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to do so if it killed him, because letting her charge into a dangerous situation with a barely grown hound as her only backup could put him in the grave in truth. “I’ll trust in your strength. But in return, I would ask you to trust my experience. I know I don’t look as seasoned as Emmett or even as old as Wilder, but I’m not so many years from sixty, and I’ve spent most of that time considering the best way to fight vampires.”
    She seemed to consider his words, then relented and held out her hand. “It’s a deal.”
    Nate curled his fingers around hers, then wondered if they were both liars. Her grip was too intimate, fingertips stroking over his palm like a lover’s caress. He might be lying to himself when he pretended he didn’t want her, but she was lying if she thought she didn’t need to be protected from herself.
    It was a problem they shared.

Chapter Three
    The coach was too damn small.
    Diana shifted position and murmured an apology when her knee bumped Nate’s—again. Even the relatively short ride from Iron Creek had proven a peculiar sort of torment, with no way to move or turn that didn’t remind her, sometimes bodily, of Nate’s proximity.
    Damn tiny coach. It would drive her mad before they reached Eternity.
    “We should be almost there.” Nate was watching her, eyes wreathed with the wrong sort of sympathy. “I know it must be difficult to travel in close quarters this near to the full moon.”
    If only simmering violence was her sole problem. “The full moon is over a week past. I can control myself.”
    “Of course you can. It must not be comfortable, is all I’m saying.”
    “I know what you meant,” she snapped, then bit her tongue. “Now it’s my turn to deliver an apology. I’m sorry.”
    “It’s all right.” This time he shifted, his knee touching hers. “Would you prefer I remain silent? Or shall I try to distract you? If you give me a scientific topic, I can ramble on about it for hours. I’ll likely bore you straight to sleep.”
    There was no telling what erotic dreams might assail her if she fell asleep listening to the low, velvet tones of his voice. But finding his dedication and enthusiasm fascinating could prove even more dangerous. “I don’t think distraction would work right now.”
    “Then maybe you could tell me about Crystal Springs.”
    How could she describe the town that had once been her home? “Would you like me to describe it as it was before the vampire attacks began, as it was during them or as it is now?”
    He seemed to consider that. “Which matters most to you?”
    “They all do, in different ways.” Diana turned slightly on the cushioned seat, just enough to hold his gaze without craning her neck. “Before, it was prison and paradise, all at once. The place where I’d died, but also been reborn.”
    “Did the townsfolk know about your nature?”
    “They did. They accepted me for numerous reasons, but mostly because of Doc.”
    Nate nodded. “A doctor of his skill and training would buy a lot of goodwill in a border town. He was the most brilliant man I’d ever met.”
    And the most brilliant man she’d never met. “I knew him as Thomas Beale, formerly of Baltimore. He never told me about the Guild or his training or his…projects.”
    “I’m not surprised. There are things I’ve done that I hope I never have to explain to Satira.”
    She snorted. “I hardly think that’s the same thing.”
    He didn’t laugh. “You think not?”
    “For your sake, I hope not.” She thought it a struggle to find the words to explain herself, but then they came tumbling out, quick and rough. “He was instrumental in creating the monster that killed my husband, not to mention the monster I became. When I first found out the truth, I told myself it didn’t matter because I was like a daughter to him. But the more I think about it, the less I believe that.”
    “You don’t believe you were like a daughter to him?” Nate watched her