The one who had plotted Wrath’s demise not once, but twice.

To sit with Xcor in the very car Qhuinn bought for her out of his own good heart was a violation of all the relationships she valued most.

Except she was protecting those she loved, she reminded herself.

“Get in,” Xcor told her.

And she did.

Closing her door, Xcor walked around to the passenger side, and as he knocked on the window and she unlocked his door, she thought of the false human mythology of vampires, where what was supposedly undead had to be invited in before they could cross a threshold.

So far from reality.

Xcor’s soldier-size body took up all the room in the sedan as he sat down in a seat that was overly big for her, even as pregnant as she was. As she inhaled to steady herself, she hated the fact that she liked the way he smelled—but she did. In fact, he always took pains to be clean whenever they met, his skin smelling of a spiced cologne that she desperately wanted to find unattractive.

This was all so much more palatable if she stayed focused on the fact that she was being coerced into the contact, the proximity, this closeness.

Because to be here with him upon freedom of will . . .

God, why was she so in her head tonight—

“Drive on,” he said. “Please.”

“What?” Her heart began to pound. “Why—”

“It’s no longer safe here. We have to meet in another place.”

“Why?” The reality of how little she knew and trusted him made her realize exactly how isolated they were. “What’s changed?”

He looked over at her. “Please. For your safety. I shall never harm you—you must know that—and thus I say it is not safe for us here anymore.”

She held his eyes for a long moment. “Where shall we go?”

“I have secured another location. Head west. Please.”

When she didn’t move, he put his hand over hers and squeezed. “This is not safe.”

As he released his hold, his eyes never wavered from hers. And a moment later, she watched from a vast distance as she reached forward and hit the ignition button to start the engine. “All right.”

As she put the car in drive, a subtle binging noise started up. “Your seat belt,” she said. “You need to put it on.”

He complied without comment, stretching the belt far, far out to extend over his massive chest, and then clicking it home.

“How far?” she asked, as a renewed spike of fear made her heart speed up again.

“Ten miles.” Xcor put the window down a crack and breathed in as if trying to find a scent upon the air. “It’s a secure location.”

“Are you kidnapping me?”

He recoiled. “No. You are, as always, free to come and go.”

“Okay.”

She hoped he was telling the truth. Prayed he was. And didn’t that shine a bright light on this deadly game she was playing.

This had to stop, she thought. There was a war going on with the lessers. He was a traitor to her King.

She was getting to be very pregnant.

The problem was, she didn’t know how to disentangle the ropes that bound the two of them together.

Rhage was the last of the Brothers to materialize onto the lawn of an estate that was right out of a magazine for one percenters. As he looked up at the great looming house, he heard the narrator from the old Batman TV show: “Meanwhile, back at stately Wayne Manor . . .”

The Tudor-style mansion was set back on manicured lawns as if it were too good to fraternize with anything less than the White House, and lights were on in the interior, glowing with soft yellow luxury like maybe there were solid-gold shades on all those lamps. With quick efficiency, a butler could be seen crossing in front of a bank of diamond panes, his formal uniform something that Fritz would wear.

They probably had the same tailor.

“We ready for His Royal Highness?” V asked wryly.

There was a grumble of agreement among the five of them, and then Vishous disappeared into thin air. The plan was for him to join Butch in the cop’s brand-new Range Rover, which was parked about four miles to the east with the King bitching about all the security measures from the shotgun seat. The two of them were going to drive Wrath over here—giving the group a number of ways to get the male out if shit went tits-up.

Rhage hated that they were bringing him here to meet with Throe, but Wrath refused to send a representative, and what were they going to do? Tie him to a fucking chair so he didn’t come on his own?

“FYI.” Rhage unsheathed one of his black daggers. “I give no guarantees I won’t fillet this motherfucker.”

“I’ll hold him down for you,” somebody tossed back.

A cold wind blew in from the north, scattering fallen leaves across his shitkickers, and Rhage looked over his shoulder. Nothing was moving over on the left. There was nobody in the bushes. No bad scents were on the air.

But he felt cagey as hell.

Well, duh. Anything that had to do with the Band of Bastards was hardly a night home on the sofa pretending he wasn’t in fact watching Scandal.

Or RHONJ, if Lassiter had the frickin’ remote.

Ten minutes later, the Range Rover rounded the corner of the drive and came over the rise, its headlights flashing across the face of the house as well as the bunch of them.

Butch piloted around the circle in front of the mansion so that the SUV was facing the escape route, and then Wrath cranked his own door and emerged from the passenger seat. In his shitkickers, the male towered over the roof of the vehicle, and unlike the rest of them, he didn’t have any coat or jacket on.

Just a black button-down. Under which was the mandatory Kevlar vest.

At least they had that.

Thank you, Beth.

Rhage fell into formation with the others and they shielded Wrath with their bodies as they moved forward. The instant they came to the front door, Abalone opened things up as if he had been staring out the windows to the lawn and waiting for their approach.

“My lord. The Brotherhood. Welcome to my home.”

As the First Adviser bowed deeply, Rhage had to approve of the guy. Applebottom, as they called him, was one of the few aristocrats Rhage had ever tripped over who not only had half a brain, but a full heart, under the dandy act.

“If you all will proceed this way?” the guy said, indicating with his hand.

Part of the prearrangement for this was that the meeting would be in the library and one of the windows would be cracked in case Wrath had to ghost out. Throe, who would be waiting in a separate parlor, would be brought in by a Brother, and escorted out by one.

And there were a couple of other provisos.

Once inside the book-lined room, Rhage pulled a quick, but thorough, inspection of the joint, and said, “Let me go get the asshole.”

“You sure?” V asked.

“I won’t eat him. Yet.”

He cut off any conversation by heading back out to where Abalone was hovering in the foyer, looking like he was stuck in an internal debate over whether to throw up on his shoes or try to make it to a bathroom before he ralphed.

“So where’s your cousin?” Rhage shot the guy a reassuring smile. As if he were just gonna bubble-wrap the bastard and nothing more. “Over there?”

Abalone nodded toward the closed door across the way. “Yes. He is in the male’s parlor.”

Rhage put a hand on the First Adviser’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, Applebottom. This is gonna be a piece of cake.”

You had to feel for the poor SOB as he exhaled in relief. “Yes, my lord. Thank you.”

After another flash of the A-okays, Rhage slipped through the parlor door and closed things up behind himself.

Throe was standing across a paneled room, looking like the distinguished male he once was back in the Old Country—in spite of the fact that his clothes were common.

“Rhage?” the male said, coming forward.