Darla. Hair like cornsilk, eyes like the night. She would stare out my windows for hours. She said she'd never realized how much more beautiful a view could be, in the sunlight. She hummed music by Mozart, Bach, Chopin. I spent a month tending to her with all the devotion I'd never given anyone or anything in my life, while she lied and plotted against me. I wanted her despite that. I wanted her because of that. I wanted her only a little less than I wanted Angel.

I look at him, and the question must be plain in my face. Angelus mock-frowns, comically distraught. "Stake through the heart. In a back alley like this one, in the rain -- behind the garbage, Lindsey. She spent her last moments as trash out beside the dumpster. Smelled like spoiled food and catshit back there. Darla must have wanted to gag from it. I don't know; she didn't get a chance to tell me. I was so stupid that I felt bad for her. I tried to save her. But nothing could save her from Connor."

Connor. Her killer has a name. It slices into me, a flick of the blade. Connor.

He keeps talking. "Darla was mine. And I was hers. You think I don't wish she was with me right now? She wanted me to come out and play again so bad." He makes a face that would be grief in someone who could feel grief; on Angelus, it's grotesque. "My girl missed her chance. And Connor's gonna pay."

"She was a vampire," I say. I don't add, because of me. She had kissed me. She held up her bleeding hands after she broke all the mirrors. I don't know if she ever trusted me, but I know she wanted to. Of all the things I did for Wolfram & Hart, there's nothing that cuts at me like making Darla be turned into a vampire again. I turned her from the woman I thought I cared about into the monster I deserved. "If Connor killed her, he was only doing his job."

"He wasn't thinking about being a do-gooder at the time; that I can guarantee," Angelus says. He is smirking down at the alley, where the young man -- Connor -- is still fighting, so skillfully that it's obvious he's only toying with the vamps before dusting them. "He tells himself that's what he is -- a white knight, somebody right out of one of Holtz's fairy tales."

Holtz. The name's vaguely familiar. As I hear it, I can picture myself looking down at notes in a file folder. I can't remember the context. I know the folder was green; thanks a lot, long-term memory. "So he's just killing vampires for fun?"

"He's up there killing vampires because they remind him of me. And when I say 'me,' I mean Angel, souled version. That's the one Connor hates more. He welded me in a box and dropped me to the bottom of the ocean for four months. Total sensory deprivation -- the perfect torture. Hallucinated every physical or psychological hell my brain could come up with, and I can come up with a lot. At the time, I was seriously pissed off. Now I'm impressed AND seriously pissed off."

"You're lying," I say. I don't actually think he is. It scares me to think that I believe him.

Angelus lifts up three fingers. Scout's honor. "Every single word I've just told you is the truth."

"Last time I checked, you didn't need my help to kill people," I say. "Gone soft in your old age?"

"Going soft is not one of my problems, as I think I've proved to you the last few hours." Angelus' eyes rake over my body, and my skin shivers in remembered pleasure and pain. "Getting close to this guy is. He has a vampire's senses of smell and hearing. I don't want to take him out in a fight. That's all over too quickly. This -- this deserves time. Effort. Planning."

If this Connor killed Darla, I can't fault him for it. She was a monster. I made her one. His motivations don't really enter into the equation; once I did that to her, she had to be destroyed. But if he tortured Angel for four months, then he isn't a good guy, no matter how many vampires he kills, or why. If he's not a good guy, then maybe he has to be destroyed. Maybe my motivations don't enter into the equation. Maybe I can get revenge for Darla. For Angel. And to tell the truth, after days of being pretty sure I'm about to die, I have a real strong need to beat the shit out of somebody. Anybody.

But I still remember: All I have for this is Angelus' say-so. I believe him, but I think the evidence of the last several hours suggests that my perspective might be a little skewed right now. If Connor comes up here to kick my ass on guilt by association, he's right.

"I can't trust you," I say, in the understatement of the year.

