"This looks even less like a vampire place than the Eternal Acres," I said once Cruz finally let the Porsche slow down to below the speed of light. We drove toward the windswept, inviting stretch of the Gulf Coast. Trees were sparse, gravel beds displayed more boulders driftwood compositions than flowers, and the buildings sported more glass than concrete. Basically, it was designed for maximum exposure to the sunshine.

Cruz frowned. "This has to be it."

Then he adjusted his oversized sunglasses and turned his attention to the buzzer at the gates. Compared to the Acres, the Restorative Nine Lives Center took their security far more seriously. It was probably because their guests weren't vampires, just feeders.

"Hi, I'm Dan Smith. We have an appointment with the admission services."

We argued about this name, but Cruz insisted rich people called themselves something basic when they went incognito. He certainly looked the part, even though in the harsh light of the day, it was more obvious that his skin was starting to lose its natural tan. I was going to miss it, but the paler appearance worked great for our cover story that he needed rehab.

The next part of our plan that we agreed on beforehand had to come into effect once we parked. The Nine Lives was noticeably more popular with the visitors than the Acres, so Cruz had to circle the parking lot to find a deserted corner. Then he cut off the engine and straightened in the driver's seat, his hands clenching the steering wheel. For a vampire, it was the equivalent of taking deep breaths before taking a plunge.

"Come on, let's do it," I said, even though shivers crawled down my spine. "I already said yes."

"Trust me, if I could think of any other way...don't look, okay? And don't unbuckle the seatbelt."

I nodded, and stared out of the window, as he moved hair and silk scarf out of the way. I braced for the prickle of his teeth, but still cried out as they punched through my skin. My chest rose and fell fast a few times, then the fiery sensation ran up my veins from the bite.

My Prince suckled, and I was happy to feed him...so happy, I cried out again when Cruz withdrew and gripped the steering wheel again. Here, the wisdom of keeping the seat belt became apparent, because its tug brought me back to my senses when I leapt for Cruz, forgetting the restraint was there.

"Whoa," I whispered, falling back into the seat and rolling my head back. "Whoa."

"I needed your blood to do the persuasion magic," Cruz said, his head bent low, fighting to hide his fangs. "I told you it will be like that. We'll...get used to it...I hope."

I sighed, straightened my scarf to hide the bite mark, and climbed out of the car. The salty breeze from the sea cleared my head by the time Cruz joined me. My chest lightened as I sensed the lessening of his hunger, but he still seemed troubled.

"And I hope your magic works better on staff here than on my dad," I quipped and threaded my arm through his. I was supposed to be his concerned girlfriend, so I didn't have to skimp on the PDAs.

"Unfortunately, you can't know until you try. Your dad is a rough nut to crack." Cruz grinned sheepishly. "It's impossible to make someone go against their nature with compulsion without damaging their mental health. So, if Freida left the staff alone..."

He trailed off, and I shuddered in the sunshine, because Freida cast such a long shadow.

***

The woman who met us had a cheerful and efficient look, softened by compassion. She was aptly named Amber, and had no troubles giving off the impression that showing us around the complex was the highlight of her day.

"Yes, yes, he works here," she chirped when Cruz showed her Dylan's photo from one of their team pictures. Then her brows knitted together. "Funny thing, I haven't seen him since Friday..."

"Are such disappearances of the attendants normal?" Cruz asked evenly.

Amber's namesake eyes clouded so much, I saw the blue swirls of magic in their depth. Or perhaps I just imagined them.

"A...a holiday. He's on a holiday. How silly of me to forget!" the poor woman spattered. Then her voice changed to something belonging to an automated system. "I want to show you our mineral treatment bath. Follow me."

She changed the direction we were walking in previously, hundred-and-eighty degrees to a gravel trek veering off from the main pathway. She pointed in the opposite direction for a good measure. "This way, please."

"Let's see what's there first." Cruz made a beeline down the path.

"Just a service road." Amber rushed after us, bobbing on her high heels. "Please, come back. There is nothing to see there!"

Cruz sped up, shaking off her pursuit. She kept following, calling for us to come back, and not go there, warning us about construction noises and the like. She sounded like a desperate seagull.

"Conditioned to respect a vampire's choices," Cruz commented through gritted teeth. "We're on the right track."

The path wound around a few smaller buildings, and more trees than there was anywhere else, to come to a fenced off area at the border of the property. Inside was a construction trailer, already inconspicuous. For good measure, the seascape plastic plastered the fence over, asking passersby to excuse the resort while renovations took place. Despite the holes cut into the plastic to let the wind through without ripping it to shreds, the real weather faded the photorealist palms, sand and waves.

The red writing, however, was loud and clear. It forbade access and warned of falling danger, high voltage and toxic fumes.

"Freida should have included the plague of locusts," I muttered, eyeing the place.

"And the vampire attacks." Cruz grabbed the padlock, ripped it clear off his hinges and pushed the gates open.

