The Minion backed off and put his cell phone up to his mouth. "She's clean. What would you like me to do with her, Master?"
Dragos's voice was menacing, edged with an intrigue that made her skin crawl. "Hold the female there. Await my further instructions."
"THE NUMBER of confirmed dead worldwide is in the thousands."
Lucan nodded as Mathias Rowan delivered the sober news that morning at his Darkhaven.
The Order had finally sought shelter there after the long night of combat. Not even Dragos's evil could trump the rising sun. With daybreak, all of the Breed - warrior, civilian, and Rogue alike - were forced to look for cover.
In the background, Tegan, Chase, and the rest of the warriors were flipping through television coverage of the attacks and their aftermath. It seemed impossible, not only the accounts of widespread slaughter and destruction over the past eighteen hours but the open talk by human law enforcement and government officials about the indisputable existence of vampires.
And mankind had, understandably, deemed them their enemies.
Savage.
Monstrous.
A deadly scourge that required a focused and swift extermination.
Lucan saw Mira's vision in the graphic video coverage and photographs being broadcast all over the world. He'd lived it last night, when his boots had been soggy with spilled blood, the bodies of dead humans and slain Rogues spread out as far as his eyes could see. He tasted it now, in the bitter tang of regret on his tongue, regret that he hadn't put a stop to Dragos before he'd unleashed such hell. Regret for the fact that the nightmare had only just begun.
Europe was bracing for nightfall again, calling in military forces to help secure the largest cities in case of another attack. Everyone was praying it wouldn't come, but Lucan and the rest of the Order knew it would. Although none of the warriors or Mathias Rowan had said as much, they had to be wondering, as he was, how they would be able to combat another attack of the magnitude seen yesterday.>As the great belch of noxious exhaust and steam cleared away, she found herself staring into the face of a monster.
The Rogue stood on the twilit curb, dressed in a tattered, bloodstained institutional jumpsuit.
He cocked his head as he stared at her, his face and neck slick with gore from a fresh kill.
Tavia's fangs throbbed at the scent of wet red cells, but the spike of adrenaline running through her had nothing to do with hunger. Fear needled her veins, racing up her spine.
Oh, God.
The carnage was about to happen here too.
With an animal sniffle and a low grunt, the Rogue stepped off the curb toward her. Tavia ducked out of his path and ran for the nearest alley. She looked back, making certain he followed.
The knot of dread that formed in her stomach when she saw him loping after her with fangs bared was as cold as ice and put a chill in her blood. She ran deeper into the alley, reaching for the weapon concealed in the back waistband of her jeans.
The Rogue's footsteps were heavy, crunching on the ice that crusted the old pavement.
Tavia slipped behind the corner wall of a brownstone and waited the few seconds before the lumbering bulk of the vampire appeared. Then she struck - silently and swiftly.
The blade stabbed into the Rogue's chest, stopping him dead in his tracks. He grunted something unintelligible, his hands coming up to the wound that was blossoming over his heart. Already the titanium was doing its business on the Rogue's bloodstream. Racing through the diseased veins and arteries like poison, just as Chase said it would.
It was thanks to that advice that Tavia had paid a visit to an area pawnshop earlier that day, spending half her remaining cash on the blade. So worth it, she thought, watching the Rogue drop to his knees as the metal made quick work of him.
Used titanium hunting knife: sixty-three dollars.
Value: priceless.
She didn't wait to watch the Rogue's body disintegrate into a heap of sizzling goo, then ash. Instead she cleaned the blade and stowed it, then ran for Chase's Darkhaven.
As she reached the front door of the empty brownstone estate, a soul-rending scream went up in another part of the neighborhood.
More Rogues on the prowl.
More human deaths taking place even now.
Night was coming, and the terror it was bringing had already arrived.