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"An old friend?" he queried, staring at her

She stared back

"Or an old lover?"

"Is that question necessary for the police report?" she snapped back

He set the pencil down

"It’s necessary for o home now?" she asked hio Years Honestly"

"How ie snapped

"Why was Maarlic?"

Her eyebrows shot up

"What?"

"Never mind Never mind" He set his pencil down, rose, and reached for her hand

"Let’s go"

"Together?"

"Yes"

"You’ve been incredibly rude"

"You need police protection"

"Surely there are other policeo"

He opened his drawer, reloading his gun, taking extra aie watched him mutely Her elbow in hand, he led her out

Sean wanted to put so to Montgoer drive out and down the river to Maggie’s family’s plantation home

She left hi that everyand door was secured

He looked into the closets, then walked up the stairway On the dalena A strange, hot treie out of the shower and down to the landing

Very strange Maybe he really should resign Have hiood hospital

He forced hi

Upstairs, he saw to it that all the balcony doors and ere secured It was a ti He lay down on her bed, and closed his eyes, his gun resting over his chest

In a matter of seconds, he had dozed off

He had ridden, he had fought He had slashed at the enemy, he had killed, he had triuo for the wounded, to protect theain The earth tore up beneath his horse’s hooves, the breeze rushed by his face He was dirty, thirsty, hungry, tired He wanted her Wanted to ride to her But this

The killer was before hiain He rode hard, ready to attack-- but not kill God, there had to be , and still, when he had bested his enely, he saw a face A face he knew

Oh, God!

Pain

He felt pain

The knowledge that death was co hith, he ’d learned both courage and mercy, but he hadn‘t been prepared, and so now, the world faded aith her tears while the face of the ene that he’d dozed, and that he’d been drea in a war that had ended well over a century ago

He sat up, carefully placing his gun on the bedside table in Maggie’s elegant room

The killer had been in his dreaht had slain hi to take hi to have a chance to coh hiood mental ward

He stared toward the bathroohts played havoc in his head Ma hiet hiarlic to choke a horse

He sat on the bed, shaking his head, then pressing his tehing There was a rueneration Years and years ago Maggie’s ancestress had fallen in love with the wrong one away

And every daughter still bore the Montgoers through his hair, he was really losing it Maggie wasn’t the killer, he knew that Maggie wasn’t the killer, but what the hell was going on?

He rose, suddenly determined to look around He pulled open her drawers, searched the a checklist in his mind of all the vampire movies he had seen, all the books he had read Vaie wore them all the time Vampires had no reflections