Those words thrilled Kara. It had been too long since she had been able to say them or chase down a criminal. Her time away from the force had nearly caused her to forget the love she held for her job, but now it was all rushing back to her.

"I'll need everything you have on the man who checked the security system," she said.

The Director happily complied with her request and handed over all the information he had.

"Should we check his apartment or his business?" Michael asked.

For a moment, she forgot he had superb hearing. "No," she said. "He'll want to get rid of this piece immediately. He won't want the heat on him or want the local pawn shops to become alerted to the robbery."

"So we're visiting pawn shops?" Michael asked with an amused look on his face. "I guess, there's a first time for everything."

Together, Michael and Kara visited all the pawn shops in town, but none of them knew the man in question or had purchased the item. Finally, they pulled up at the last shop on the list.

"What if it's not here either?" Michael asked.

"Then we're back to square one," she said, but she knew it would be there. Her instincts were rarely wrong, and she had a strong feeling the criminal pawned the piece.

They hurried inside the shop and approached a meek man with large eyes that reminded Kara of a baby owl. Michael pulled a vintage photograph out of his pocket to show the man. She caught a glimpse of the missing object, a small metal cross. Questions flooded her mind, but she knew now was not the time to ask them.

"Yeah, a guy just left with that right before you came in," said the broker. "He tried to sell it to me, told me it was a valuable artifact. Didn't have any proof though, I can't buy anything without proof."

Without warning, Michael fled the store as fast as if he had flown, and for all Kara knew, he did. He left her standing at the counter with the pawnbroker, but she quickly caught up to him in an alley a few blocks down the road. He had a man with the word "Maintenance" on his breast pocket cornered, pressed against the wall. His forearm pressed so hard against the man's neck that he gasped for air. "Where is it?" Michael growled.

"I don't know what you're talking about," choked the man.

Michael's gray eyes did something Kara had never seen before. They turned solid black as his fangs grew wider and longer than they had ever been when he fed on her. "Don't toy with me!" His voice rumbled in a demonic way that made Kara want to run away.

Michael didn't respond. He seemed to fall into a trance while looking at the cross, and the thief wiggled out of his grasp and scurried away. Michael didn't chase after him. Instead, he held the cross to his chest with such ferocity that it surely must have almost broken. Suddenly, the strange trance broke and Michael sped away. Before Kara could even comprehend that Michael had left, he was back with the thief, his clasped hands around his throat. His face quickly turned blue.

"No!" Kara yelled.

"He betrayed me, he must die." Although Michael spoke calmly, Kara had never been more terrified of him. That fear normally would have made her run, but now, she found that all she wanted was to save Michael from himself.

"Michael, please," she begged, her voice as soft as down.

Michael looked at her with his black eyes and she knew that there was nothing she could do. Just as she gave in to the inevitable, however, Michael released the thief's throat. The scruffy man fell to the ground, gasping for air, but, thankfully, still alive.

"The only reason you're still alive is because of her. You should be kissing her feet right now." Michael snarled as he gave the man a few swift kicks to the side. Then he bent down and looked deep into the man's wet brown eyes. "You will forget everything you saw tonight. You will forget that you have ever seen this cross. You will forget that you have ever seen me or her. When I let you go, you will immediately move out of this state and never return. If you do, I will find you, and I will kill you. Do you understand?"

The man nodded then ran away, only stopping to kiss Kara's feet for a matter of seconds.

"What about everyone else that is connected to this crime? You are letting my suspect getaway." Kara was frustrated, but she was still too afraid to raise her voice to the creature she saw that was standing in front of her.

"I will take care of them. No one needs to know about this cross. You must promise me never to speak of it to anyone." His eyes began to fade back to their normal smoky gray.

"Of course," Kara said.

Once Michael had completely composed himself, they made their way back to the car and headed home, but something bothered Kara. As they pulled up to the curb at the mansion, she finally decided to speak up on the matter and hoped it wasn't going too far.

"Back there, you said that he betrayed you. I'm sorry for saying this, but do you think you might have overreacted?"

To her relief, Michael did not seem upset by her question. He continued to remain calm as he spoke to her. "Maybe so, but I have experienced betrayal so often in my life, that I see it everywhere I look."

She watched him carefully as he spoke and realized her feelings for Michael were changing once more. When she first met him, she hated him, but now she pitied him. He carried a burden, and she could only assume he had been carrying it for years, maybe even hundreds of years. This burden weighed him down.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Come, I'll show you."