“Stop,” Benedict snapped as I finished putting my shirt on.
“Stop what?” I sank into one of the wingback chairs that faced the fireplace and laced up my boots.
“Stop telling yourself that you could have stopped it if you’d been here.” Damn, the guy could deliver a lecture from half a world away.
“Yeah, well, maybe I could have.” What the fuck were we doing? We’d been here for twenty-four hours, appeasing her parents and attending the ballet, while the Sons continued to wreak utter havoc on our home.
“You are pretty fucking talented in combat, my friend, but not even you can thwart plans we don’t see coming and a hundred Sons with night thistle bullets.”
“Fuck,” I muttered.
The door opened, and Olivia walked in, her smile faltering when she got a glimpse at my expression. “Ransom?”
“Benedict, I gotta let you go. Thanks for keeping me informed.”
“Be safe, brother.”
I hung up the phone as I stood, pushing the long sleeves of my black T-shirt up my forearms. “We need to wake the Hunters. Now.”
An hour later, we stood in a massive, cavernous chamber three stories under the Sorokin palace. Three equidistant tunnels led from the surface a hundred feet above, granting access to the chamber from two separate locations in the Sorokin palace and one that came from halfway across the island at the ballet theater.
It reminded me of the chamber where Conclave met, but without Genevieve snapping at Luka while Xavier ignored them both. Plus, there was no giant tomb in the middle of Conclave with six deadly vampires lying in stasis.
Menacing stone pillars rose to the floor above—thicker than I could reach around—forming two rings of support. The first was carved into the sides of the oblong space, and the second ring surrounded a gray, marble vault the size of my bedroom back at the estate.
I blinked from the foot of our staircase, taking in the updated lighting on the pillars and the security panels that rested beside two of the doors I could see on the vault. We’d passed two sets of security guards on our staircase alone, and there was another set patrolling the ring between the outer wall of the chamber and the vault.
“This is astounding,” I said quietly, but my voice echoed off the stone walls.
“What were you expecting? Torches and bats?” Olivia’s father asked, slapping me on the back as he trudged by with Olivia’s mom close behind.
“Well, kind of,” I admitted, walking slowly toward the vault.
“I love the new lights!” Olivia zipped up her vest.
“Want my jacket?” I offered, seeing her shiver.
“I’m okay, but thank you.” She smiled up at me.
“You two are so sweet you’re going to make me vomit,” Zasha muttered, pushing past Olivia and sticking her finger down her throat.
“Leave your sister alone,” their mother chided, clucking her tongue. “One day, you’ll find your mate and be just as nauseatingly happy.” She gifted Olivia with a proud smile. Somehow the woman managed to look regal in jeans and a parka, a trait that she no doubt managed to pass on to her daughter.
Olivia looked like a queen in everything she wore, from ballgowns to yoga pants. It was never what she had on but how she held herself. I just wished her mother could have celebrated all the ways Olivia truly kicked ass, instead of finding joy in our fake mating status. She was missing out on one hell of a woman.
“Where is—”
“I’m here!” Katya called as she rushed down the last few steps from the other household tunnel. She carried a camping cooler with one hand and waved a flashlight with the other.
“Katya, we’ve had electricity down here for the better part of fifty years,” her father teased, taking the cooler from her.
“Are we picnicking?” I whispered to Olivia, my lips grazing the shell of her ear.
She sucked in a breath but leaned into my body as her mother watched us. “Someone is going to eat, but it’s not us. Speaking of which, have you—”
“Nope.” Canned, synthetic blood always sat like shit in my stomach. I’d have to head to the mainland in a couple of days to feed.
She narrowed her beautiful eyes at me.
“I’m fine. If I bite you while we sleep, just smack me.” I shrugged and forced a grin. How the hell were we going to rebuild the Onyx Industries blood bank? It had taken us years to procure enough donor blood, and now it was all gone.
“Your grace,” the tallest guard greeted the duke by bowing his head. “There have been no disturbances this shift, nor in any prior since you last visited.”
“Thank you, Viktor,” the duke took Katya’s cooler. “Fresh?”
She arched a brow that looked like an uncanny replica of her mother’s. “Flew it in this evening.”
“Thank you, my little dove.” He turned to the rest of us, who were hovering between pillars, Olivia and I both gawking like tourists. “Well, my little loves, go ahead. Surround our finest warriors with your beauty.” He gestured to the vault.