"Okay, any Leads?" Edward asked his family.
"No sign of the intruder." Kurda said. "But Raphael continues to make appearances."
"He's toying with us." Larten said. "Keeping us distracted."
"From Seattle?" Darius questioned.
"Or the intruder." Larten said. "Or something else."
"Kramisha can keep tracking Raphael's decisions but we have to track him on the ground." Edward said.
Tired of being ignored, Reiko headed out to the deck.
"We've already cover the entire southern peninsula down to Quinault." Kurda said.
"We'll search the northwestern trail." Edward said.
Xxx
The sun set over the river as Aphrodite looked out.
Reiko exited. Aphrodite knew who's behind her without looking.
"Go blather to someone else about the joys of being a new vampyre." Aphrodite snapped.
"Okay. Aphrodite... I don't understand what I did, to make you hate me so much." Reiko growled back. "Why do you have to—"
"I don't hate you. I don't particularly like you, but... Reiko, I envy you." Aphrodite said.
"What?" Reiko looked at the beautiful, powerful Aphrodite. "That's ridiculous."
"No, it's not. You have a choice. I didn't. None of us did. But you do, and you're choosing wrong. I don't care how miserable your human life is." Aphrodite said.
"My life is not miserable. It's not perfect, but nobody's life is perfect." Reiko said.
"Mine was. Absolutely perfect." Aphrodite said.
"It was a long time ago, maybe you're forgetting the bad." Reiko said.
"I remember. And it was perfect. Till the end..." Aphrodite said.
"I had... almost had... everything, even though it was the Great Depression. Back then my name was Beth-Rose. I was eighteen, beautiful—everyone in Rochester envied me. I was the daughter of the Mayor. My mother was a poised, perfect Lady. My father was a well-respected politician. I was engaged to be married; but I had no idea, that there was a woman in town, Lilia, who loved the man I was engaged to. So she paid someone to kill me. The last thing I remember was bleeding in the gutter after being gunned down. Larten found me, he smelled all the blood... Thought he was helping me."
"I'm sorry." Reiko said.
"I got my revenge eventually." Aphrodite said. "Especially after I found out my parents had paid for the hit on me..."
Reiko looked horrified. "That's horrible."
Aphrodite shrugged. "I was just an item to them. And they could always be bought. Lilia had enough money."
"Things got better after I found Darius. But we'll always be this. Frozen, never moving forward. That's what I miss the most, the possibilities. Sitting on a front porch somewhere, Darius gray haired by my side, surrounded by our grandchildren, their laughter."
Aphrodite was silent for a beat. Reiko turned to her, empathetic but holding her ground...
"I understand, that's what you want. But there's nothing I'll ever gonna want, more... ... than Edward." Reiko said.
"You're wrong again." Aphrodite said. "Don't you remember how you felt when your first turned? When you were rabid? You didn't think of Edward. You thought of...Blood."
Seeing her point had landed, Aphrodite walked off. REiko, shaken, turned back toward the house and saw Edward standing in the window, looking out at her.