Saxson Olaru swept his hand through his hair, trying to calm his nerves.

Tracking the van from the alley had been painstaking and slow—there were times when Julien had lost the scent, and they’d had to return to the ground.

Track forward.

Track backward.

Take a different tack.

It was almost as if the van was everywhere—north and south, east and west—all at the same blasted time. And as anxious as Saxson was becoming—something inside his gut was literally screaming—he couldn’t fault Julien for the confusion. No doubt, Kiera’s attackers had driven the thing from one end of the city to the next over the last seven days, and that was beyond Julien’s purview: arranging the clues in linear time.

All he could do was track what he found.

At last, they came to a stop in a dark, secluded space and approached an industrial wood door. Silent as cats, they crept forward, ready to pounce, as Julien nodded his head.

His ears humming, his stomach lurching, Saxson glanced at his watch—it was ten o’clock. Dear gods, please…let my destiny be alive, he prayed, and then he gave the tracker the thumbs-up.

* * *

Saxson held his breath and Nathaniel thumbed his polished silver stiletto, with its custom handcrafted grip. Julien Lacusta slammed his fist into the center of the wood, splintering it into a thousand pieces, and the vampires rushed inside.

The smell of fear, sweat, and blood was pungent in the dark, rusty space, thick with cobwebs, dirt, and old smelly hay.

What the hell!

There was no one there.

“It’s a godforsaken barn!” Julien snarled, flying up to the rafters, in and out of old stalls, and checking under piles of rubble.

Nathaniel kicked over barrels, studied hanging, archaic implements, and made his way to a large wooden bench about the size of a kitchen island. “No,” he argued, shaking his head as he fingered a blindfold, gestured toward several rickety shelves stocked with glass vials and mysterious containers, and pointed out an assortment of archaic medical equipment. He whistled low beneath his breath. “It’s a lab.”

Saxson was about to explode.

Everything about the place was wrong.

And if his gut had been churning before, it was practically curdling now, his esophagus filling with bile. “Where the hell is she!” he shouted, uncaring as a pair of wooden beams crashed down from the ceiling. “And what the hell is this shit!?” He picked up the blindfold and sniffed it, and his eyes filled with moisture, from fury. “Julien!” he barked.

The tracker flew to his side, sniffed the vile cloth, and nodded. “She was here.”

“With a werewolf,” Nathaniel hissed.

Saxson booted a stiff metal chair across the barn, threw his head back like a lion, and roared his rage, no longer capable of restraining it.

“Sentinel,” Nathaniel admonished as the uneven earthen floor beneath their feet began to rock back and forth and quake. “Put a lid on it.” He placed a strong, supportive hand on Saxson’s shoulder and squeezed. “We will track the damn van all over this city if we have to. We’re gonna find these sons of bitches.”

Saxson shook his head. “You don’t understand, Nathaniel. We’re out of time.”

Julien joined them in the center of the barn and began to tinker with the various implements—sniffing the vials, thumbing the equipment, studying each and every contraption—even as Saxson reached out to his brother telepathically. Santos! Brother! Tell me you’ve found something in that phone…an address, a gods-forsaken address! What the hell is Owen’s last name, and just how deviant is the human bastard? He had been in such a hurry when he had taken Kyla’s memories that he had forgotten to expunge some very basic details.

I’m working on it, brother, Santos’s calm, methodical voice echoed back. His last name is Green—Owen Green—but he’s not in any state or federal system. No driver’s license, he doesn’t pay taxes, and I haven’t been able to find as much as a phone bill or a property deed. He doesn’t have a criminal record. Saxson sighed. I’m hacking into everything I can think of, brother, and I’m still pulling texts from the phone. What’s up? he added soberly. You sound like you’re ready to blow a gasket.

Saxson clenched his hands into fists. We tracked the van all the way to a barn, but she isn’t here—no one is here. And this shit, Santos—this shit is jacked up. Xavier tortured the crap out of her, here, in this place. And someone—something—is torturing her now, or worse. I can feel it in my bones. He almost choked over his next unthinkable words. She’s dying, Santos—I can feel my own life-force slipping away.

The connection went eerily silent.

And then Julien’s harsh voice filled the void. “Saxson!”

Saxson spun around to face the tracker, noticing a jagged, broken vial resting in the vampire’s hand. “The blood,” Julien said brusquely. “It’s Kiera’s.”

Saxson glanced upward, toward the heavens, his heart expanding in gratitude, his senses coming alive with purpose.

Blood!

Life-giving—all-sustaining—immortality-enhancing blood!

It would contain Kiera’s DNA!

And destiny or no, there wasn’t a vampire alive who couldn’t track another soul by the anima in their blood.

He practically dove across the warehouse, snatched the vial from Julien’s palm, and poured what was left of the contents down his throat. Afraid that he might have missed a drop, or that the meager teaspoon he had swallowed would not be enough, he crushed the glass in his hand, shoved it into his mouth, and chewed it down to dust, swallowing every last fragment without hesitation.

His aorta thrummed.

His veins exploded with knowledge.

And his consciousness filled with smells, impressions, and sounds: Blessed Prince Jadon, she had waist-length blond hair, just like Kyla’s, only Kiera’s was thicker, silkier, and more vibrant. She smelled of lavender and vanilla; her heart was kind and compassionate, and she could play the strings off a violin. She was an absolute virtuoso.

His chest heaved, his stomach quivered, and his legs nearly buckled beneath him.

Someone had carved obscenities into her flesh, and they had also slit her wrist.

And someone else—no, several others, dressed in dark, ridiculous robes—were about to violate her, while her life slipped away beneath them.

“Follow me,” he hissed, locking onto the signal like a beacon. And then he released his wings, leaped into the air, and shot straight through the roof of the barn. Oh, and Nathaniel, he snarled telepathically, knowing the predator was renowned for torturing his prey, don’t kill anyone quickly. Take your sweet damn time.