Angelus sighs; I've started to bore him. "I tell you what," he says. "We'll try a little test. If Connor passes it -- then you can hide out up here with him, wait for the white hats to come home and hunt me down with a stake someday. Until the Beast kills you, of course. Minor detail. But if he fails -- then you'll know, Lindsey. Then you'll know he's evil."

"What kind of test?"

He tells me. Sounds straightforward. Sounds fair. It doesn't seem like there's any way for it to be a lie or a trap.

The last vamp is staked. Connor doesn't even look upward as he runs into the warehouse. Angelus waggles his eyebrows delightedly, then steps to the edge of the roof. "Let me know if you're running into trouble," he says. "G'night."

And with that, Angelus drops over the edge and leaves me alone on a rooftop, waiting for Connor. The murderer.

Darla stood in my doorway, burned and bloodied, flesh hanging from her in strips. "Help me," she said. And I will.

The door swings open with a clang. Connor's head whips over toward me, his shaggy hair flying. "Where's Angelus?" he says. His voice sounds young, but it still sounds like the voice of a dangerous man. "Who are you?

I hold up my hands. "I'm -- I just want to talk." Not the answer to either of his questions, but it's a start. He's asking questions instead of just skipping straight to the killing.

He squints at me. His stake is still gripped tightly in his hand. "Where is Angelus?"

"He jumped off the roof. Left me here." As far as it goes, it's accurate.

Connor breathes in, and at first I think it's a sign of emotion, though I can't tell what emotion it is. Then his eyes widen, and his face clouds in disgust. "I can smell him on you," he says, quiet and queasy, like a seasick man.

I don't have time to deal with teenage homophobia right now. "I did what I had to in order to survive," I say. "If you're gonna give me shit about that, get it over with. I've been through enough today."

"Sorry," Connor says sulkily. But for one moment his eyes are less predatory, and my trust in what Angelus told me about him -- which wasn't exactly rock-solid to start with -- wavers. If this kid is willing to try and understand about me screwing Angelus, then he's ahead of me. "Why didn't he kill you?"

"He was just about to get to that," I say. True again. Amazing how well the truth works as an answer.

Connor goes to the edge of the building and peers down, looking for Angelus. There's no sign. I know what this kid doesn't know; Angelus hasn't gone far. Probably the smell of him is so strong on me that any fainter traces are going right by Connor. Sighing, he slumps a little. He is wearing a big, floppy T-shirt and jeans, a wooden cross hanging from his belt, and somehow he seems younger to me than he did a moment ago. Sadder. And I know: He's not going to kill me. He didn't go judge, jury and executioner on me just because he saw me with Angelus, knows we're lovers. Not the homicidally insane juvenile Angelus was describing, that's for sure.

The test. It's time for the test. It's too simple to be a trap. Even Angelus couldn't make a trap out of something this simple. And if this kid isn't what Angelus says he is -- or if he is -- I want to know.

"We have to stop Angelus," I say.

"Yeah," Connor says, in a tone of voice that makes it clear he'd rather say something like, Of course we do, you jackass. "It isn't easy. He's strong. But I'll kill him soon."

Here we go. "I know a way to stop him," I say. "Not to kill him. To put his soul back in his body, to bring Angel back."

Even in the unnatural night, I can tell that Connor's gone pale. "How can you know that?" he demands.

"I used to work with a lot of black magic practitioners here in town. I'm not proud of that, but it's true. Some of them know about this kind of shit. They can change him back. Put his soul back in, so we have Angel again."

Connor is silent for a moment. A story or two below us, I know Angelus is listening. Connor smells him on my body so strongly that he must completely miss the fainter signs of Angelus on the ground.

Could this kid have killed Darla? Could he be evil? Could Angelus actually be telling me the truth? I find myself rooting for Connor, God knows why. Say yes, I think, say yes, you want to save him. Prove Angelus wrong.

At last, Connor's mouth twists into a snarl. "No," he says. "Angelus doesn't deserve a soul."

