The cool voice came from our left, and it belonged to the man who’d now been identified as De Luca. But I had no sense of him—no sense that there was anyone with him—and I had no idea why. Maybe the spell had something to do with it, but if that was the case, why could I still sense the five other vampires?

Except, I suddenly realized, there’d been six. One of the vampires who’d stood behind us was no longer there.

Did Parella have a turncoat in his own crew? It was certainly possible, given there was no other way De Luca could have known about this meeting. But even with help on the inside, De Luca wouldn’t have come here alone. If he didn’t have his vampire buddies with him, then he’d at least have the red cloaks.

But how had he gotten so close without anyone sensing him? I glanced at Adán, eyebrow raised in question, and he pointed downward.

“Sorry. I didn’t sense them until it was too late. I was intent on the vampires already here.”

“Can you stop any more of them getting into this place?”

“I can reshape and block the sewer entrances, but it’ll take time and I’ll be vulnerable to attack.”

“I have your back,” Jackson said.

Adán nodded and closed his eyes. A tremor ran through the concrete under our feet and began to radiate outward in ever-increasing circles. If the vampires noticed, they gave no indication.

“What are you up to, De Luca?” Parella growled. “Surely even you can see—”

“What I can see,” De Luca said, “is an opportunity to cleanse the sindicati of your faction’s stain and bring the organization into the current century. That it comes with the prospect of great profitability is a bonus.”

“If you think the man in charge of the red cloaks is about to share wealth or power,” I said, “you’re seriously deluded.”

“About twenty have now entered the area via the sewer grates,” Adán murmured. “But they feel … wrong. Warped.”

“Because they’re the red cloaks.” Fire burned through me, and I flexed my fingers in an effort to remain calm. Sparks skittered across my fingertips, but they were a pale imitation of their usual strength.

But at least there were sparks—even if I couldn’t create a full flame, Jackson would be able to catch and shape the sparks into something far more deadly. But history had already told us they wouldn’t be deadly enough to take care of the red cloaks. I just had to hope I could reach the mother’s heat.

“Oh, I’m well aware of my counterpart’s untrustworthiness,” De Luca said, amusement in his tone. “However, our deal currently suits us both—and it has certainly benefited us both.”

“I’d be wary of deals with the devil, De Luca,” Parella growled. “They have a habit of turning.”

“Yes, they do, don’t they?” The underlying rancor in De Luca’s voice suggested there was a very long history between these two men.

“Why have you brought so many red cloaks here, De Luca?” I said.

Parella glanced at me sharply. “There are red cloaks here? Why can we not—?” He paused, and swore again. “They’re coming up through the sewers.”

“Yes,” De Luca said. His voice was now coming from a different spot, though I’d had no sense of movement. But then, I couldn’t sense the red cloaks, either, and I wasn’t sure if that was the spell or something else—especially since Parella hadn’t sensed them until I mentioned it. “And you have so kindly employed magic to nullify the one person who can actually stop them.”

“So that’s what this is all about?” I asked. “You’re going to snatch me and kill them in the process?”

“Kill them? No, what I have planned for them is far dirtier than that.”

The amusement and confidence in De Luca’s voice was so strong, I wanted to punch him. But I had no doubt that the minute I so much as moved, or even sparked, the red cloaks we couldn’t see would attack. Besides, I doubted De Luca would be an easy target—at the very least, he’d be protected. He, like Parella, didn’t seem the type to put his own safety at risk if he didn’t have to.

“I will not become a cloak,” Parella said. “I will slice my own throat before it ever comes to that.”

“That, too, would be an acceptable outcome,” De Luca said. “I’d like to say it’s been a pleasure knowing you all, but the true pleasure will come when you all are a part of the hive and as mad and mindless as any of the soldiers.”

And with that, the red cloaks screamed and charged.

Fire burned instantly to my fingertips, but even as the flames came to life, the magic surged and snuffed them out. But Jackson caught the fading sparks and breathed new life into them. As they grew into flame, Adán threw out a hand, the gesture imperial, demanding. There was a mighty roar as the ground beneath us answered his call; then the concrete split, forming jagged fissures that ran like fat fingers through the concrete, allowing the earth to surge through the gaps. It was a fierce brown tide that quickly solidified, forming a wall that was thick and strong. Adán made a sweeping gesture to the right, and as the tide of earth followed, a circular cage began to form around us. The cloaks screamed again and threw themselves sideways, racing the earth, trying to get around it. Half a dozen managed to scramble over the wall before it reached the ceiling and charged at the vampires. They didn’t panic—they simply produced several rather large guns each and began to fire.

