. After all those years spent proving myself, could I really quit before I’d had proof that I’d done it? And, yes, of course, Dad’s here, and Father McAffery and Berger cookies. But after all this time, couldn’t it ever be Carrie’s turn? I mean, what I would be doing in LA would be nothing like her little Italian Rumspringa. MUNCH I couldn’t believe that I was standing around, undead, still waiting for a woman to give me some kind of marching orders—once you find yourself tasting rat’s blood on a lean night because the conventioneers have gone home, shouldn’t something be more different? But it had been long enough that I tried to assert myself. “Look, Darla, when you said you need me, that doesn’t include sex, right? Because I’m not the same fool twice.” But in just that moment that I voiced that thought, it became very clear that I was, that some instinct I hardly knew I still had, regarding her at least, would be happy to have her up against some wall or in some alley, her chilly body against mine. “Angelus won’t do it, and I need you to return the favor.”

“I thought you didn’t like it when I did that thing with my finger.” Maybe she just didn’t want to admit it. Disgust and eagerness battled it out across her face. If I had a dollar for every time I saw that expression on a woman’s face, I probably wouldn’t have had rats’ blood for dinner tonight. “Not that favor,” She frowned, and her nose almost disappeared, a fascinating bit of genetic sleight-of-hand that I hadn’t realized that I’d missed.”I need you to give me my unlife back.”

Doing something that Angelus wouldn’t admittedly swelled what I would still think of as my scrawny chest, but then I do know what it's like, inside and out, when someone bleeds out. Feeding is one thing, but this?