Holy shit. Angelus has been telling me the truth. It's the final slap of unreality that sends me reeling. I say, slowly, "He said you tortured him. He said you buried him at the bottom of the ocean for four months."

"He told you about me?" Connor says. "Why was he talking about me?"

"Mostly because he loves to hear himself talk," I say. But Angelus isn't the one I'm mad at anymore. I remember Darla in a hotel room, crying as I sent Drusilla to take her life. "Did you do that?"

Connor lifts his chin. "Yeah." He's proud of it.

Angel, in a box for months, hallucinating and in pain and afraid and unable to get out -- and that's probably what it's like for him now, for his soul, anyway --

I'm not turning this kid over to Angelus to torture and kill. I never intended to, no matter what that smug bastard thinks. If Connor had wanted to save Angel's soul, I would have walked away. I would have let what happened to Angel and Darla go.

But now -- I'm gonna kill this kid myself.

I walk a little closer. If this kid is as strong and fast as I think he is, surprise is pretty much my only shot. But Connor's a teenager, full of himself and probably underestimating the bruised-up fag with a vampire's smell on his jeans. "Where did you learn to fight?"

Connor says, "My father taught me." After a moment, he adds, "My REAL father." Whatever that means.

"You're pretty good," I say. Nothing takes defenses down like flattery. Amazing how quickly the Wolfram & Hart training kicks back in. Haven't used it in a while, but it's not even rusty. "Wish I'd run into you earlier." The better to kill him before he did what he did to the two vampires I was idiot enough to care about.

"You got away alive," Connor says. He sounds begrudging as he adds, "I guess you know what you're doing."

He's so far off it's not even funny. I try to make myself sound admiring as I step closer yet -- a half-second's swing from his jugular or his heart. "I heard what you did to Darla."

Connor frowns at me, wary and confused in a way I hadn't expected him to be. And then he says, "How did you know about my mother?"

Mother. Darla. I stare at Connor, and he stares back at me, and there's something in the set of the mouth that I realize is hers. There's something familiar about Connor's eyes, too -- but they aren't Darla's.

Darla. Angel. My mind layers their images over one another, and the face staring back at me is Connor's.

"Oh, God," I say. "Oh, shit."

"What?" Connor's angry now, angry and confused, and I don't have anything left in me to care. "Did you know my mother? What did you think I did to her?"

Did I know his mother? Do I know his father? I don't know anything. Vampires can't have children. Angelus said, He has a vampire's senses.

"He THINKS you killed her." Connor and I both whirl around to see Angelus, standing at the far end of the roof. He doesn't look remotely amused. "And he's right. By the way, Lindsey, this was not the plan. But I guess you know that."

"You lied to me," I say.

"Whoa, there's a shocker," Angelus says, walking closer. There's a swagger in his step, and his long coat sways slightly from side to side. "Actually, everything I told you was true, but maybe I left out a detail or two."

Connor glares at me, his stare as white-hot as -- as his father's. "You were helping him," he says. "You let him do that to you." No question what he means.

This kid tortured Angel. He wouldn't give back Angel's soul if he had the chance. He is Darla and Angel's son.

"Yeah, Lindsey here helps me out in all kinds of ways." Angelus keeps coming closer, and Connor's focused anger slides away from me. It's Angelus he's watching. "See, I know how to make friends. How to get my lovers to come back for more. Skills you haven't quite mastered, have you, boy?"

Connor's face pinches up in anger and pain. "It's all going to be different after I kill you," he says. Then, as an afterthought, he says to me, "And you."

"Oh, no, you don't," Angelus says. "You can't kill me. And I'm not going to let you kill Lindsey. He's mine."

"No," says a third voice, deeper and louder than thunder. "He's mine."

We all turn around to see, on the next building over, a figure that's about eight feet tall, horned and scaly, his golden eyes blazing as he looks at me. It's the face I remember from page 177.

The Beast is here, and this is the hour I'm going to die.

