In order to properly orientate herself, she re-formed in the parking lot of one that had been renovated and turned into a museum. As she stood in a handicapped space and looked around, she was shaking badly, but not because it was chilly and she had no coat. Closing her eyes, she fought the distraction of her anger and concentrated on where Sahvage was. When she had a precise pinpoint on him, she ghosted off again, re-materializing in a unkempt backyard that was fenced in by six-foot-tall planks loose in their arrangement.

Off in the distance, a dog barked. Then she heard an ambulance.

Surveying the back of the house, she found two back doors. One led into a kitchen, given what she could see through some windows. The other was set down at the base of a shallow set of concrete steps.

That was where she sensed Sahvage.

• • •

One advantage to crashing in an old, drafty house that had been built before the turn of the last century, and that was currently owned by an old, dafty eccentric . . . was that there were a lot of old fashioned fixtures and shit in it. Like plumbing. Appliances. Light fixtures.

Heating systems.

As Sahvage walked down past his rented room, he could feel the warmth gathering in intensity, and had a thought that he was glad he’d squatted in upstate New York instead of, like, Florida or the Carolinas. No way they’d have their ancient coal-burning furnaces going on a night in April.

Pushing his way into the boiler room, he checked out the old school, fat-bellied, fed-by-fossil-fuels furnace that kept the three-story, multiroom sprawl warm.

Thanks to being a couple hundred years old himself, he was well familiar with how they worked. And yet as he stood in front of the iron behemoth, it was like he’d never seen one before.

Under his arm, he could feel the Book trembling, as if it were a small animal that was scared.

“Sorry,” he said roughly. “You got to go—and you know this. You cause too many fucking problems.”

As things got even more trembly, he glanced down. “Oh, come on. A little self-awareness, please.”

The Book stopped with a shudder of what seemed like resignation.

What the hell was he waiting for, Sahvage wondered.

On that note, he reached out for the latch to the belly’s door—

“Stop.”

At first, as he thought he heard Mae’s voice, he assumed it was his conscience talking. But then a red beam pierced him through the side of his right eyeball.

As he turned his head, the laser sight drilled him in the skull. And on the trigger end of that calling card? Mae was absolutely steady as she two-handed the gun he had gotten for her.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked in a voice that cracked.

He looked back at the boiler. “It’s the way things have to be—”

“Says who! This doesn’t involve you—it’s none of your goddamn business.”

“I’m trying to save you!”

Mae bared her fangs, her face screwing tight with anger, her body vibrating with emotion. “I do not need help from a coward like you.”

“Excuse me.”

“You got burned in your past, and I’m sorry about that—but you’ve been running ever since. No roots, no connections. Because you don’t have the balls to live life. Well, that’s your failing, not mine. And you’re not going to prevent me from walking my own path.”

“You don’t know me,” he said coldly. “You know nothing about me.”

“I don’t? You couldn’t even make love to me last night properly because you can’t handle any responsibility—even one that’s made up in your own fucking head. You don’t have the courage to be real—but whatever, I’m not going to let your failings fuck my life up. Give me the goddamn Book.”

Sahvage jerked forward. “Just so we’re clear, I didn’t have sex with you because I knew I was going to do this.” He jabbed a finger at the boiler. “And I knew you’d hate me for it. The last thing any female wants is a first time with someone she despises, so I held back for you, not for me.”

“Well, aren’t you a fucking hero.”

Holding up the Book, he said, “You don’t know what you’re doing, Mae. I’m just trying to make sure you—”

“I’m done talking. Give me the Book. It’s mine.”

“It’s no one’s.”

“I summoned it.” She shook her head and lowered that gun muzzle to the center of his chest. “It’s been trying to find me, and you’re in the way.”

How fitting, he thought. If she pulled the trigger, she would shoot him right in the heart.

“Mae—”

“No!” she yelled into the heat of the boiler room. “I don’t need you to tell me goddamn anything. You have no right to determine the life of a stranger—especially given the stand-up way you’ve run your own. This is not your business! We met by mistake and you’re already a regret of mine—I’m not going to add you to my list of tragedies!”

Sahvage narrowed his eyes . . . and told himself that she was right. They were strangers. Proximity and some really fucked-up shit had randomly brought them together. If she wanted to screw up her brother and herself? Why the hell did he care so much.

With a curse—at himself, this time—he tossed the Book over.

As Mae went to catch the goddamn thing, she fumbled with the gun and pulled the trigger by mistake, a bullet exploding out of the muzzle and ricocheting around the rough stone room in a series of pings!

Sahvage ducked and covered his head, bracing to get hit somewhere—

A high-pitched squeal, like that of a pig, marked the end of the lead slug’s free-flying trip.

Lowering his arms, he looked over at Mae. She had the Book up to her chest, and as she straightened from her own crouch, she turned the tome around.

In the dusty glow of the exposed light bulb over head, the small round hole in the center of the front cover was like any other wound in flesh—but the imperfection didn’t last long. As if the thing were capable of healing, as if it were alive, the bullet “wound” gradually sealed itself up.

Mae lifted her eyes, and as Sahvage met her stare, the ache in his chest was just like if he had been the one hit.

“Goodbye, Mae,” he said in a low voice as he stepped around her.

In the doorway out of the furnace room, he looked over his shoulder. “And I’m saying that because I want closure. It may come as a complete shock to you, but other people make choices, too.”

Balz was still crumpled on the floor of the triplex’s book room when Xcor strode in. He was accompanied by a number of Brothers, none of whom really registered, and nobody looked happy.

The leader of the Band of Bastards, the one Balz had pledged his life to long ago, knelt down and took his dagger hand. As the image of that harsh face, with its cleft lip and its familiar eyes, got wavy, Balz kicked himself in his own ass. But damn, the guilt stung.

“We’ll get you out of here and have that leg looked at.”

God, he felt awful, and not just because his ankle was on fucking fire. “Have you found Sahvage?”

“V’s tracing his cell phone.”

“Okay.” Shit. Shit. Shit— “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry—”