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grandmother is also a practicing witch.”
    “So he inherited it from her?”
    “No, our mother was adopted.”
    “Your family is certainly unique.”
    Rafe nodded. “Indeed.”
    “And your brother, he doesn’t want to be a witch or a Vampire?”
    “So it seems. All his life, he’s been torn between light and dark, between good and evil. Becoming a Vampire was more than he could handle. He ran away from us, and from himself. I looked for him. The family looked for him, but he’s closed his heart and his mind to us. I don’t know how he is, or where he is. All I know is that he’s alive.” Rafe stared past me, his expression bleak. “I’d know if he were dead.”
    I had read somewhere that Vampires were incapable of tender human emotions, but whoever had written such a thing would surely have changed his mind if he could have seen the anguish on Rafe’s face, the hurt in his eyes, or heard the pain in his voice.
    I stared at him, wishing I could help, and thinking that I had learned more about Raphael Cordova and Vampires than I had ever wanted to know.

Chapter Four
    Raphael was right about the filet mignon. It was the best I had ever tasted, rare and tender and seasoned to perfection. I have to admit, I felt a little strange enjoying a full-course meal in front of a Vampire. When I offered him a bite of my steak, he made the kind of face I would have made had he offered me a glass of warm blood.
    “Don’t you ever eat anything?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine never drinking a glass of ice-cold lemonade on a hot day, never eating a double scoop of fudge-ripple ice cream, never biting into a cold, tart green apple, or a juicy slice of watermelon. And the thought of never again indulging in a brownie still warm from the oven didn’t even bear thinking about. “Don’t you miss it? Food, I mean.”
    He looked at the steak on my plate. It was medium rare, the inside a deep rosy pink, just the way I liked it.
    “Sometimes,” he admitted, “but not often.” Lifting his glass, he took a drink.
    I wondered again if it was really wine. I told myself it had to be. I mean, he had obviously planned to share it with me until I ordered something else. Still, when I wasn’t looking, he could have signaled the waitress to bring him something more to his taste. I spent a moment debating whether to ask him, and then decided I didn’t really want to know.
    The waitress arrived to clear our dishes. She asked Raphael if she could bring him anything else.
    He looked at me. “Kathy?”
    “Nothing more for me, thanks, I’m full.”
    With a slight nod at me and a smile for Rafe, the waitress gathered my dishes and moved away from the table.
    I shifted in my seat. I was all too aware of the silence, of the man beside me, and of the way his thigh was pressed intimately against my own. His scent tickled my nostrils. It wasn’t cologne, it wasn’t soap. I don’t know what it was, just the scent of the man himself, I guess.
    “Kathy?”
    “What?”
    “Would you like to go for a drive?”
    I cleared a throat gone suddenly dry. Every instinct I possessed screamed that going for a drive with a man whose scent was more intoxicating than a shot of whiskey straight up was a very bad idea. So naturally I said yes.
    Moments later we were flying down the highway at a hundred miles an hour. It was a first for me, and I have to admit that it was exhilarating until I let myself think about what would happen if the car skidded out of control and wrapped itself around a tree. It probably wouldn’t hurt Raphael much, at least not permanently. I would most likely end up dead.
    Before I could ask him to slow down, he eased off the gas and turned on the radio. Kenny G’s “Songbird” filled the air, though I didn’t pay much attention. I was too busy watching the speedometer. I didn’t relax until we were doing a nice, reasonably safe sixty.
    Raphael flashed a grin in my direction. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you. Going a