So much for their not being armed.

Not that I was about to complain right now.

Jackson cast a ball of flame toward the ceiling. As the shadows fell away, the true depth of our situation was revealed.

There had to be at least thirty red cloaks here.

“Oh fuck,” I muttered. Luke—or whoever else might be leading this mad rabble—really was intent on winning this particular battle. He surely had to be throwing most of his resources at us. Unless, of course, he had far more soldiers than anyone had thought possible.

And yet he was nowhere to be seen, and that was unusual, given he’d been at every other major confrontation I’d had with the cloaks. Did that imply he’d been seriously injured when I’d blown that building apart? He wouldn’t be dead, because I couldn’t imagine the red cloaks leaving De Luca standing untouched if he wasn’t under some sort of protection order.

“It’s worse than it looks,” Adán muttered, sweat beginning to trickle down his brow, “because there’re another twenty trapped underground. They may yet find a way in.”

Jackson swore. “Is it possible to lock off this entire area? If we can stop any more of them getting in, we might stand a chance.”

Three more red cloaks made it around the wall. The vamps calmly shot them. As blood and gore and brain matter splattered across the still-moving earth wall, the younger vampire who’d been left alone went down under the weight of another three cloaks. They tore him apart in an instant. He didn’t even have time to scream.

It was a fate that might well be ours if we weren’t very careful.

Adán glanced around, his face paler and more drawn than only minutes before. “I can try, but I can’t finish the earth wall and lock off the entrances. Pick one, and do it fast.”

“Entrances,” Jackson replied, even as I said, “What about Rory and Dmitri?”

“They’re in the first section of the parking lot.” Adán paused and tilted his head slightly to the left, his expression closed, as if he were listening. “The red cloaks are not the only soldiers De Luca brought. Rory and Dmitri are engaging his vampires.”

“This just gets better and better,” Jackson said, and flung a ball of flame at a red cloak as it screamed toward us. The creature went up in an instant, but that didn’t stop it. It took a bullet from Parella’s gun to achieve that. “Do it, Adán.”

I swore violently and hoped like hell that Rory would be okay, that he and Dmitri would survive even if we didn’t. It was a purely selfish thought since I could be reborn and the others here could not, and I thrust it away and swung around. The earth wall came to a shuddering stop, leaving a breach of about twenty feet between the two ends. The red cloaks filled it in an instant.

“Parella, if you want to survive, you might want to get your arse over here,” I bit out, “because the only way any of us are going to get out of this is by joining forces.”

His hesitation was only brief; then, with a silent glance at his men, the four of them moved over to us—Parella and one vampire on either side of Jackson and me, and the other two behind. Adán stood in the middle of the rough semicircle, his sweat beginning to stain the concrete at his feet as he concentrated on locking off the entrances to this section of the underground lot.

“I don’t suppose you can undo the damn spell,” I added, frustrated by my continuing inability to reach my flames.

“Not from here, I can’t.” Parella raised his weapons and fired as he spoke. One red cloak went down. The others just ran over the top of him. “And, unfortunately, we have a limited supply of bullets.”

“Then fucking don’t fire until absolutely necessary.”

“Define ‘necessary,’ ” Parella snapped back. “Because none of us are waiting for the bastards to get within slashing distance before we take them out.”

It was a viewpoint I could only agree with. Besides, Parella and his men knew the dangers of running out of bullets just as much as we did.

I reached for the mother. Only it felt like I was reaching through a wall of glue. Whatever the spell was, it really was powerful. Sweat broke out across my brow as I kept reaching; gunshots echoed, and the smell of burning flesh fouled the air as Jackson’s fire hit the nearest cloaks. They screamed but kept on coming. I wasn’t going to reach the mother in time. The red cloaks were too close. More shots rang out, but the sound was lost to the screaming of the cloaks.

So I did the only thing I could do. I thrust my knife at Jackson, then became spirit. As my inner fires answered my call and tore away my flesh form, Parella swore. But, to his credit, he didn’t move—even though the heat of my natural form had to be damn unpleasant, given how close he was standing—and he kept on firing. But as one gun clicked over to empty, the nearest red cloaks literally launched at him.

