Kyra smiled again, but she felt hollow inside. If she’d made better choices, then she could have possibly had this brave female as a sister-in-law. She could have gotten to know her and had a friend as well. But now that would never be possible.
She wanted to ask about Derek as well, but she didn’t dare. Instead, she waited, hoping for some good news.
Everleigh must have sensed her hopefulness.
She frowned. “I’m sorry. He’s not awake yet. But I do have this.” Everleigh handed her a folded piece of paper. “This is a note from Roman saying that you’ll be allowed a one-time entrance to the cave where the vampires are being held. Either Tristan or Jameson will be out here to go with you.”
Of course, she wouldn’t be allowed to know the location. That made sense.
“Thank you.” She wished she could hug the other female, but she wasn’t going to force herself on Everleigh, who had been so forgiving of her.
Once again, Everleigh seemed to sense this and she leaned forward. “Come here.” She wrapped her arms around Kyra. “My human friends hugged me all the time when I was a brand-new single mom out in Juneau. It helped me enormously.”
“Thank you,” Kyra whispered. That seemed to be the only thing she could say. She bit down on her lip and squeezed her eyes shut to keep the tears at bay.
She sucked in a breath and pulled away. She’d survived her parents’ being murdered in front of her. She’d survived over a decade with soulless monsters who were only using her. She could survive the next few days as well. She put her hands on Everleigh’s shoulders. “Your kindness means the world to me. I will never forget it.”
* * *
Tristan endedup being the one to escort her to the cave. He didn’t seem inclined to make small talk, and she didn’t push him. He drove her in a car, and then they got out and hiked through several miles of forest until they arrived at a cave near the ocean.
She’d expected anger, but Victor was as composed as always.
They were being held in a cave that had been reinforced with magical wards created by witches. Kyra had never met a witch, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to, if they could create something that could hold a vampire prisoner.
The cave was dark and cold, but that didn’t matter to a vampire.
All twenty members of the coven appeared to be in custody. She had no idea how they’d been able to capture them all. Maybe the witches had been involved in that as well. She wanted to ask Tristan, but she didn’t think he’d tell her the truth, even if he knew.
“You can have thirty minutes,” Tristan said. He looked at Kyra. “Do not touch the bars.”
Victor was behind a set of bars that were shimmering in the dim light.
“Hello, dear,” he said.
Don’t call me that. I was only a tool for you. But she knew better than to react. “I have a few questions.”
“I assumed that you would.” His eyes glinted in the gloomy cave.
Why the hell was he so chipper? Did he think he’d be able to escape? She would have to warn Roman or Everleigh that he was being smug. Or maybe he was just trying to save face. He was too vain and self-important to ever let on that he might have failed.
But he had failed. She had to believe that. If he escaped…
Focus.
“You planned everything, right? You killed my parents. You planned for me to be orphaned. You planned to be my guardian, and you planned to brainwash me.”
“Well.” He grinned quickly. “Some things were planned. But it was pure luck that you accepted us so easily. We had tried before, with other shifter children. And every single one of them ran away from us. Every one!”
Her brain short-circuited. She wasn’t the first? They’d had shifter children before her? No one ever mentioned them. There were no photographs, no records… but that was easy when you had no emotions, and you had the money to move from mansion to mansion. What would it have been like to have a pseudo-sibling? Another shifter raised alongside her? She doubted they’d have allowed it – she’d have been harder to control then.
“I wasn’t the first,” she said.
Victor curled his lip into a snarl. “Of course not. You were the seventh try. Most of the pups only lived with us for a few weeks. One only lasted a day. The fifth one, a little boy pup in Maine, lasted four months.”
“You didn’t kill them?”
“Oh no. We weren’t ready to give up so easily. Each and every one escaped.”