Total pages in book: 182
Estimated words: 165649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 828(@200wpm)___ 663(@250wpm)___ 552(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 165649 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 828(@200wpm)___ 663(@250wpm)___ 552(@300wpm)
“Is there a second choice?” Isai asked.
Elisabeta looked at Ferro. For the first time, he silently willed her not to answer. If she couldn’t do it on her own, as she normally couldn’t, then maybe he would have every reason to justify keeping her safe—but he knew better. He knew he wouldn’t.
For finding the army of vampires and directing our hunters to them, it has to be the roof. There are so many of them, and so many different directions you need me to find them in. From there, I can find the master vampires as well. Elisabeta gave her answer to Ferro alone. There are safer places, but those places will limit me. I do not wish you to be so uneasy, beloved. I will do whatever is your preference.
Her courage astounded him, as did her audacity. Sun scorch the woman; she was manipulating him and it was working. He couldn’t very well be a coward when she was a shining example of female daring.
“I will take Elisabeta to the roof. Lorraine and Julija do not need to be with her there. In fact, they might be of more use in the club.”
Lorraine rolled her eyes. “You are not in the least good at telling lies, Ferro.”
“I said might,” he pointed out.
He took his lifemate in his arms. She could fly. She might even want to fly, but he needed to hold her as he took her out of the cavern and into the night air. His brethren could deal with their lifemates, decide one way or the other what they were going to do, but right now, he was going to let himself just feel the soothing comfort of his woman’s gift.
Elisabeta surrounded him with her serenity, heightening the night’s deceptive illusion of peace with her familiar and haunting fragrance, the one that now stayed with him even when he was away from her. Above them the moon had begun to slip into its next phase. Clouds drifted lazily across the deep midnight-blue-colored sky so that a slightly wider sliver of a silver curve peered down at them. A sea of stars, each trying to outshine the next, surrounded the moon as the gray clouds floated almost languidly. The clouds were deceptive; already the predicted storm was moving toward them.
Her breath caught in her throat and she pressed her face into his shoulder. The vampire servants are spread out, Ferro, moving through the city, all heading this way.
Numbers? At once he was all business, a full Carpathian hunter, setting his lifemate on the rooftop, his two brethren joining him with their women.
They began to weave their safeguards over the top of the building, an intricate web with Julija adding in her strand of magic and binding it tight every few strands over and over as they shared information with the others as quickly as possible. They couldn’t leave Josef waiting too long or Sergey would become suspicious.
Each of the master vampires has ten servant vampires. That is all they can seem to sustain at any one time without things beginning to go very wrong. There are seven master vampires somewhere close, so you are looking at seventy of them coming to you. Do not forget those unfortunate newly made vampires. They will be the most aggressive, the bloodiest and the first they will send in.
Where are the ones looking to acquire Josef? Are they servants? Do you know who they are? Ferro asked.
He was already on the move, taking one side of the building while Isai, Andor and Julija each took a different side, all four continuing to weave the safeguards as they hurried to the underground cavern. Once there, Julija broke off and returned to the rooftop, slipping through the magic loop she’d left for herself and then pulling it tight behind her to enclose herself inside.
Edward Varga waits at the exit with two of Cornel’s highest-ranking servants. Varga knows if he shirks his duty in any way, he will be punished in a hideous way. Cornel has stressed to all of them that Josef cannot be harmed. He is to be alive and in good condition.
Ferro was grateful that Cornel had no idea that Elisabeta could tap into Sergey’s mind. Everything was shared with Sergey. Leaving him alive was difficult but necessary. Elisabeta could feel where the others were, but she would know exactly what was being said or what orders had been given as long as Sergey lived.
Josef, let her take you to the table. Move slowly. Stop and start. Keep talking to others around you. We are going to move on their army as they head toward the nightclub and begin to take them out one by one, coming up on the ones in the rear, Tariq ordered. Dragomir, you take your men and start the hunt to the west.