Page 95 of Sold to the Dark Vampire Prince

“Do you want to know how many vampire males promised me they would make our arrangement permanent?” Nadine asked sadly. “They had all the promises in the world when we were still tangled together in the bedsheets, while their wives were waiting for them at home somewhere across town. In the end, vampire males are all slave to their craving for blood. And they will whisper whatever sweet promises they have to in order to keep drawing from your vein one more time. Don’t kid yourself, Daniela. You’re nothing to him.”

“You’re wrong.” But there were tears in her eyes as she said it.

“It’s late,” Evan said, turning off the range. “I think this discussion can wait for morning.”

Holding up her hands, Nadine retreated back into Ava’s room.

After the door clicked shut, Evan poured hot water into two mugs, then slid into the opposite chair at the kitchen table. Her eyes stayed on Dani’s hand as it shook where she gripped the handle of her mug.

“I’m worried about you,” she said at last. “Nadine was trying to be cruel, but I worry she’s not entirely wrong. Not about all of it.”

“Alex loves me.”

“He might care for you,” Evan allowed. This was maybe the most generous thing she’d ever said where Alexander was concerned. “But you keep getting hurt whenever he’s around. There was the explosion at the factory. Then earlier today when Lara’s men picked you up. Now your hands are starting to shake. He has all these promises, but all I see is my sister getting hurt by being close to him.”

“What are you saying?” Dani whispered, finally managing to still the trembling in her wrist enough to lift the mug of tea.

“That someone can love you and still be toxic for you. You need to figure out which one of those Alexander is to you before it’s too late.”

Alex covertly snuck a glance at his phone under the table to see if Dani had answered his texts. Nothing. They had to finish up with these endless meetings so he could get back to the sector and check on her.

The soft fountains and waterfalls of Thornwood provided a pleasant enough backdrop for their early morning meeting, even if his sister and Finneas had spent most of it fighting. He had to admit the fae king had provided a lovely meeting space, with an open-air conference area looking out over the mountains, and comfortable chairs crafted of some sort of flexible wood and lined with plush woven cushions.

There was a spread of fruits, flaky croissants, jams and honey butters that he’d been rather enjoying, up until Sera had accidentally flung a small pot of honey butter at their host’s head (missing, fortunately.)

She’d tried to pass it off as an accident, saying she’d been about to butter a croissant when her hand slipped. Cringing, Alex had barely restrained himself from kicking her beneath the table like they were kids. His sister had pitched softball for five seasons for her team at their elite private school.

Hand slipped, indeed.

Fortunately, a rather enormous wooly-looking gray dog had leapt off a plush cushion where he had been sprawled by the fire, and trotted over to lick up the fallen pot of butter, tail flagging appreciatively. He had then come over to sit politely by Sera’s side, blinking hopefully at the croissants, like she might throw something else at the fae king if he just waited patiently enough.

“Your information gives us very little to go on,” Finneas said evenly. Alex suspected he was regretting having invited them at all. “Unfortunately, vague rumors of fae being held at an underground research facility that could literally be located anywhere in your sector don’t do us much good.” When Sera glared, he shrugged. “Throw another pot of butter at my head if you must, Serafina, but you know I’m right. It’s not exactly actionable intelligence.”

“We know where she was found,” Alex said. “In her condition, it’s unlikely that she could have walked more than a mile at most.”

“Do your resistance leaders have any suspected locations within that search radius?”

Alex opened a folder and passed across copies of the maps they’d brought to Finneas and his advisors. “I know this doesn’t look like much, but you can see the high-security fencing and number of guards posted don’t make sense for an abandoned warehouse in that part of the sector.”

“You think this building is a front.” Finneas studied the photograph. “Possibly. But they could just as easily be running a drug smuggling operation, or a human trafficking ring.”

“You’re right that we don’t have any definitive data pointing to this location as the research site,” Sera said. “We’ll have to get confirmation first, but we believe this is the right place. Since we’ve been watching this location, we’ve been able to note the number of trucks coming in and out every day. Vampires working within the facility would be able to dematerialize in and out through any wards they had set in order to cut down on traffic and avoid calling attention to their location, but an operation of the scale we suspect we’re looking at would need to be resupplied regularly with food, medical supplies and other equipment.”

“If the site is warded, and I would assume it is, it wasn’t done by us,” Finneas pointed out. “And that means Cavalieri may be working with one of the older fae with very powerful magic.”

“How many of the fae can set wards?”

“Small wards like the type you’d put around your home to knock back an intruder are something most of the faerie are capable of, to one degree or another. The magic required to ward something as big as your castle back in Sector Four, or Thornwood,” he waved a hand absently, “which is always a target due to the nature of what it is, takes much more skill and power. Only a few of the high fae can do this. And that narrows down who we need to look at.”

The dog trotted over to the king’s side. He eyed the platter of egg sandwiches, looking hopefully at Sera, like she might want to throw something else.

Finneas reached over, absently stroking the dog’s wooly head. “A direct assault is going to mean casualties. We need a way in.”

“We’re working on that,” Alex said. “And since we held up our end of the bargain, we need keys for the shackles my father is using to hold his prisoners down in the dungeons.”

“We’ve studied the pictures you provided,” Finneas said, gesturing to one of his advisors, who tapped a screen and turned it to face them. “These shackles, or really, they’re almost bracelets, given the thinness and presumed weakness of the magic they wield, aren’t the type we typically see.”

“So, you don’t think they’re fae in origin?”