Then I smiled. I remembered something my dad told my brother and me. Something only royalty would know. I pushed the buttons and it clicked—Costin’s birthday. His real birthday. When he was human.
The safe swung open.
TheLapis Umbraeshard sat on a velvet cushion inside a crystal cloche, no bigger than my thumb — dark as obsidian, veined with threads of deep violet light that pulsed like aheartbeat. The glow cast strange shadows on the walls of the safe, and the air around it hummed with a low, almost inaudible vibration that I felt more than heard.
My chest loosened for the first time all night. This was it. My mother's life, sitting on a velvet pillow.
“Rocco, no.” She grabbed my arm.
I broke free. “I’m taking it. There’s nothing you can do about it.”
“Yes, there is.” She ran toward the door. “I’m going to tell Costin. I won’t let you die.”
I beat her to the door before she could open it and placed my palm flat against it. “No, you’re not.”
“Rocco, let me pass.”
I wrapped my arm around her waist and pulled her against me. My fangs extended, and I bit her on the neck, sucking hard.
“Rocco, stop.” She pounded on my chest, trying to break free.
Her blood was intoxicating—hot and sweet, staining my lips and chin—and something ancient and primal roared to life between us. Electric. Overwhelming. Too much. Too fast. Her struggles weakened as the taste of her consumed me.
God, I really was a bastard.
I looked down at Selena in my arms. Her head lolled against my chest, her dark hair spilling across my sleeve. Blood—her blood—smeared across her neck in two thin lines, already starting to slow. Her face was pale, her lips parted, her breathing shallow. She looked fragile. Breakable. Nothing like the fierce woman who’d been pounding against my chest seconds ago.
What the fuck had I just done?
I had only one choice.
I fucking called Angelo.
He answered on the first ring, like he’d been waiting. “Did you get it?”
“Yes.” I could still taste her blood on my lips. “But we have a problem.”
Pause.
“What kind of problem?”
“Selena caught me, and she’s threatening to tell Costin.”
Silence stretched across the line. Then, in that voice that made even the fiercest vampire quiver: “That’s unfortunate.”
That’s unfortunate. Like she was a broken vase. Like she was an inconvenience to be swept away. My grip tightened on the phone until I heard the case crack.
“I’m not going to kill her, Angelo. Don’t even ask.”
“I wasn’t going to.” His tone was almost amused. “Dead bodies raise questions. But you’re going to have to take her with you.”
Take her with me. Drag her deeper into this nightmare—the woman I’d already bitten, betrayed, and used as a pawn. Every step I took made it worse for her.
But leaving her here meant Costin would find her in Julienne’s office with an empty safe and blood on her neck. She’d take the fall. And Costin wasn’t known for his mercy.
“Where?”
“My houseboat. TheSangue Reale. It’s docked in the bayou. Dimitri can’t drive you there—someone might see you.”