The last of my human body burned away, freeing me. Flicking out two ribbons of fire, I caught the red cloaks in midair, stopping them and burning them. As their ash fell like black snow to the concrete, I surged forward, my body incandescent as I flung my arms wide. Three red cloaks smacked into me; they tore at me, bit me, even as their screaming stopped, their flesh cindered, and their bones became little more than soot staining the ground.

The rest of the cloaks simply slipped around me. I spun so fast, my fires trailed like a comet behind me, bright and fierce against the fading light of Jackson’s flaming light that still hovered above us, providing light.

I flung ribbons of flame left and right and flared them high, creating a wall of fierce fire. But I wasn’t fast enough. Two red cloaks got through, and one of Parella’s men went down. The other two spun and fired, taking out the cloaks. The vampire was bloody and torn but alive. But not for long, because Parella turned and fired. As the vampire’s brains bled out across the concrete, Parella growled, “We need to end this. I only have a few bullets left.”

I swore, though no one here would have heard anything remotely resembling speech. If he had only a few bullets, then it was likely the other two were in a similar situation. And while Jackson might be armed with fire, it was fading fast and wasn’t really stopping them anyway; Adán was still attempting to lock the area off. There were simply far too many red cloaks here for me to cope with alone.

We weren’t going to survive. Not if I didn’t pull something special out of the box.

I threw as much strength as I could into my wall of flame and once again reached for the earth mother. The glue was still there, but this time, desperation won the day. I burned through the barrier, and the ground underneath us began to tremble and shake as she responded. Then her energy exploded through me, a wild force that—as had happened up at Hanging Rock—would not be contained or in any way directed. She erupted outward, a wave of flame and heat so fierce that the air beyond my barrier briefly became unbreathable. Fingers of fire that burned with the color of all creation wrapped almost lovingly around the throats of the remaining red cloaks and cindered them in an instant.

When there was nothing—not even ash, her force retreated, leaving me back in flesh form, on my knees, and shaking with weakness.

But we were alive, and the red cloaks were not.

And that was more than I’d thought possible only minutes ago.

“Fuck,” Jackson said. “That was close.”

“Yeah, it was.” I pushed to my feet and met Parella’s gaze. “Can you sense De Luca?”

He hesitated, then shook his head. “He’s not in this area.”

I glanced over my shoulder. “Adán?”

The earth Fae took a shuddery breath and wiped the sweat-dampened hair out of his eyes. “As the vampire said, he is not in this area.”

“Is he in the other area, with Rory and Dmitri?” Jackson asked.

“Meaning you did not come alone,” Parella commented. “That is a breach of our trust.”

“So say the vampires who swore they didn’t need weapons but who subsequently produced something of a small armament,” I snapped. “Kindly remember we survived, no thanks to those guns or the damn spell.”

“I have no idea if De Luca is among those who still battle our companions,” Adán said. “But there is movement in the locked-off area to our left, and it is vampiric in feel, but not fouled.”

Meaning it was De Luca and his people rather than the red cloaks. It had to be. Highpoint’s security people would be well aware by now that hell had broken loose under their feet, but even if they had vampires in their employ, I doubted they’d come down here themselves. But the cops would have been called, and that meant we were now on a countdown. I certainly didn’t want to tangle with the law right now, and I doubted Parella and his crew did, either.

“If it is De Luca,” Jackson growled, “we can’t let the bastard escape.”

“De Luca is our prob—,” Parella began.

But I cut him off with a quick “Like fuck he is.”

I didn’t wait for his reaction. Neither did Jackson. The two of us bolted forward as one, but the vampires were after us in an instant. Only Adán remained behind—and I very much suspected he simply didn’t have the energy to follow.

None of us got far. Fifty feet from the wall of earth was another wall, this one made of concrete and stone. It blocked the entrance into this section of the lot from the rest of the parking area on the Warrs Road side of the complex. Jackson swore and swung around, but before he could say anything, Adán said, “Working on it.”

The wall began to shiver and quake. Bits of stone broke away and fell around us, a less-than-gentle rain that quickly became something more dangerous. We jumped out of its reach, and, a heartbeat later, the wall came down, spewing rocks and concrete chunks around our feet as dust plumed into the air.

I didn’t wait for it to settle. Neither did anyone else. We scrambled over the still-moving pile of rubble and raced into the next section.

“De Luca is ahead but not alone,” Parella growled. “There are at least a dozen others with him.”

