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decided to get some work done. She’d finish up what she needed to do and hope that when Elizabeth woke she was feeling better and was ready to get her birthday started.
    She crossed into the living room and fired up her Mac, another new addition to the household. She’d picked up some work doing data entry, and while i t might not be her dream job—though those aspirations seemed long behind her—the work kept her mind focused and meant she didn’t need to be totally reliant on someone else. Sebastian always made sure they had enough money, but she liked to have some modicum of independence.
    Her heart clenched at the thought of him.
    He stayed in regular contact, sending pre sents from all around the world and letters filled with words of love and how he missed them. She studied the postal marks, trying to track his location, but he never stayed in one place for long. Besides, she wasn’t about to beg him to come home. Not yet anyway. Perhaps when Elizabeth was a grown woman and had moved out and created a life of her own she would take the chance, but right now, with Elizabeth still so vulnerable, neither of them could take the risk.
    Still, on the occasions he called, she couldn’t stop herself from closing her eyes and imaging him beside her . Late at night, when the loneliness was at its worst, she often found herself crying into her pillow.
    Serenity took a seat in front of her computer, fired it up and lost herself in some work for a while. The time passed quickly enough and she topped up her coffee mug when needed.
    After an hour or so, she sat back, rubbed her eyes and then glanced up at the calendar hanging on the wall above her workspace. Elizabeth had given her the calendar as a Christmas present—one of those online orders she’d made herself, filled with photographs of herself and Serenity. Of course, Serenity loved the present and always being able to look up and see her daughter happy and smiling, but at the same time, she found the absence of Sebastian’s face from the collection to be like a stab in the heart.
    That time has come again, she realized. Her time to take Sebastian’s blood, something she needed to do once a month.
    She didn’t dare not take it. What would happen to Elizabeth if she were to plunge back into that nothingness she’d inhabited after Sebastian had rescued her from Jackson? She’d not known who she was back then, or even who Elizabeth was. The idea of such a thing happening again was more than enough to keep her taking the blood.
    With a sigh, she pushed herself away from her desk and headed into the kitchen. She opened the door to the cellar and paused at the top of the steps. With one hand, she reached out and flicked on the overhead light, flooding the dark, confined space below with illumination. She kept a small refrigerator down there so she didn’t need to keep the blood in her main fridge, knowing she would never want to explain the vials to anyone who might happen to pop around for coffee.
    Serenity trotted down the steps and pulled open the door of the fridge and crouched in front of it. Styrofoam trays filled with small glass vials, rubber droppers plugging the tops, lined the three wire shelves. The result looked like something that should exist in a hospital. In a way, she supposed it was her medicine.
    She lifted the closest vial from its tray and carefully squeezed the bulbous end of the dropper between her thumb and forefinger, drawing a few milliliters of blood into the fine glass tube. She tilted her head back, lengthening the line of her throat, and opened her mouth. With a gentle squeeze, she allowed one single drop of Sebastian’s blood to hit her tongue, a cool bead of liquid strength. There was something so intimate about the act, taking a part of Sebastian and placing it inside her.
    She swallowed.
    Immediately, the effects of his blood began to work on her body. The vampire blood spread out through her torso and limbs, making her whole body