Brynne’s smile was not her own. It belonged to the beast inside her. The one whose power surged inside her now, more lethal than anything this lowly blood addict would ever know.
She rose like a wraith in front of the Rogue. He had no chance to react, no chance to stop the violence that exploded out of her.
She lashed out, lightning-quick. Her fingers ripped through clothing, flesh, and bone. The Rogue roared as she opened his chest with slashing strikes of her hands, his agony only feeding her power.
His chest cavity shredded, the Rogue shrieked and convulsed on his feet. But that wasn’t enough for the monster raging within her now.
Grabbing a fistful of the vampire’s mangy hair, she bellowed with battle fury as she drove the vampire’s head into the bricks at her back. The skull caved in with a sickening crunch.
She smashed it again and again, lost to an unearthly violence that seethed through her veins like poison. She didn’t know what finally made her head clear enough to realize her opponent was dead.
But no, that wasn’t right.
She did know.
The scent of fresh blood lifted her chin from the revolting carnage she’d wrought.
On the ground nearby, the human was shuddering in a growing pool of red. He was dying. Easily only moments from the grave already.
But his blood was still alive.
And it called to her.
It called to the beast who’d been pacing its cage for too long—since the last time she’d finally broken down and fed. She hungered now. So severely she could hardly stand the agony of it.
Brynne drifted over to the man. His gaping, sightless eyes probably didn’t register the inhuman face looking down at him.
But Brynne saw what she looked like now.
In the scant light of the street, she saw her face reflected in the glossy surface of the dying man’s blood.
It made her want to weep, that reflection of who—and what—she truly was.
Instead, she knelt down beside her dying blood Host…and she fed.
CHAPTER 19
Zael sensed the sudden shift of energy in the Order’s headquarters even before he heard the heavy drum of boots on marble floors and the jangle of weapons. Following the sound down to the central artery of the command center, he found all of the warriors suited up and rolling out for patrols.
Or, rather, for battle.
“What’s going on?”
Lucan cut him a stark glance. “Rogues. We’ve got upwards of a dozen of them on the loose right now.”
Zael knew the derogatory term for a blood-addicted member of the Breed. In fact, there probably wasn’t a person alive in the past twenty years—mortal and immortal alike—who hadn’t at least heard of the violence and carnage Rogues had inflicted on the human population. But it had been a long time since they had posed any kind of threat¸ thanks in most part to the work of the Order.
It hardly seemed coincidental that this kind of disaster was coming so quickly on the heels of two other shocking strikes against public confidence and security.
“You think Opus is behind this?”
“They haven’t confirmed yet, but I don’t think there’s any question. This has Opus written all over it.” Lucan practically spat the words.
“There have been isolated Rogue attacks in other locations recently,” Tegan added. “Apparently, Opus got its hands on a chemical substance that makes bloodthirsty killers out of anyone who takes it.”
“Fucking déjà vu all over again,” Sterling Chase snarled as he fastened an arsenal of firearms around his hips.
“Yeah, it is,” Dante agreed. “We grabbed a bunch of the shit and torched the rest when we took down Riordan, but there was already some of it in play.”
“And now it’s here in D.C.,” Lucan said, his tone bleak. He motioned for the warriors to start rolling out. “Nathan took out three Rogues so far, but they’re cutting a bloody path through Georgetown as we speak.”
Zael’s stomach clenched. “Ah, fuck.” The alarm he’d felt upon entering the weapons room a moment ago now turned to ice-cold dread. “Brynne’s in Georgetown.”
Lucan gave him a curt nod as the commanders and other warriors began filing out to the corridor. “She’s with Nathan. He left her in the vehicle while he went to check things out. If she stays put, she should be okay until we reach her.”
“Where?” Despite the assurances, Zael’s pulse kicked hard and didn’t let up. “Tell me exactly where she is.”
Darion Thorne was the first to speak. “Nathan was taking her to a blood Host parlor. It’s on Wisconsin Avenue, near M Street.”
Zael knew the area. Not well, but enough for his needs right now. The Order and everything else pushed from his thoughts, he put an image of the intersection in his mind’s eye. Then he glanced at the Atlantean emblem that dangled from the leather thong around his wrist.
The piece of silvery crystal responded to his psychic request with a brilliant flare of light.
It flashed brighter, enveloping him in its power—and then Zael was no longer picturing the Georgetown intersection in his mind, he was standing there in the flesh.
The street was ghostly in its stillness, only the bleating cry of a vehicle alarm piercing the night. Zael started walking. Up ahead of him, a brutalized body lay broken and covered in gore next to the smashed hood of a car. Blood streaked the asphalt, which was also littered with items the terrorized people had lost in their haste to vacate the area.
He saw the glossy, black bulk of the Order’s SUV parked at the curb, just as Lucan had assured him it would be. But Zael’s lungs constricted as he realized the vehicle was empty, the passenger door ajar.
He wheeled around in the middle of the street, his gaze searching for any signs of life.
“Brynne!”
There was no answer. Only the nagging drone of the alarm. He silenced it with a sharp mental command.
“Brynne! Where are you?”
His feet started moving on their own. It wasn’t hard to tell which way the other people had gone. Personal effects, blood, even the savaged body of another victim lay in his path.
And then—a grim, but hopeful, sign.
A dead Breed male, his head twisted grotesquely as if by violent, monstrous strength.
One of Nathan’s kills, perhaps. Zael didn’t much care how the vampire met its end. One less Rogue was one less threat of danger to Brynne.