Maya listened with bated breath. “But why did God give him such powers then, and the lust for human blood? Wouldn’t that go against his wish to protect humans from him?”

“God didn’t give him those powers. The Devil did. He protects his own. When God condemned our ancestor to the night, the Devil bestowed him with powers to survive the night and frighten humans. He made him strong during the night, but couldn’t change anything about his weakness to the light. And so the first vampire was created.”

Disgust rose in Maya. “Does this mean we worship the Devil?”

Gabriel laughed and shook his head. “No. We have our free will. We alone decide how we act—never forget that. You can be as good or as evil as you decide. It’s in your own heart. Your decisions are still your own, and don’t let anybody tell you otherwise.”

She relaxed at his words. “How did you become a vampire?”

Gabriel closed his eyes as if wishing the memories away. When he opened them again, he gave her a sad smile. “I wasn’t very happy in my human life. I was alone, and with the scar on my face, female companionship was difficult to attract. I had the misguided notion that if I was a powerful man, things would change. So when I got to know a man who seemed to have everything I wanted, I spoke to him, and he took pity on me. My sire was a kind man, but it turned out that even as a vampire, I was still the same man: lonely and with a disfiguring scar.”

Maya stroked her hand over his face. She didn’t mind the scar, but if it seemed to bother him, maybe something could be done about it. “There are many good plastic surgeons today who would—”

He stilled her hand with his. “My body was set in stone the moment I turned into a vampire. Just like my hair would grow back to this length if I cut it short, anything I change on my body will be restored while I sleep, so that I’ll look exactly like I did at my turning. A vampire can’t change his physical form.”

Maya’s hand instantly went to her face. “You mean I will look exactly like this forever?”

He nodded. “Long dark hair, beautiful eyes, no wrinkles, just a few laugh lines.”

She grinned. “Just as well that I shaved my legs the night of the attack then.”

Gabriel broke out in a hearty laugh. She’d never heard him laugh, and she discovered she liked it, liked the way his deep rumble went through her body. There was a twinkle in his eyes when he looked at her. “Only a woman can distill things down to their most elemental.” Then his hand ran down her torso to her thigh. “Even though, I must admit, I do like those smooth legs of yours.”

She took hold of his hand and stopped it from going any further. Not that she didn’t want what he was offering, but since she had him talking, she wanted to know more. “What else will change in my life? How will people not realize that I don’t get older?”

“Ah, that’s the difficult part. In general, most of us live quiet lives. We have our own communities and stay away from humans as much as we can. It was easier in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when recordkeeping was not as thorough as today. With Social Security numbers and the like, we have unfortunately taken to forge a lot of documents.”

“You mean like fake IDs?”

“Something like that. We do a lot of planning these days. Every twenty-five to thirty years we birth a new identity—we report the birth of a child, establish a Social Security number and all kinds of school and graduation records in order to set up a history.”

“That sounds complicated.”

“Not when you have a few talented IT guys among your kind, who can hack into just about any computer record. In fact, with the advent of computers, it’s made our lives easier again. No more breaking into City Halls at night.” He winked at her, but her mind was already on how difficult all this sounded.

“I have no idea how I would do any of this. Where do I even start?”

Gabriel shelved her chin on his hand. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of everything for you.” The sincerity in his eyes was real. She knew instinctively that he would give her everything she needed. But could she accept this?

“But I can’t be dependent on you.”

A frown disturbed his features. “But I want to take care of you.”

“I’ve always done everything for myself. I don’t know how to rely on anybody else.”

“We all rely on other vampires: to help us create identities for us, to keep our secrets, to protect us. It’s like a big family. Nobody will think you weak for relying on others of our kind.”