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also take a fall skiing that would kill any mortal. After that, he’d pushed the boundaries of his body by skiing the most challenging runs. Today, he would teach Gracie the thrill of defying death on the slopes.
    She blinked at his outburst, but sassed him fast. “If you want her so badly, go get her. Once she sees you, she’ll be unable to resist the ‘Calling’.”
    Will glared at the icy highway. Freezing rain gathered at the corners of the windshield, and the taillights of the traffic created blurs of color upon the ice. “You don’t need to remind me I’m at fault, Gracie. But thank you very much. Now I can spend the day pondering the idea that I’ve driven my immortal mate into the bed of a black-belt martial artist and deejay.”
    “He saved her from the rape, Will,” Gracie said.
    Will gripped the steering wheel like it was her attacker’s throat. “Thank God for that. If I get the chance to thank him for protecting her, I will.” He sent Gracie a burning look. “How the hell can I convince her to come with me? That she’s my destiny? I screwed up. I thought a sort of mental dating would help her see the light, but I’ve only driven her away.”He slammed the heel of his hand against the wheel.
    “Calm down, Will,” Gracie said slowly, twisting a long lock of hair around her finger. “I think that’s the answer.”
    He looked at her, but the scream of metal against metal brought his attention back to the highway, making him brake abruptly to avoid the four-car pile-up in the passing lane. His vehicle fishtailed, but he righted it.
    “What the hell are you talking about, Gracie?”
    “You need to send her over the edge and into your arms.” Gracie’s green eyes glowed. “Make her see she won’t get relief from the voice in her head until she faces it.”
    Will drew up, staring at the mangle of metal on the highway. Her idea was brilliant, really. It would propel Evangeline into his arms on her own terms.
    “Gracie, you’re a genius.” The words died on his lips when he realized the passenger door stood ajar, and Gracie was streaking toward the wreckage. The blade he’d given her as a birthday present was tucked inside her jeans pocket, ready to slash her skin and share her immortal blood with the victims. In a flurry, he shoved through the door too, fishing in his own jeans.
    * * * *
    Will and Gracie fell back onto the snow, filled with the double high of having just rescued nine victims from their vehicles, while forced to ‘Make’ only one immortal. Then, they'd navigated the most extreme hundred-foot drops in the state of Vermont on skis. They lay staring upward at the brilliant sky, Gracie’s head pillowed on his bicep.
    He kissed the blond head with a resounding smack. “That was an amazing run for a first-timer,” he said.
    She laughed, and the wind ruffled over them, blowing a strand of her hair across his face. He wiped it away with a gloved hand, trembling as the first notes of a vision of Evangeline filled his mind. All day he’d tried to see a certain scenario, so when the new vision funneled into his mind, he embraced it. He needed to see her walking away from Sean Livingston and climbing on a plane bound for Vermont. He ignored the ice stinging his face, and the howl of the wind, tuned to an internal song. The vision swallowed him.
    The strains of guitar music reached him through the walls of the art studio behind the mansion where he lived with his immortal friends. His palm pressed against the rough wooden door, shoving it open noiselessly. He inhaled through his nose and filled his lungs with the scents of a cold fire, carving dust, and the sweet, mouthwatering musk that could only come from Evangeline.
    A sweeping study of the room revealed her seated cross-legged on the concrete floor, hunched over her guitar. Her throaty voice bathed him in liquid tones, blasting a hole of awareness through his gut. Into the gaping wound seeped the bittersweet need he’d been