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It was certainly her stock and trade to ignore what she didn’t want to see

Lowering her lashes, she battled a ridiculous urge to blush "We should be getting up"

"Abby, please don’t shutto a dark, pleasant rasp that feathered down her spine "I didn’t ainst her will, her eyes lifted to clash with his silver gaze "Just what?"

"I want you to know e of what you wish I could be"

"I saw you fight that derimaced in the dusky shadows "No, you don’t, but you will before all this is said and done And that’s what I fear"

Suddenly Abby understood This was about more than just her uncertain opinion of vampires It was about faith Trust In him

"We both knoould already be dead if you were a hu but what you are," she ad her lips "Besides, my record with men of the human species doesn’t precisely make me anxious to be saddled with one for an eternity"

His features thankfully softened at her rueful confession "No knights in shining arhts? More like mooks"

"Mooks?"

"Well, my last boyfriend dumped me for our mailman, and I doenough to steal s account"

"Worthless veraze

"Unbelievably they were an iht the best way to end an argument ith his fists"

There was a stark silence as he studied her face "He hit you?"

"Only once I at least learn from my stupidity"

"Do you want me to kill hi "Ah… well… a te offer, of course, but I suppose I should pass"

He shrugged "It’s an open-ended offer if you change your et they ever existed," she assured hiaze swept down to the fullness of her lips before lifting "But do you think it wise?"

Abby frowned Surely to God she was not about to receive dating advice from a half-naked vampire who just happened to be perched on top of her?

A deliriously sexy half-naked va them eaten," she forced herself to mutter

"I only wonder if you truly have learned from your mistakes," he said

"I’ve learned that I have rotten judgment when it comes to men"

"Or you seek out those who are destined to disappoint you so that you needn’t worry about an emotional attachruht "The last thing I need is to be psychoanalyzed by a vampire"

He arched a raven brow "It is the fact that I aht You don’t live a of their peculiar habits"

"Well, you don’t know anything about me"

"No?" His lips curled in a faint smile "I know that you hate onions and tuna fish, that you consu a pound, and that you need a recipe to boil water I know that you pretend to enjoy classical e the radio station to punk rock when you think no one is around I also know that you hide yourself from the world and that you’re lonely You have always been lonely"

Abby dutifully tried to breathe Unfortunately her lungs refused to cooperate

Da for her to have spent the past threehim with covert fascination After all, she had discovered nothing eous and possessed a haunting skill upon the piano To think that he had seen so easily through her carefully erected barriers was

"Fine," she et up?"

His smile only widened ’There is no hurry The sun is just now setting"

"Well, you could use a bit of sun," she informed him dryly ’You are very pale"