"Of course I know. Dmitri's the most senior vampire in the area and I report directly to him unless my master wants a face-to-face." His voice turned bitter. "I've been having quite a lot of chats with Andreas since you ended my hope of escape."
"Damn it, Harry, you signed a contract. In blood!"
"I wouldn't expect you to understand family loyalty," he said, slicing right through her heart. "But I suspect your life is important to you."
"I called to warn you," she gritted out, refusing to let her twerp of a brother-in-law hurt her. "You might be a vampire, but Beth is mortal."
"Not for long. We've petitioned for her to be Made."
Elena's soul went ice-cold. "You are not dragging her into that world. Does she have any idea of what she's signing on for or did you tell her it was all roses and fairy tales?"
"Oh, believe me, Elieanora, we know it's not perfection but it is immortality. And not that you'd have any comprehension of the concept, but I love Beth-I don't want to spend eternity without her."
That halted Elena, because, all his faults aside, Harrison Ling did actually seem to love his wife. "Look, Harry, we can fight about this later-hide from Dmitri until this blows over."
"Why should I hide?"
"He'll try to get my location out of you."
"He already asked and I told him I didn't have a clue," Harry replied. "Since he appears to know precisely how close you are to your family, he believed me."
"Just like that." Elena frowned. "No strong-arm tactics?"
"Of course not. We're civilized beings."
Elena's mind rebutted that with a memory of Dmitri's smile as his neck spurted blood. "Fine," she muttered. "As long as you're safe."
"Where are you?"
Every one of her instincts screamed in warning. "You don't need to know."
"Turn yourself in," he urged. "That's what I meant about your life-if you give yourself up, Dmitri might be swayed toward leniency. It'd also make our life easier if I brought you to him. Beth agrees with me."
That was all she was to him and Beth, Elena thought, refusing to consider the crushing hurt in her chest-a convenient way to curry favor. "Since when did you become Dmitri's pimp, Harry?"
The sharp hiss of an indrawn breath. "Fine, get yourself killed. Did I mention that Dmitri's looking for you on behalf of his sire?"
"What?"
"Word is that Raphael's gone cold."
Elena didn't know what that meant, but Harry's tone made it clear it wasn't anything good. "Thanks for the warning."
"It's more than you gave me."
Vivek began to bring his chair around.
"Gotta go." She hung up in the nick of time.
Exiting the blackout booth, Vivek headed immediately to his computers. She expected an explosion when he detected the unauthorized call, but he just sighed and shook his head before turning his chair to face her. "Why do you even bother, Ellie?"
That shook her, far more than anything else he could've done. Her legs folded and she collapsed into a chair. "They're family."
"They rejected you because you didn't fit the mold." His mouth twisted. "Believe me, I know all about that."
"I know, Vivek." His family had institutionalized him after the accident. "But I can't leave Beth vulnerable when there's a chance I can protect her."
"You know she'd hang you out to dry if it ever came to it?" His tone was as bitter as darkest coffee. "She's married to a vampire-he comes first."
Elena couldn't disagree, not with Harrison's words still ringing in her ears. Her family wanted to turn her in to a high-level vampire. Forget about what that vampire-and more importantly, his sire-might do to her. "That's who they are," she whispered, "but that's not who I am."
"Why not?" Vivek shifted his chair back around to face the computer. "Why bother? It's not like they'll ever love you."
Elena had no answer to that, so she left. But the words burrowed into her skull, and dug in. Painful. Clawing.
"Hey, Ellie!"
She jerked up her head to see another hunter lounging in the doorway to one of the sleep rooms. Tall, slender, with long, straight black hair and snapping brown eyes, Ashwini was one hell of a tracker. She was also all kinds of crazy. Which was why Elena liked her. "Hey, yourself," she said, glad for the chance to get her mind off things, if only for a few minutes. "I thought you were in Europe."
"Was. Got back a couple of days ago."
"You were already in the country when you called Sara?" God, had that been only yesterday?
Ashwini nodded. "Hunt took an unexpected turn."
"Yeah?" she said, forcing her thoughts back to the here and now.
"Damn Cajun."
"Uh-oh."
"I finally get within a block of him and all of a sudden, he's come to an 'understanding' with the angel who put out the track." Her eyes narrowed. "One of these days, I'm going to turn him into gator-bait."
Elena grinned. "Then where would the rest of us get our entertainment?"
"Fuck you." Said with a grin before she yawned, lifted up her arms, and stretched, sinuous as a cat. "I like sleeping down here."
"What, you like the ambience?" She rolled her eyes. "How was Europe anyway?"
"Sucked. I was in Uram's territory."
Elena's nape pricked. This wasn't coincidence-Ash was a little bit spooky in her prescience. "How's the situation there?"
The other hunter shrugged, the movement lithe and unconsciously graceful. According to the Guild rumor mill, she'd been a trained dancer with a prestigious company before deciding to take up hunting. Ransom had once asked her to perform. It had taken two weeks for his black eyes to fade.
"Uram's fallen off the grid," she now said. "The locals are scared of their own shadows-they think he's spying on them."
Elena caught the glint in the other hunter's eye. "But you don't think so?"
"Something's hinky. No one's seen his assistant, Robert Syles, for a while either. And Bobby likes the TV cameras." Ashwini shrugged. "My guess is that they're doing some hunting of their own. Maybe angels. We'll hear about it soon enough." Another yawn.
"You'd better get back to sleep."
"Nah, I'm all recharged now. But I do have to shower-got to head out again in an hour." She turned. "Oh, hey, El, one other thing I picked up-seems like they found more than a few decapitated bodies around the time Uram went AWOL. It looks like the poor buggers were his servants. Must've been some temper tantrum. Lucky we don't have to hunt these bastards."