Jon shook his head. He didn’t think he was wrong. He’d lived with his kid sister long enough to recognize the signs.

She obviously knew something about somebody now…only who? And why wasn’t she saying?

“Is it Mom and Dad?” he asked. “I thought you said they were fine. I mean, relatively speaking.”

“They are fine.” Meena glared at him. “For two people who continue to whoop it up at happy hour every night down in Boca like they think they’re F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.”

“Then I don’t get it,” Jon said. “Your crazy-ass millionaire neighbor who thinks she’s a countess invited you to a dinner party at her place to meet a real Romanian prince on Thursday night. And you’re telling me you don’t think you’re going to get any story ideas out of that? Are you serious?”

Meena looked at him, her big dark eyes luminous in the light from the sun setting just outside her windows, turning the sky from rosy pink to a delicate lavender. Finally she smiled.

“You’re right,” she said. “How could I miss such a fantastic opportunity, so rich with the promise of pretentious buffoonery for me to mock later on Insatiable? I have a professional duty to be there.”

“Absolutely,” Jon said.

“I’ll RSVP yes to the countess,” Meena said.

“Way to go.” Jon reached out to ruffle her short, boyishly cut dark hair. “I’ll go order us some samosas.”

Meena grinned and turned up the volume on the news, which was all about how they still hadn’t been able to identify any of the victims of what they were now calling the Park Strangler. They were urging any members of the public who might recognize the women to come forward.

“After all,” Meena said thoughtfully, clearly not paying attention to the information the grim-faced anchorwoman was doling out, “Victoria Worthington Stone’s dated plenty of doctors, lawyers, millionaires, shipping magnates, gangsters, murderers, maniacs, cops, cowboys, priests, and once even her own half brother-until she found out who he really was. It’s about time she dated a prince.”

“That’s the spirit,” Jon said, and started dialing.

Chapter Twelve

6:30 P.M. EST, Tuesday, April 13

West Fourth Street

Chattanooga, TN

Alaric Wulf wasn’t surprised to find that Sarah, like most women-and men-in love with a vampire, was initially resistant to the idea of giving up the address of her lover.

“Just tell me where he is, and I’ll let you live.”

Sarah had hedged for a while. Like most victims, she didn’t care anymore about her own life. Her brain was too nutrient deprived. She cared only about protecting her sire.

Until Alaric finally put his sword to her throat.

The Palatine Guard was listed in most encyclopedias and search engines as a now-defunct military unit of the Vatican, formed to defend Rome against attack from foreign invaders.

This was partly true: the Palatine Guard was a military unit of the Vatican.

But it was hardly defunct. And the invaders it had been formed to defend against weren’t foreign.

They were demon.

And the Guards weren’t defending just Rome from them, but the entire world.

Members of the Guard had different methods for getting victims of these demons, who were often besotted by their attackers, to talk. Abraham Holtzman-currently the Guard’s most senior officer, who’d trained both Alaric and Martin-had always preferred deception. He’d flash a fake card from a fancy (fictitious) legal firm, explaining that he’d been hired by the vampire’s estranged family to deliver a large inheritance check.

Often the victim was so flustered by delighted surprise that she didn’t notice Holtzman had never even mentioned the vamp’s name.

That was because he didn’t know it.

But that was Holtzman. Alaric had always suspected that Holtzman could get away with this because he was so scholarly looking. His Jewish parents had been appalled when he’d gone to work for the Vatican, though Holtzman hadn’t converted. (Conversion was not a job requirement. It was difficult enough to find anyone able to keep his head while swinging a sword at a screaming succubus, let alone someone who was also a devoted Catholic. Palatine Guard members were of a wide mix of religions…even, like Alaric, complete nonbelievers.)

It helped Holtzman’s ruse, Alaric supposed, that he looked like a lawyer.

Still, there was nothing wrong with looking like a muscle-bound demon-hunter…especially if that was what one was. Alaric didn’t have degrees in anything, except chopping the heads off vampires and returning their victims to full humanity once more.

So Alaric didn’t waste time on ruses the way Holtzman did. Especially not when it came to Sarah. He got straight to the point…by applying Señor Sticky to her throat.

When she finally stammered, “Felix…Felix lives in a loft over an antiques store on West Fourth…but please…,” he grabbed her by the back of the neck and stuffed her into the passenger seat of his rental car. He didn’t need her texting her undead lover any warnings so Felix could call his vamp friends and set up a trap.

It wasn’t the most uplifting drive over to Felix’s place. Especially because Sarah sobbed most of the way and whispered, “Please, please…don’t hurt him. You don’t understand…he doesn’t want to be the way he is. He hates what he is. He hates that he has to…hurt me.”

“Yes?” Alaric glanced at her. He’d turned the car radio to the heavy metal station. He didn’t particularly like heavy metal, but he needed something loud enough to drown out the sound of her sniffling. “So why do you let him do it, then?”

“Because,” Sarah said, sniffling, “he’ll die if I don’t.”

“You’re wrong about that,” Alaric said. “He can’t die unless someone stabs him with a wooden stake through the heart or cuts off his head. Or, alternatively, if someone shoves him into some direct sunlight or completely immerses his body in holy water. But then,” he added, throwing a glance her way, “you must know all this.”

“None of that’s true,” Sarah said. “He told me all those things were myths. Also about how vampires can live on animal blood. He said if they do that, they’ll die. That’s why he has to drink my blood. To stay alive.”

Alaric rolled his eyes. “Do you realize girls like you have been falling for that one for centuries? Vamps just don’t like animal blood. It weakens them. And they don’t look as nice after they’ve been drinking it for a while. And if they’re anything, vamps are vain. Human blood’s like filet mignon to them. So if he told you he’ll die if you don’t let him drink your blood, he’s a damned liar, in addition to being a putrid stinking woman-abusing soulless abomination.”

Sarah seemed to find his language objectionable, since this statement only made her weep harder.

Alaric felt a little bad about this. Holtzman was always telling him that he needed to work on his people skills more.

Accordingly, Alaric passed her a tissue from the little packet the rental car agency had left in the car.

“You’re mean,” Sarah said, blowing her nose into the tissue. “Felix isn’t a soulless abomination. He’s sensitive. He has feelings. He reads me poetry. Shakespeare.”

Alaric wanted to pull the car over so he could throw up, but they didn’t have time. The sooner they got this over with, the sooner he could go back to the hotel; order some room service; have a nice, relaxing bath (in the world’s tiniest tub, which had those grainy strips attached to the bottom, so guests wouldn’t slip in the shower-this was Alaric’s number one pet peeve about less-than-five-star hotels; he was a grown man, he knew how to stand without falling in the tub); and go to bed.

Then, tomorrow morning, he’d fly to New York, check into the Peninsula, find the prince, and kill him.