By Nightfall

23

Reconcile

The library was all but empty the next afternoon when Evaine came to visit. It was Tuesday, so most of the students who would normally sit in and study were busy with after school sports and clubs. It was days like these that Evaine would normally savor having the library practically to herself, but now, more than ever before, she wished she had a friend to talk to.

She had meant to come to the library to read, or maybe work on her and Tayshia's project for a bit, but the moment she got settled in her favorite chair and set her mind to task, she was lost in thought. Her eyes drifted over to the window to look out over Jericho plaza, but she wasn't paying attention to the people out shopping or the early fall wind that whistled as it passed over the glass. Her mind was replaying the events of the night before, of the kiss which had consumed her thoughts the entire day.

She had been surprised by the coolness of him; although she'd touched his hands before, feeling him on her lips was something else altogether. She had been aware to some extent that his being a vampire would mean that he was, by certain standards, dead. But she hadn't realized precisely what that would entail until she felt that cold seeping into the very core of her being. She had laid her hand on his chest, yet she felt no heartbeat beneath her fingertips. When she felt his fangs, it hit her in equal parts fear and exhilaration that she was touching a creature of death.

"Cut it out with them googly eyes before I puke," Alec said, slumping heavily into the reading chair across from Evaine. He looked, if possible, worse than the night before. His clothes were wrinkled, and his shirt had been buttoned unevenly. His five o' clock shadow was well on its way to midnight, and dark circles had appeared on his already heavily-lidded eyes.

"You sure that's not the hangover talking?" Evaine asked with one accusatory eyebrow raised at him.

"Oh I see, get yourself a vampire boyfriend and suddenly your shit don't stink. I see how it is." He snorted to himself and grinned at the ingenuity of his humor, and Evaine couldn't help smiling back. He was her Alec again.

"He's not my boyfriend," was all she had to say in her defense. "We barely met on Friday."

"Yeah, and I only hunt bunnies and squirrels," he said sarcastically. He reached into the pocket of his shirt and pulled out a squashed plastic baggie of what loosely resembled a peanut butter sandwich.

"Do you still hunt?" Evaine asked, ready to start diving into her bottomless pool of questions. It was about the only thing capable of taking her mind off of Jesse Rayne.

"In a way. Just because I'm not...shall we say, an exterminator anymore, doesn't mean I'll let the pests build up around my own house." He took a bite of his sandwich and chewed for a long moment, probably deciding just how much to trust her. When he spoke, his voice was thick from the sticky peanut butter. "I keep 'em out of Jericho and the immediate area. I used to take cases in Redwood, too, but it's better to have a partner in bigger cities. They've got their own communities and underworld societies these days, and I just couldn't keep up by myself."

Evaine wondered if he knew about Logan's, or any of the creatures who frequently gathered there. The little ramshackle watering hole had been about forty-five minutes outside of Jericho, probably just outside of the territory that he was able to manage on his own. If she were to tell him about it, would he go busting down their door, guns blazing?

She resolved to keep that to herself.

"Why did you quit?" she asked. "Jesse made it seem like a big deal for you to give up the hunting life. How did you get from there to...here?"

She gestured around at the library, at Jericho, at the entirety of his quiet little life there.

"I fell in love with someone that I shouldn't have," he answered, giving Evaine a pointed look as if to say I know what I'm talking about. "I met her while I was on a hunt, as in, she was the hunt. I was s'posed to kill her, but fool I was, went and married her instead."