She probably didn’t give it a second thought They had to have known by then that Victor had disappeared, or at least couldn’t be reached And with Lacey’s body being found, I’iven for her death, and whether the police were involved"

"Well, that’s one thing we all agree on No police"

"No police," Duncan confirmed "I’ll take care of this myself"

"We’ll take care of it," Emma said firmly "Lacey was my friend"

"And you’re not a killer, Emma"

"But you are?"

"When I need to be, yes"

Emma considered all the years Duncan had been alive, and how different justice ht have been backShe frowned Back when?

"How old are you, Duncan?" she asked, wondering if he’d tell her "I mean how old are you really?"

"I was born in 1836"

The unreality of that took Emma’s breath away for a moment Duncan was nearly two hundred years old, which h to be married, to have children, especially back then

"Did you have a family? I mean before you beca for a one too far, that she’d touched on another va that was too painful for him to think about Duncan crossed over to a tall dresser, opened the top drawer, and rear box E out, then stood staring down at whatever it was before finally turning and co back to the bed

He held it out to her, and she saas an old-fashioned photograph, the kind they called a daguerreotype It was a portrait of a young woman and two small children--a boy somewhere around four years old, and a second child of indeter on the woraph, then looked up at Duncan

"My wife and children," he said simply "They died while I was at war"