“You boys don’t do anything by halves when you plan a trap, do you?” The words came out as little more than a wheeze of air, and it wasn’t due to just a shortness of breath. I was pushing my limits physically, but I wasn’t about to be left behind. Not when the bastard was so damn close. “Can you at least destroy the spell and give us a fighting chance against them?”

I wasn’t even sure I had enough strength left to make flame, but I certainly couldn’t call to the mother in my current state of weakness. She’d claim me, of that I had no doubt.

“Fredrick,” Parella snapped; then, as the vampires peeled off as one, he added, “De Luca is mine to deal with. Understood?”

“I don’t care who places the final blow, just as long as the bastard dies.”

“Then that is something else we agree on.”

We raced up the ramp to the next level, heading toward Warrs Road. Six vampires blocked our path. Jackson thrust the knife back into my hand; then, with a yell that was all anticipation and fury, he raised his own and charged. Flames still flickered across his fingertips, which lent the silver blade a bloody glow. Parella and the remaining vampires were silent but no less angry or determined as they surged past Jackson.

And they all left me in their dust.

But that was okay. I didn’t need to get involved in this fight. What I needed—what I wanted—was De Luca.

The clash of flesh against flesh was fierce and ugly. As the vampires fell on one another, Jackson slashed left and right, and his flames flared higher, burning flesh even as he sliced and diced. I skirted around the lot of them and ran on.

One of De Luca’s men sensed me at the last moment and lunged for me. I yelped and dove away, but I was far too slow. We went down in a tumble of arms and legs, and came to a halt abruptly against the edge of a concrete pillar. Air hissed from my lungs and I swear something broke inside, but I ignored the pain that ripped down my side and thrust a hand into the vampire’s face, clawing at his eyes. He swore and jerked away even as he threw a punch—not at my face, but at the side that was burning.

It hurt, god how it hurt. Just for a moment, all I could see were stars dancing merrily in a field of gathering black.

But at that precise minute, my flames surged. Fredrick had broken the spell.

And while I was fast approaching the end of the line, when it came to strength, I wasn’t there yet. I slapped a hand against the vampire’s chest and pushed, as hard as I could. Flames erupted from my fingertips, the force of them enough to both set him alight and throw him off me.

I scrambled to my feet. Just for an instant, the world spun. I took a deep, shuddery breath, then forced myself on.

Another blockade of vampires soon appeared, although this time there were only three of them. Even so, that was probably two too many in my current state. I swore and slithered to a stop, fire dancing across my fingertips. It lit the shadows and highlighted the anticipation in their eyes. If they were afraid, they certainly weren’t showing it.

They attacked en masse. I yelped and threw up a wall of flame between them and me, but it was weak and nowhere near high enough. They simply leapt over the top of it and charged on.

I ran backward, not daring to take my eyes off them, the silver knife in my hand, raised and ready. It wouldn’t be enough. I knew that; they knew that.

Awareness surged through me; Rory was close. Even as relief washed through me, threatening to buckle my knees, the concrete under my feet began to shift and crack. Out of the small fissures that formed as a result, earth, stone, and concrete erupted, forming a wall that swept around the vampires in less than a nanosecond and locked them inside.

“Go,” Dmitri growled. “I will take care of this filth.”

A hand grabbed mine and pulled me forward. “Flame,” Rory growled, even as his fingers became fire.

This time I didn’t argue; I simply sucked down the strength he was offering, refueling my energy even as I drained his—but only to the point where our levels evened out. Neither of us could afford to be close to the point of exhaustion since we had no idea what might await if and when we caught up with De Luca.

“What happened to the vampires you and Dmitri were battling?” I asked as we continued to race forward. Our footsteps echoed through the dark silence, a warning we still were on the hunt to anyone up ahead.

“They retreated not long after Adán raised the walls to shut off your area. We gave chase but came back the minute I realized just how close to the edge raising the mother had brought you.” His eyes glittered in the shadows as he glanced at me. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared in my life.”

“That makes two of us.”

I squeezed his fingers, then released him. We ran on. But as we neared the Warrs Road exit, three more vampires stepped from the shadows on either side, raised their guns, and fired.

We both became flame.

The bullets tore into our spirit forms and melted in an instant. The vampires’ eyes went wide, but before they could move, before they could react in any way, we hit them and swept on. Not even dust remained in our wake.

The headlights of a car speared the night as a big black vehicle spun around in the open parking area beyond the exit and accelerated away. Rory hit it with a ball of flame so powerful that the rear end of the vehicle rose high in the air and the car teetered on two front wheels for several seconds. Then it tipped over, with odd grace. It landed on its roof and slid forward for several yards before halting against the concrete wall of the building.