"Please," Amber, who finally caught up, begged through the wheezing. She pointed at the warning sign. "Very dangerous."

Cruz looked directly into her face. The familiar glowing blue threads of magic circled his head, then stretched toward her. "It says open excavation, but I don't see any. Do you?"

"No, but there used to be one. Until they found an underground cavern, flooded by the sea." Sentences came out of Amber with a great difficulty, as if each was pulled by thongs. It was hard to say if she even understood what she was saying, or if she just recited something planted into her head. "Also, there was methane. They had to stop the work until a district engineer reviewed the health-and-safety plans."

"Really?" Cruz said quietly. "How long ago was that?"

Amber's expression grew even more pained. "I...I don't remember. But the owner strictly forbade access. Because of the safety concerns."

The blue tendrils stretched out from Cruz to Amber. While he was charming her, I dashed for the trailer.

Its windows were barred, so I couldn't peer in before entering, but the door was unlocked. I squeezed inside, letting my eyes adjust to the darkness, wishing I brought my brooch along. Apart from the dimness, the trailer was suffocatingly hot, with a smell of death and refuse filling the air.

"You can smell the rat, Amber," Cruz's calm voice poured from the outside like an air-freshener.

I took a mouth-breath, propped the door open on some crate and walked around the trailer.

Even ajar, the door didn't admit enough light to see more than the outlines of various construction equipment. There wasn't a soul inside. Dammit!

"Freida Seidr is hiding something in this trailer. We need to enter it and make sure it's not something so bad, it'll destroy your Center," Cruz said.

A moan echoed his baritone. It was faint, as if coming from a well...no! From under the ground!

Wincing, I dropped to all fours and searched the floor by touch. In the darkest and dirtiest corner, the palms of my hands encountered a large metal hatch, the kind they cover the sewer holes with.

"Cruz!" I hopped out of the trailer. "There is a hatch! A dungeon!"

Amber's carefully made-up lips twisted at the sight of me, smeared with rust, dust and even a spot or two of engine grease. Deep wrinkles gathered on her forehead. She rubbed it with a shaking hand.

"If you don't leave right now, I'll call the security. I...I have to?" Amber's gaze was so dopey, I was afraid she'd collapse.

"Good idea," Cruz said. The magic's glow around him intensified so much, it was a wonder Amber didn't see it. But mortals never did, except for me. "Call the cops while you're at it."

Cruz turned his back on the poor woman and rushed inside the trailer.

I trooped in after him. With his vampire's senses, Cruz had far less trouble identifying the hatch than me. He grabbed a metal rod from the pile of scrap, hooked it through a hole in the cover and heaved. The heavy hatch wobbled, then moved an inch with a terrible scraping sound. Cruz grunted and heaved again.

Looking at his bulging muscles, I muttered. "I thought your doctor didn't want you to exert yourself."

He gave me a hurt look. "It would have been dangerous for the mortals, if I stayed on the team, not to mention unfair."

Of course, he'd think of fairness. He was such a noble soul...Before I teared up, Cruz loosened the cover enough for him to hook it with his fingers, and then he simply...lifted it out of the way.

The show of a vampiric strength surprised me every time, because Cruz was such an ordinary teenager otherwise. I whimpered in admiration, but Cruz paid no heed, peering into a dark hole he revealed. A ladder disappeared into it.

"I'm afraid we're too late for someone," he said. "Cover your nose and mouth. And dial 911."

While I placed the call, Cruz climbed down, and came up with the first victim to lie out on the grass outside. "Fresh air and hydration until EMS arrives. Do you have a water bottle?"

I nodded mutely, and he stuffed his water bottle into my numb hands as well.

"H-how many?" I stammered, unscrewing the cap from it, while holding the phone between my ear and my shoulder, the 911 operator still on the line.

"Eight alive," Cruz said shortly.

"E-eight," I repeated his answer into the phone listlessly. "Alive..."

My throat constricted before I could force myself to ask how many were dead, and if Dylan was among them.

As a vampire, Cruz couldn't cry, but a crease deepened between his brows so much, that my fingers tingled to smooth it for him. I wanted to kiss the suffering from his soulful eyes too, but I couldn't be this selfish.

Freida's victim on the grass must have been beautiful once with her slim, tall build and blue eyes. Now, she looked like a plant that grew without sunshine: sunken, dull eyes; bulging veins and bloodless skin, blue and white. Her hair that was once probably a vivid blonde or brown, turned completely white from the horrors of her imprisonment by the vampire.

I shuddered and poured water into her chapped mouth. My hands shook so bad, I drizzled her waxy cheek with precious moisture.

"Hurry up," I whispered to the 911 Operator, swallowing tears.