In one powerful leap, the Beast vaults over the alleyway and lands on our rooftop. The concrete cracks beneath his cloven hooves. Connor suddenly looks like the teenager he is, and even Angelus seems to be at a loss for words. All I can feel is the cold sweat that's covering me.

As one -- by instinct -- Connor and Angelus run toward the Beast.

The Beast doesn't even flinch as their blows land on his body, and he throws Connor aside easily. As the kid tumbles across the roof, the Beast rumbles, "It is not too late to join me, Angelus."

"I don't know what you heard," Angelus says, landing a savage kick on the Beast that seems to faze him not at all. "But I do NOT hire myself out as a henchman."

"I have gone to great trouble to find you," the Beast says. "Together we could rule." And then he tosses Angelus a dozen yards away.

Connor jumps the Beast again, and then it occurs to me -- what the FUCK am I doing standing here?

I run through the door, run downstairs, three steps at a time, more of a controlled fall than anything else. I know one or more of them is going to catch up with me, and soon, but goddamn if I'll just sit there and wait to see which one. I want it to happen fast, when it happens. I want it to be Angelus, but I lost my chance to choose. If I ever had a way out of this, I blew it.

It hits me: This is the last thing I'm ever gonna do. I'm running for the last time. I've seen the sun for the last time. My last meal was a granola bar. The T-shirt and jeans I'm wearing are the clothes I'll die in. This stairwell suddenly seems more real than anything I've seen in my life, the avocado-green paint on the cinderblock walls, the metal railing, the echo of my feet on cement. I can't say any of it's beautiful, but all of a sudden it seems like it's worth seeing.

When I slam against the door and run out into the street, I don't hear fighting upstairs. No crashing, no yelling. Battle's over, then. My murderer, whoever it may be, is probably coming after me right now. No matter which one it is, I can't get away. But I keep running. This is the last thing I'll ever do, and I don't want to stop.

I round a corner, and there's a group of people there -- yes, people. Not vamps. They're trying to load up stuff from an office into a van. Shit, they're gonna get killed too. "You have to get out of here," I say, trying to weave around them.

"We know," mutters a guy. "You want to help us out here? We could use it."

I open my mouth to say no, and then I read what's on the side of the van.

JAILBUSTERS: ATTORNEYS WHO CARE.

I hesitate, turn it over in my head once. "Offer me money."

The guy breathes out, frustrated. "You know, we've got enough trouble in this city without people trying to gouge people more desperate --"

"Offer me anything!" I yell. "Ten bucks! Five! One! Anything!"

He stares at me, then fishes in his pocket and holds out a twenty. "I'm not cheap," he says. I grab the bill in my hand, and in the next moment, the Beast comes around the corner.

The Beast roars. The ground beneath us shakes, and the Jailbusters group starts to scream. I feel panic clutch at me, but I force myself to step forward. In my left hand -- my own -- I hold up the twenty, and I try not to shake.

"Having accepted money to perform services for a law firm based within 100 miles of the main office of Wolfram & Hart without first securing a waiver, I am in violation of the noncompete clause of my employment contract," I say. "I am therefore no longer an independent contractor of Wolfram & Hart, and I am entitled to none of the rights and privileges thereto. I acknowledge their right to sue me in a court of law and in the venue of their choosing, and I accept that this means the permanent termination of my employment."

The Beast stares at me. Then he stares at the twenty. Then -- it's like he stops seeing me. His eyes unfocus, then look somewhere else. He stalks off, his heavy hooves pounding against the concrete. The pounding gets quieter as he walks father and farther away. And he's gone.

Whatever vengeance spell or curse was put on the firm, it was only put on current employees. Severing the contract breaks the spell completely. Some days, I really love that I went to law school. I want to laugh, but all I can do is stare at the empty place where the Beast was standing. I close my fist around the money.

"What the hell was that?" says the woman behind the wheel of the Jailbusters van.

"These days, who can tell?" says somebody else. "Let's move before it changes its mind and comes back."

