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Are you going to stand over there and beat a dead horse all night?

He narrowed a glance at her shadowed silhouette, heard her chuckle at his retaliatory thought Now that wasn’t nice at all, Dev I ht be of a htened froested the deadly purpose to her, that stillness that reet, that she wasn’t human

Grab your beer, busho

When they at last reached Alice Springs, they had a private berth on the train to Adelaide, two narrow stacked beds and a sitting area by theThey boarded at night, but when daylight caht of what she’d said, about ho vaet ht hours

Even now, all he had to do was reach over her and pull back the drapes to puncture her body with an unrelenting square of bright sunlight Why did she trust hi to her send his hand automatically to the knife at his side?

The trip by vehicle had been long, so al seat by the , blinked sleepily at him

Come take off my boots, Dev

He’d arched a brow at her “Expect you’ve kno to do that since you were a little one, love” I have Come take them off

Meeting her eyes, the blue that could pull hi in the beauty of the Great Barrier Reef, he’d put his swag and weapons in the corner and moved toward her

“You playing games with me, love?”

“Would it be easier for you if you thought I was?”

He shook his head Not a denial, but a resignation to the peculiarity of her ways that co her sole to his knee so he could unlace the boot and slide it fro his palm slide over the ankle and smooth flesh of her sole, tease the tips of her toes She stayed on her side as he shifted farther down the cushion, worked the boot off the next one On i it with the tip of his tongue, feeling a tremor run up her calf beneath his hand Then he laid his head there, feeling a temporary easiness to it

“What will you do while I sleep?” Her hand passed over his hair, grazed his shoulder before he straightened

“You brought along soave her a half smile “You know, they say , to keep up with the little tykes when they’re awake” She gave hio to sleep Tell ”

When he obliged, sliding under her, she coiled her ar his buttocks in a very distracting way

With her cheek pillowed on his thigh, he told her one of the Dreamtime stories, the story of creation, when the Father of All Spirits woke the Sun Mother and had her create all living things

When he was done, she was quiet for a bit, her breath even, and he laid his head against the wall, his hand absently tracing her temple, that baby-fine hair that everyone seemed to have there, human and vampires As well as every man he’d killed

ShhNot asleep, obviously She began to sing to hi sensation as she chose another lullaby, all about a cradle rocking in the clouds, carried along by the wings of angels, never to tip, always to have sweet drea water

He was starting to rely on it, another copinga curtain over his et restless,” she murmured at last

“I’ in a strange place

Another moment of silence “Dev, you did what you had to do And you did it forto swear loyalty to Charles As well as to save your own life”

“One of me for six or seven of them”