The next day Schroder turned up at sunset. Vampires didn’t like the sunlight, so I couldn’t help but wonder where he had gone during that time.

He came lugging a sizable crate full of groceries.

“Wow,” I murmured, looking at the pineapple leaves coming out of the top of the box.

He dropped it on the counter and said, “For you.”

I was completely despondent. “This is a lot of food for just me.  Are you ever planning to let me go?”

“Once you’ve been here for a while, you won’t want to go.”

“I seriously doubt that.”

“So even after you thought about it, you didn’t believe my first piece of evidence?”

I winced. From where I was sitting, I could clearly see the place where Dudley had shot him in the head a couple of nights ago. It was just above his left temple. I had deliberately avoided looking at it the night before, but now I couldn’t help it. The mark was dark with a hideous black scab and the skin was pulled over it with two metal stitches.

“Thank you for not hurting me back then.  It was worth something, but not as much as you hope,” I said, seeking to meet his gaze rather than stare at his wound, but it was hard since he still wore sunglasses. “I have often wondered how I managed to take on a vampire and win, and if you weren’t willing to hurt me then that makes everything make a little more sense. By itself, it makes you seem like you might be a good sort of guy since you let me kill you and all...” I trailed off.

He sighed. “I suppose it would have been unrealistic to expect more. I expected you to doubt me, which is why I came up with the plan—the four-day plan. Every day for four days I will tell you one reason that should prove to you that I have always loved you. Last night was the first reason and it seems to have had an impact.”

I turned my face away saucily. His plan wasn’t going to work. “What am I going to do here while you finish your plan? There’s nothing to do.”

“Like what?”

“There’s no T.V. No computers. No books.”

Schroder looked at me like he had never seen me before. “Those are the only things you can think of?”

“Well, I’ve never had this much spare time in my life. I’m always busy. I have to earn a living. I have to take care of myself—shop, cook, clean, wash, work. I have to help London meet deadlines, so sometimes I spend the whole weekend beading.”

“While she sleeps?” Schroder asked suspiciously.

He was absolutely right. That was usually what happened, but it wasn’t that London didn’t work. She got a lot done at night, but she couldn’t keep herself awake during the day. I had stopped trying to keep the same schedule as her. My system couldn’t handle the constant change in times especially when I had to work nine to five, so I usually just saw her for a few hours in the evening and then went to bed while she stayed up.

All the same, I couldn’t let Schroder bad-mouth her. “And you don’t sleep during the day?”

“Not usually.”

“Don’t vampires hate daylight?”

“If you’re asking if I want to go sun tanning, then the answer is no, but that doesn’t mean I don’t keep normal hours. A vampire sleeping all day is a sign they’re unhealthy.”

My eyes narrowed. London had never stayed awake during the day. “Did you make her wrong on purpose?”

He scoffed. “It’s nothing I did. Vampires are all made the same way, even if they steal the blood. You think I don’t know her? It’s her attitude that’s sour.”

“Well, you’re the thing that’s been bothering her. She was crazy about you. When she thought you were dead, she was lifeless, too.”

“Whatever. She was like that before I changed her into a vampire. Nothing is different. Besides, haven’t you clued into the fact that I wouldn’t have bitten her if I thought she could overpower me?”

I averted my eyes. Yeah, what he said sounded true. I just didn’t like it. Dudley said the same thing and I didn’t want to face it when he said it either.

“After hearing you say such despicable things about my sister who I have protected with my life for the past eight years, how do you expect me to fall in love with you? Are your reasons really that great?”

“They are—especially the last one.” He took off his sunglasses and looked at me. His blue eyes looked especially pale now that he had no eyelashes.

Seeing him thus defaced, I couldn’t hold it in anymore. “I’m sorry for what I did to you.  I wish there had been another way,” I whispered.

At first, he didn’t respond, and when he did, he asked, “Would you feel better if I forgave you?”

I put a hand to my forehead. “Probably not. Part of me wishes I really had killed you if it meant that you would never come after London. I’m not sorry for cutting and burning you when I remember what I saw in the basement of your shed. You were ordering your weasels to drain her. You pointed her out to Garth and asked him to seduce her, right? I can’t forgive you for that, so what good is your forgiveness if I still wish I’d killed you?”

He gulped down on something hard in his throat. “I didn’t realize you saw that. My mind has been cloudy lately.”

“You’re forgetting things?”

“All the time.”

“And now that you’ve remembered, do you still think you can convince me your feelings for me are real?”

“I have to try.”

“I’m listening.” I rolled my eyes rudely. I was only putting up with his nonsense because I was completely trapped. I crossed my arms and waited for him to give me the second piece of evidence.

“I didn’t turn you into a vampire.”

He’d already told me that, so nothing felt new. I let his words ring through the house for a moment and then said coldly, “If you’re not trying to kill me then please don’t bore me to death.”