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tingle with energy. Right away, the world became clearer. She could make out every detail of the exposed brick of the cellar walls. The almost silent skitter of a spider in its web in the far corner of the cellar rang in her ears. Her nostrils grew alive with the scents of dank mud and mildew; not something she would normally relish, but, with the effects of the vampire blood working on her, it smelled like life. She sensed the vibrations of traffic passing on the street outside, carried through the earth to this underground space.
    She knew the effects wouldn’t last long, mere minutes now that her body had grown used to the blood. In the early days, she felt the after-effects for days or more, but she didn’t any more, something she wasn’t sure if she should be happy or sad about. She supposed if she really wanted to experience more she could take more blood, but that wasn’t a path she planned on heading down.
    Carefully, she replaced the stopper in the vial and put it back in the refrigerator. Sebastian had made sure there was more than enough blood to keep her going. She didn’t fear running out, but wasting any would have felt wrong.
    With a lightness to her step that hadn’t been present on the way down, she made her way back up into the house.
    She stopped at the mirror mounted on the wall below the staircase. As she’d known would happen, her hair had curled with a lustrous shine, her creamy skin appeared smoother, and her eyes were clear with a sparkle that hadn’t been there only a few minutes earlier. Without looking, she also knew her body would be tighter and firmer, any extra pounds she might have put on over the month vanished without a trace.
    If the rest of humanity was aware of what vampire blood could do , she thought, vampires would be hunted down and locked into laboratories to be bled dry.
    Serenity scowled at her reflection and pulled a hair band from her wrist. With force, she scraped her hair back from her face and tied it into a severe ponytail. What was the use in beauty when she had no one to appreciate it? It wasn’t as though she had any interest in other men. After being with Sebastian, no other man would ever measure up. Her heart belonged to him and she could envisage no point at which she would ever feel any different.
    She sat back at her desk and forced herself to concentrate on her work. Her heart wasn’t it in, though, and she found her mind wandering, thinking about Elizabeth and, of course, Sebastian.
    Leaning back in her chair, she ran a hand over her face and then looked over her shoulder toward the wide doorway which led into the entrance hall and stairs. There had been no movement from Elizabeth’s room, though she’d been asleep for an extra couple of hours now.
    She frowned and got back to her feet. Elizabeth would sleep through her whole birthday if she wasn’t careful. She started across the room and then hesitated, weighing her decision to wake sleeping beauty. If she had a bug, she might be better to sleep it off.
    Serenity hardly believed Elizabeth was a young woman already. How those years had flown by, even with all of the craziness of their lives going on. Even though she was terribly lonely and she knew Elizabeth missed her father, she had to admit that life had been more peaceful with him gone. Nothing newly supernatural had entered their lives for five years now, though she’d desperately missed them being a family.
    I’ll go and check on her again, make sure she’s okay, she decided, heading back up the stairs toward her daughter’s room.
    Pushing open Elizabeth’s door, worry bubbled up inside her. The room was silent, her daughter’s breathing so shallow she couldn’t even hear it. If not for the shape outlined beneath the blankets, she would have assumed the room to be empty, devoid of life.
    Serenity was suddenly forced back in time, like she’d stepped through a doorway into the past. How often had she felt the same way when either standing