Finn crossed his arms and glared at Volusian. It was kind of a bold move, considering Finn looked like a cartoon character and Volusian looked like he ate the souls of small children. For all I knew, he probably did.

Don't be too hasty," she warned. "Conserve your strength. If you're too eager to fight the undead, you may find yourselves joining them. Then you'd never see us again, and we'd be very sad." "Yes," said Christian. "I'd cry into my pillow every night." I resisted the urge to kick him. "Well, I couldn't visit if I was Strigoi, yeah, but hopefully I'd just die a normal death. Then I could come see you as a ghost.

Who else is going?" I asked. He shrugged. "Just you and me." My mood promptly shot up past 'cheerful' and went straight to 'estatic.' Me and Dimitri. Alone. In a car. This might very well be worth a surprise test. "How far is it?" Silently, I begged for it to be a really long drive. Like, one that would take a week. And would involve us staying overnight in luxury hotels. Maybe we'd get stranded in a snowbank, and only body heat would keep us alive. "Five hours" "Oh." A bit less than I'd hoped for. Still, five hours was better than nothing. It didn't rule out the snowbank possibility, either.

At the same time, we both pulled back briefly still oh so close. Everything in the word rested on that moment. "We can't..." He told me. "I know," I agreed. Then his mouth was on mine again, and this time I knew there would be no turning back.

You know, Aunt Tasha makes jokes about how youʹd actually be a better queen than the others, except sometimes . . . I donʹt think sheʹs joking.

The future of our relationship hinged on advice from a fifteen-year old girl, a probably untrue story from a one-eyed Chihuahua trainer, and me unromantically – yet skillfully – kissing you on top of silverware and china?

To my surprise, I recognized Dimitri Belikov-Rose's boyfriend-among those doing crowd control. He was easy to spot since he was almost always taller than everyone around him. Dhampirs look very human, and even I could admit that he was pretty good-looking. There was a rugged handsomeness to him, and even in a still photograph, I could see a fierceness as he watched the crowd.