I help them load up, quickly and efficiently. I am a very good employee.

The parking lot looks deserted. The dead bodies are still lying there. My truck is parked right where I left it. I slide my hand down to my front pocket, finger my keys.

For the first time in days, it seems like I could actually get out of this mess. The Beast is done with me, now and forever. But Angelus is still out there, somewhere -- somewhere close. Plus I just made a brand-new enemy named Connor who seems like he's, oh, maybe just a little bit better in a fight than I am. Can they smell me? Can they hear me? Angelus could be close, right now, listening to my heart beat faster --

No time for that shit. I have one chance to live, and it's sitting in the parking lot, and it takes a while to warm up, so I have to MOVE.

I run across the parking lot, not caring that my footsteps echo off the concrete. All that matters is getting to the truck, now, now, before they hear me, before they can find me. I slam into the side, pull open the door --

And there's Angelus, lying across the front seat, trying to hot-wire my truck. He glances up, looking pleasantly surprised. At least, as close as he gets to pleasant, which is not that close. Flash-quick, one of his hands wraps around my wrist, holding me in place. "I had you figured for the Beast's lunch meat," he says.

"The Beast isn't coming after me," I say. "Not now, not ever." But I'm still going to die. My hopes about staying alive scatter into the wind, ashes above a campfire.

"You got the Beast off your tail? How did you manage that?" Angelus looks royally pissed.

"That's my secret," I say. "Speaking of yours, where's Connor?"

"Limping home, wagging his tail behind him," Angelus says. He's stretched out, as comfortable as if he were about to take a nap. "What's got you hacked off about him? The fact that Darla had my baby? Or did you want to be the only one I'd ever fucked?"

"You said he killed her." Before I get killed, I want to know this one thing: "How did Darla really die?"

"He did kill her, in a manner of speaking," Angelus says. "She had to stake herself to give birth to him. You remember that morning she came crawling back to your place after screwing me all night long? That's the night Connor was made. I knocked her up and sent her back to your place to shower. Couldn't you have convinced her to douche? Would've saved me a world of trouble."

"That's bullshit. It couldn't have been then," I say. "I kinda noticed he's a teenager."

Angelus actually sighs. "That, Lindsey, is a long story. I don't really enjoy telling it, so it's gonna cost you a few teeth. Still want to ask questions?"

"Never mind." Darla staked herself? To have a child? That doesn't seem like the woman I knew and wanted at all. Then I realize -- it wasn't her, not exactly. She must have been so different, at the end. The Darla I knew wouldn't have given up her life for anyone or anything else. But she did.

I think of the alleyway, and the rain, and I see her pregnant and frightened. I see Angel with her, imagine what he felt, losing the woman he'd tried so hard to save, gaining a son he couldn't ever have thought he'd have. It's only my fantasy about something I didn't witness, but it feels like the one and only time I ever got close to them at all.

"I wasn't lying when I said Connor was evil," Angelus says. "You heard him for yourself. He's hanging out with Cordelia and the rest of the gang now, pretending to help them. But it's only a matter of time before one of them lets him down too hard, too often, and then he's going to start killing them off too. I can sense it." He's smiling. "He's like his old man, that way. You'd have been doing them a favor if you'd given him to me."

"I'm getting out of the favor business," I say. "Hope you enjoyed it while it lasted."

Angelus smiles mirthlessly. "You're talking like a bad-ass because you got the Beast off your back," he says. His hand clamps down harder on my wrist. "But you're not going anywhere now, are you? You know you belong to me."

He leaps from the truck in an instant, his arms slamming into my chest as we fall to the ground, hard. I make one desperate swing at him, but he pounds my fist back onto the pavement. I yell out in pain, but then his mouth covers mine. Angelus kisses me savagely, and I can feel his fangs graze my tongue.

I open my eyes to see the vampire staring down at me. He's grinning. "You belong to me," he repeats, and then he sinks his teeth into my neck.