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dark-haired man's gaze swept up to her face and froze, locking on to her. For one moment there was shocked recognition in his eyes and then it was gone as he got his shoulder under Terry to relieve her of the weight.
    Lara whirled around, back toward the car. "Get him inside and ask the innkeeper to find a healer. I'll get the snake heads."
    She rushed back down the steps, crossing the distance to the car in a run. As she yanked open the door, her birthmark, the one shaped like a dragon, began to burn hot against her skin. There was only one thing that brought forth the dragon's warning: Vampire. And he had to be close. She hastily donned her wraparound skirt and a cloak to cover her weapons. She closed the door and looked carefully around her, one hand sliding beneath her thick red cloak to find the knife on her belt.
    Chapter 2

    The night was bitter cold. He shouldn't be feeling it—Carpathians could easily regulate body temperature, but he wanted to be cold. It was a feeling. Not emotion—but something . Cold was like bitterness maybe, and bitterness was an emotion. Maybe that was the closest thing to a feeling he would have before his death.
    Nicolas De La Cruz walked the length of the village with long, slow strides, his face turned from the people who shared the walkways with him to prevent them from seeing his eyes. He knew the normally dark, midnight-black color glowed a deep ruby red. Icy cold swirled in the pit of his gut, and deep inside, where his soul should have been there was only a small black piece left—and that, too, was filled with holes. The centuries of hunting and killing the vampire had long since taken their toll.
    He lifted his face to the swirling clouds laced and heavy with snow. This was his last night. He was done with his fight. He had served his people and his family with honor, held fast through the centuries and hunted more of his fallen comrades than most. Tomorrow he would walk into the sun and end his long, barren existence.
    He was far from his home and his brothers. His oldest brother, Zacarias, would be unable to stop him from such a distance, in fact, wouldn't sense his end until it was far too late to stop him. He wondered how long it would take for the sun to burn him clean. A long time with the stains on his soul, but still, his brothers wouldn't have to share the intensity of the suffering of his last few minutes of life.
    He shivered, grateful for the cold on his face and skin, grateful he could feel physical sensations. Emotions—he had lost those so long ago they were a distant memory, or maybe not really his memory at all. Three of his brothers had found lifemates and shared their newfound emotions with him. In some ways their happiness made it so much harder to bear being so alone.
    He had come for one last walk through the village before meeting with Mikhail Dubrinsky—prince of the Carpathian people. He'd traveled far to deliver a warning, yet now, he wasn't certain it was safe for a face-to-face meeting—especially in the close confines of the local inn. Already heartbeats were loud, bombarding him with the need for rich, hot blood. Sharp teeth pushed against the inside of his mouth and saliva gathered in anticipation of the feast.
    It wouldn't take much to let himself taste—just for a moment, one time—the hot rush of adrenaline-laced blood that would give him a glimpse of lost emotion. And a woman… He would love to feel a woman's soft skin, inhale her scent, pretend for just a moment he had someone who belonged to him, would look at him with love—genuine love—not that greedy heat that came the moment a woman knew his material wealth.
    If he could feel regret, it would be not for the countless times he had to destroy an old friend, not for the many souls he'd freed and laid to rest, but that he'd never felt the true need for a woman. He'd never held a woman he loved in his arms and worshipped her with his body.
    The whispers in his mind grew stronger,