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‘romantic’ they might have felt at the time. There was nothing romantic about what had come after. Afterward, eventually, there had been blood and pain and death. Followed by a new sort of life that terrified me.
    Here in the present, Theo’s face was as open as I had ever seen it. He wore his grief like a shroud, and he suddenly looked old – old enough to scare me. Not in a gross, wrinkly kind of way. I just mean that he seemed, for the first time since I’d met him, exhausted by the burden of years. I remembered what Caitlín had asked me just hours ago, about whether I’d be injured in some way if something bad happened to Theo. Could I really be in danger?
    What would it mean for him, now that Nicole was dead? What would it mean for
me
– and for the rest of the Boston Family? Already I was certain that there was more to his strange mood than ‘normal’ shock or grief.
    He surprised me by speaking first. ‘We must take care, my Moth.’
    ‘Because the killer might strike again?’
The killer who is not Jace, not Jace
, I chanted to myself in the hope of making it not-true.
    ‘That,’ he said, ‘but also because of what might become of me.’
    ‘Now that Nicole is  . . . gone.’ I kept my voice level.
    ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Now that she has been ended after all her centuries. Any of the vampires she Made will have to be mindful.’
    ‘Could you die?’ Well, I had to ask. No point in tiptoeing around the issue.
    ‘No, but there will very likely be  . . . changes. Especially in the oldest among her children.’
    I swallowed. ‘What kind of changes?’
    He didn’t reply and I fought the urge to shake him, force him to give me some answers.
    ‘Theo,’ I said. ‘What changes are you talking about? Hadn’t you better tell me, so I can help you look out for them?’
    He took my hand in his, something he hardly ever did because I usually yelled at him for it. ‘I don’t want you to worry. This part of it, the potential for unraveling, is something I have to deal with alone.’
    I thought about that word:
unraveling
. I had a weird image in my head of Theo being slowly unwrapped like a ball of yarn.
    ‘You’re not alone though, Theo,’ I said. ‘You have me. You have plenty of others around who—’
    ‘No. You will leave me now. Say nothing of my link to Nicole.’
    ‘Forget it,’ I said hotly, ripping my hand from his. ‘You’re not allowed to shut me out. You can’t ask me to help you avenge someone’s death, but then push me away when it comes to your pain. I won’t let you!’
    ‘I will do as I please.’ His voice was suddenly cold. I hated it when he flipped on me like that. ‘I am still Master of this city.’
    Oh great, he was going to play
that
card. I scowled and nibbled at the skin on the base of my thumb. I could tear strips off it and it would heal within minutes. I was such a classy gal.
    I decided on a change in tactics, softening my tone. ‘Is there anything I can do to help? Anything at all? Maybe I can just listen, if you want to talk.’
    ‘Nicole meant something to me a long time ago,’ he said. ‘In the last century our relationship has been  . . . difficult.’
    We made ourselves comfortable on the cushions that Theo had spread on the wooden deck he’d built up here. A rooftop ‘moonbathing’ deck, he called it with a sly wink that proved he actually did have a sense of humor.
    Not that we were talking about anything funny at the moment.
    I pulled my knees up and rested my chin on them. ‘Even if you didn’t exactly get along with her these days, you’re still allowed to be sad.’
    ‘Sadness passes, just as one day passes into the next.’
    ‘You’re not going to go all Zen on me, are you?’ I forced a smile.
    Theo looked up at the scattered stars. ‘The past has gone. Therefore, the present is all we have.’
    ‘But don’t you ever think about the future?’
    ‘Why would I?’ he replied, leaning against the low wall that led to a