A vampire scrambled out of the passenger’s side of the car and raised a gun. A brave man, but he was ash in an instant.

There were two others inside the car, one at the front—presumably the driver—and one behind. That had to be De Luca.

I flung a ribbon of fire at the door, wrenched it free from the car, and then dragged De Luca out. I wrapped him in fire but didn’t actually burn him; I just burned the weapons from his grasp. As the metal dripped onto the concrete, I became flesh once more and walked toward him.

“It doesn’t matter if you kill me,” he said, his voice cool and amazingly calm. “Another man will just take my place.”

“Oh, I’m not going to kill you.” Ignoring Rory’s surprised glance, I stopped in front of De Luca and crossed my arms. It was an action that hurt like blazes; I really had broken something inside—possibly a rib. Or two. I swallowed bile and said, “I just want answers.”

“Answers will not help you,” he said. “Answers will not save you from either the wrath of my faction or the rage of the red cloaks.”

“Maybe they won’t, but I’d still like them.”

“Then ask away.”

Alarm slithered through me. He might be a very old, very powerful vampire, but we’d ensnared him and wiped out all his soldiers … all except for the ones who’d fled Rory and Dmitri, that was.

I spun around and glanced up, catching a glint of metal as a weapon was raised.

“Rory—,” I warned, even as I became flame once again.

Several bullets ripped through me. Others pinged off the car and zipped into the darkness. I twisted around and saw blood plume from Rory’s arm a heartbeat before he attained full fire form.

“They’re mine,” he growled, and surged upward. The bullets kept raining around me, through me, and then abruptly stopped as heat boiled through the darkness and screams shattered the silence. They were screams that cut off as abruptly as they’d started.

I regained flesh and shook De Luca violently. “No more. If any of your men are still alive, tell them to run.”

“None remain.” He was still far too calm and self-assured for my liking. Did he really care so little about his life? Or did he believe, perhaps, that the red cloaks would come to his rescue?

If so, why? He had to be aware that we’d cindered the lot of them. Why else would he have fled?

“Good,” I said. “Now tell me the name of the man who controls the red cloaks.”

His smile was thin, amused. “I’m surprised you have not already guessed.”

“Maybe I have. Maybe I just want confirmation.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Then you can have your confirmation. It is indeed Luke Turner.”

Well, fuck. Even though I’d suspected all along that my guess would be right, part of me had been hoping for a miracle. Hoping that even if fate couldn’t give me a break, it would at least give Sam one.

I should have known better.

Sam was not going to take the news well at all—not that I intended to say anything to him. He’d have confirmation enough when PIT exhumed his brother’s grave.

“And what do you really get out of the deal with Luke? It has to be more than full control over the sindicati and mere monetary gain.”

“If you do not think power and monetary gain are enough, then you have no understanding of those within the sindicati.”

“But this virus provides just as much threat to vampires as humans. You cannot believe that Luke will leave the sindicati standing untouched. Especially since he now has control of the two men who have any chance of quickly finding a cure.”

“Ah, but there is the rub,” De Luca said. “He may have control of the scientists, but to proceed where they left off, they must have their research. And that is something I control.”

“Except that you don’t. Parella’s faction stole Baltimore’s files, not you.”

His smile held little amusement. “They may have stolen them, but I now control them.”

So Parella did have a mole in his organization.

“If you do control all the information, I’m surprised you’re still alive to boast about it.” I hesitated, studying him through narrowed eyes. But there was no stain in him, no hint of the darkness I’d often sensed in Sam. “You’re not even infected.”

“No, because the few vampires he’s turned simply became insane. They do not fall under hive control and cannot be read by either the hive mind or by Luke.”

“He learned this the hard way?”

“Oh yes. And since the notes are inaccessible to everyone but me, he is forced to abide by our deal.”

“Until the moment you dole out the last of the notes and your usefulness comes to an end,” I said.

“Perhaps. And perhaps I have other cards up my sleeve.” His gaze went past me, and I suddenly realized Parella was moving up behind me. Once again, De Luca’s too-confident smile flashed. “So, you see, it would appear that neither you, nor Parella, nor anyone else can kill me. Not without risking a quick end to this virus.”

“That’s where you would be wrong,” Parella growled.

And with little other warning, he blew De Luca’s brains apart.