Three nights pass before I gather the courage to return to Emily's club.
Three nights of James holding me through blood tears I can't quite explain. Three nights of staring at my phone, drafting and deleting messages that all sound like excuses. Three nights of knowing I need to face her but being too much of a coward to actually do it.
On the fourth night, I just go.
The club pulses with its usual rhythm—bass vibrating through the floor, bodies moving in negotiated desire, the careful choreography of consent that makes this space sacred. I slip through the crowd toward Emily's office, and my hands shake as I knock.
"Come in."
She's at her desk, drowning in paperwork, reading glasses perched on her nose. When she looks up and sees me, something flickers across her face too fast to name.
"So," she says, setting down her pen with deliberate precision. "Vampire. That's your excuse for never eating my cooking?"
The joke punches through the tension like a fist through paper. I laugh—sharp, surprised, almost hysterical—and suddenly I'm crying blood tears I can't control.
"Shit." Emily's around the desk in seconds, pulling me into a hug. "I was going for funny, not traumatic."
"You succeeded at both." I wipe at my face, smearing red across my hands. "God, I'm a mess."
"Yeah, you are." She guides me to the couch, sitting close enough that our knees touch. "But you've always been a mess. At least now you have a good excuse."
I look at her—really look at her—searching for the hurt I know I caused. It's there in the tightness around her eyes, the careful way she's holding herself. Like she's not sure if I'll bolt or bite.
"I'm sorry," I say. "For not telling you. For lying by omission. For—"
"For assuming I'd reject you?" She tilts her head. "Tess, I've known you for years. You spend your whole life convinced people will leave, so you leave them first. Self-fulfilling prophecy."
The observation lands like a diagnosis. "That's not—"
"It absolutely is." Her voice softens. "I wasn't hurt because you're a vampire. I was hurt because after everything we've been through, you still didn't trust me."
"I did trust you—"
"Then why didn't you tell me?" Not accusatory. Just honest. "Why did you let me find out from Whitney's psychotic surveillance footage?"
I don't have a good answer. Or I do, but it's ugly. "Because I was terrified. Terrified you'd look at me like Alan did. Like I'm something monstrous that needs to be put down."
"Are you?" She leans back, studying me with clinical interest. "A monster?"
The question should be rhetorical. Instead it feels like a test.
"I killed people, Em. Multiple people. And I enjoyed it."
"Did they deserve it?"
"Does that matter?"
"Philosophically? Probably not. Practically?" She shrugs. "Yeah. It does. Vincent was a piece of shit who terrorized your brother. The others probably weren't much better."
"That doesn't make it right."
"No," she agrees. "But it makes it understandable. Human, even." She pauses. "Well. You know what I mean."
I almost smile. "You're supposed to be horrified."
"Why? Because you did what you thought you had to do to save someone you love?" Emily stands, pacing to the window. "Tess, you think I built this club with good intentions and clean hands?"
The shift catches me off guard. "What?"
"You think I'm some saint because I run a BDSM club with ethical guidelines?" Her laugh is bitter. "I've done things I'm not proud of. Hurt people who probably didn't deserve it. Made choices that keep me awake some nights."
"Like what?"
She turns, and her expression is raw in a way I rarely see. "My first investor. Real estate developer, lots of money, very interested in 'helping' me get started. I knew what he wanted. Knew the price before he named it." She pauses. "I paid it. And then I recorded everything and used it to get him to sign away his stake for nothing."
The confession sits heavy between us.
"You blackmailed him."
"I survived," she corrects. "I used the tools I had to get what I needed. Was it right? Fuck if I know. But it got me here. Got me this." She gestures at the club. "And I don't regret it."
"How do you live with it?"
"By understanding that 'good' and 'monster' aren't opposite ends of a spectrum. They're just... different angles of the same complicated mess we call being conscious." She sits back down beside me. "You feel guilty about Vincent?"
"Yes."
"Then you're not a monster. Monsters don't feel guilt. They just consume."
"I consumed him."
"Because you were scared and desperate and newly turned." Her hand finds mine. "Not because you enjoyed his suffering. You enjoyed your power. There's a difference."
The distinction should feel like rationalization. Instead it feels like absolution I don't deserve.
"Alan hates me," I whisper.
"Alan's processing. Give him time."
"I have forever. He doesn't."
Emily's eyes sharpen. "Exactly. So stop hiding from him like a coward and go talk to him."
"He told me to stay away—"
"He told you that when he was angry and scared and probably in shock." She squeezes my hand. "Try again. Not because he deserves it, but because you deserve closure either way. Forgiveness or acceptance that it's permanent—both are better than this limbo."
"What if he tells me to leave again?"
"Then you leave. And you know." Her voice goes gentle. "But Tess? You have eternity now. He doesn't. Don't waste his mortality on pride."
The words crack something open in my chest. She's right. Of course she's right.
"When did you get so wise?"
"I've always been wise. You were just too busy being self-destructive to notice." She pulls me into another hug, and this time I don't cry. Just hold on. "We're good, Tess. We're always good. Just... no more secrets, okay?"
"No more secrets," I promise.
When I finally leave the club, dawn still hours away, I pull out my phone. Alan's number glows on the screen like a dare.
I text before I can overthink it: "Can we talk? Please. I'll come to you."
The response takes seventeen minutes. Long enough that I've convinced myself he's ignoring me.
Then: "My office. Tomorrow. Noon."
Not forgiveness. But not rejection either.
Hope unfurls in my chest like something fragile and dangerous.