Help arrived sooner than that, since Amber returned with security officers. If her goal was to remove us from the premises, it changed the moment she saw Freida's poor feeders on the grass. The fog of confusion cleared from her eyes. She whipped up her phone and in a few minutes we had staff with medical training on-site, a cooler with water and towels and more...

Cruz was right—Amber was a good person, and with Freida's spell broken, she charged into making things right to outrun feeling guilty. For her sake, I hoped she would.

Amber's efficiency pushed me to the side-lines of the caretaking, but I didn't mind. I was too hollowed out and nauseous to be of much use, anyway. So, while we waited for the cops to arrive and question us, I knelt by Dylan's side—the only person I knew among the rescued victims.

He'd just regained consciousness. "Zoe," he gasped.

"Shh," I said. "Don't talk. You are too weak."

He was. One thing that attracted me to him in the past was his body that matured into a masculine frame before other boys. Now he was a shadow of himself. Cruz whispered to me that Freida had a feeding frenzy before capturing him, and drained blood for his turning ritual without caring about the health of her stock. It must have been terrible for these young people to plunge from pampered pets to sacrificial animals...ouch.

Dylan didn't listen to me, because he never did. He roamed around with a half-senseless gaze. "Corazon?"

There were two sets of bite marks on him, unlike anyone else, so Corazon didn't just supply him to Freida. "She's not here. You know she did this to you, right? Almost killed you?"

"I know. She made me...lead you on. I didn't care, okay? Said, leave her to it. But she hated you for some reason. Hated you even more when you crushed on me, while I was hers...sorry."

Funnily enough, none of it hurt had a power to hurt me anymore. "Good to know, but just rest, okay? They'll be transporting you to the hospital any minute now."

He winced, like getting medical aid was a nuisance. "I must find Corazon."

"Seriously, dude..." There was no helping him.

"Zoe!" Cruz called, with more snap in his voice than absolutely necessary, I thought. What did he think I would do? Wash Dylan with my tears and avow my undying love, despite everything that built up between Cruz and me? Simply because Dylan was hurt? Puhlease...

"Cruz, for the thousandth time, I love you!"

"Congratulations," Dylan scoffed, staring in the distance. "I think he wants you to come over and talk to the FBI."

I turned. Sure enough, Cruz was with a couple of agents in telltale blue vests with large yellow letters. Heat rushed into my cheeks. "Well, I must go then. Get better soon, okay?"

I didn't think Dylan heard my well-wishing. His eyes looked inwards and his lips whispered, "Corazon. Must find Corazon. Must find her and stake her."

I shivered in the hot afternoon sun, before going to talk to the FBI. Maybe they would help Dylan in the hospital. Hopefully.

There were two agents, a female one with a name tag Sam, and a man with a name tag Frank. I slowed down, and stopped two paces away from them, because Cruz was talking and we didn't have time to set our story straight.

"Freida Seidr, the owner of this place, is at a retirement home," Cruz said, then chewed his lip.

"Ah...it is a tightly run facility, so they might not be conducive to releasing her into your custody. They might even say that she had died. If you take her in, well...she requires additional security, despite the appearance. She is...ah...possesses abnormal strength. I mean, you see how she could overpower young, healthy people we found here."

Frank raised his hand to forestall Cruz's round-about attempts to save Freida's skin, while keeping her neutralized.

I could only applaud him. I hated Freida, yes. But to have someone who had lived for more than a thousand years burned and utterly destroyed? It sounded wrong. I couldn't explain why. It just did, okay?

Frank from the FBI did a really strange thing then. He flashed his badge at Cruz. Only, it wasn't his FBI badge. He wore that one on his belt, in plain sight. No, he showed Cruz a badge that he had stashed in his pocket, and that had intertwined gothic letters on it.

VH, maybe?

"We understand all the difficulties inherent to apprehending Freida Seidr and keeping her contained," Frank said.

Sam of the FBI folded her arms on her chest and nodded grimly.

Cruz made a swallowing motion. "Then you must hurry, before the news of the raid hits the local news...or you might be too late."

The two agents raced away without as much as a goodbye.

I followed their departure with my gaze. "Who the heck were they?"

"The vampire hunters," came Curt's curt reply. "Dangerous people to our kind, but they know what they are doing."

I noticed I wasn't the only one who watched the FBI slash vampire hunters' departure with rapt attention. Dylan did too. A dark premonition descended upon me. This was going to spiral somehow. I shivered.

Cruz hugged my shoulders. "Let's get out of here, my love. You're tired, and we've fixed everything we could fix. It's out of our hands now...let the grown-ups handle the rest."

I sighed and leaned into his embrace, inhaling the familiar scent of his aftershave and threading my fingers through his hair. Letting their curls flow through them. He was right...we did all we could, and I didn't just want to kiss him. I needed to kiss him badly, and I didn't want to stop on just one measly kiss.

"Find a good place for that portal to Necrontium soon, okay?" I said and kissed him, because what the heck? He was my boyfriend, and we needed it.