“Anybody like me? Oh, you mean psychopathic vampire who doesn’t give a damn about human life?” he asked, smirking. “Well the good news is that you don’t have to love me.”
Anger, finally, burned behind her green eyes. “Don’t tell me what I can do. You don’t know what I can do. Shall I take it in? Your rage, your despair, your grief … your love? Shall I show you why I survive it, every day, surrounded by people who, if not individually, then collectively feel as strongly as you?” She unfolded her arms, lifting a hand between them, fingers spread wide and cupped around the palm. “Shall I suck it out of you the way you draw blood from your prey and show you the difference between lack of humanity and lack of feeling?”
Sparks, controlled but brilliant, lifted from each fingertip. “Don’t tell me what I can do. What I can sense. You think someone who survived 9/11 can’t survive /you/?”
Damon stared at her, watching the sparks flying from her fingers with little interest. “I kill people, Summer. And I don’t feel any remorse. Humanity or not. If I’m staying in one place for a while, I’ll rob a hospital. Keep a stock of blood bags. But if I’m not staying in one place — if I’m moving around and just following the wind — I kill. I could have killed that girl. I would have. I should have at least taken a bite because I’m hungry and this conversation is not helping that.”
“And how often do you kill people who are not a threat and who are not prey? How often do you simply kill for the pleasure of killing, and not to protect yourself, to feed yourself?” she asked softly. Her hand flared into flame with a dull whump, and her eyes flicked to it, then back to his face, marked with shifting shadows.
“Why are you so desperate to convince me that you aren’t good?” Slowly, she reached out toward him with the flaming fingers.