“Let me check one other thing…” Baylin trailed off, his eyes glued to the screen as his fingers danced over the keyboard with supernatural speed. “There!” he exclaimed triumphantly.
Saiden leaned forward. “Did you hack into the Ruling Coalition’s database?” He didn’t know much about computers, but he’d seen screenshots before and was confident that he was looking at the Coalition’s internal dossier on Bianca.
“Nah,” Baylin dismissed, scrolling through the document and sipping his Celsius energy drink. “After the third time I broke their firewall, they just gave me access. Said it was easier than trying to find a programmer skilled enough to keep me out. We have an arrangement. I don’t use the database for anything nefarious, and so long as I do the occasional tech job for them here and there, they let me keep my head. It’s all good.”
“Right,” Saiden grunted, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’ll ignore the fact you’ve been hiding that from me if you can tell me where to find her.”
Baylin chuckled and continued scanning the document. “She’s been on their radar for over a hundred years, it looks like. Originally born in 1878 in Stockholm, she was sired by somebody named Gunther Larsson in 1897. Looks like he wasn’t her mate, so the reasoning for her turn is unknown. After that, she was a perfect vampire until she lost it in 1905 and murdered her sire. She’s been tied to seven different minor rogue outbreaks throughout Europe, but they’ve never been able to catch her. It’s her siren gift, apparently. Most enforcers end up dead or incapacitated, and she escapes to do it all again.”
Saiden pushed himself out of the chair and paced anxiously around the room, waiting for his brother to tell him something helpful. Bianca murdered Cora. He didn’t care what her life story was. Didn’t care what drove her over the edge. He just wanted to make her pay.
“There’s some sort of flag on her file,” Baylin continued. “It’s not labeled, though. I can dig a little deeper, but your pacing isn’t exactly helping my concentration."
“So have another energy drink,” Saiden growled, but halted his attempts to wear a hole in his brother's floor. He grabbed the back of Baylin’s chair and leaned in to take a look at the file, his nails slicing into the leather upholstery with little pops while his eyes passed over Bianca’s grainy picture.
Baylin tapped at a small marker on the screen. “Found it. That red flag indicates she is NCM. Non Compos Mentis. It means the Coalition believes her to be insane more or less. Completely unpredictable. No enforcer is allowed to go after her alone.” Baylin cast Saiden a dubious look. “That means you too, bro. No cowboy shit. I know what she did but—”
“You have no idea just how much damage she did,” Saiden snarled, pushing back from the desk. “Knowing I’ve lost my mate is tearing me up inside. I feel like the other half of my soul has been ripped out.”
“You don’t know that you’ve lost her,” Baylin offered. “She might be okay with it.”
Sure, Saiden thought,and maybe you’ll take up drinking tea.
“Does it say where she was last spotted?”
Baylin scanned the screen. “Looks like she was seen entering the U.S. from Canada about a decade ago but nothing since. She’s an expert at avoiding detection. I can run the photo through a wider database of traffic cameras, but it will take a while.”
Saiden spun around and started toward the door. “I’m not waiting for her to get away. I doubt she went far, and I’m going to find her.”
“How, Saiden?” Baylin called after him. “You going to knock on every door between here and the East Coast?”
“If I have to,” he replied, halting long enough to grab a blood bag. “But I’m starting with Donna. My mate is in there hooked up to an IV because she nearly bled to death, and any minute she’s going to wake up to a terrifying new life. I don’t care how long Donna worked for us. I don’t care how much everyone loved her. If I need to break every bone in her frail human body to get the answers I want, then I will.”
“She’s human, remember? You can always try compelling the answers from her,” Baylin pointed out, his words stopping Saiden at the door.
Rotating slowly to face his brother, Saiden’s lip curled up into a snarl. “She doesn’t deserve the easy way out.”
The amount of concern Baylin showed should have made Saiden pause to consider if he was going too far, but he already knew he’d gone off the rails. Now it was time to get back on track.
“I’m going to swing by Cora’s room to check on her, then I’ll be inthe dungeons if you find anything else.”
Saiden spun on his heels and sped away before his brother could try to dump more useless logic on him. Baylin hadn’t tangled with Bianca, so he didn’t know just how accurate the NCM flag was. It also meant she wouldn’t leave her toys behind. She wanted to keep playing with Saiden, wanted to keep breaking him, so she had to be nearby. Somewhere.
He was halfway down the main hall when a strong hand clamping on his shoulder halted his movement, and his momentum nearly forced his feet out from under him. Regaining his footing, he turned to see Marquin standing behind him with a dark expression.
Lilith save me, what now?
Saiden didn’t think he could handle any more tragedies. He was about to tear his skin off if he didn’t get back to Cora for at least a little while.
“We have a problem,” Marquin stated grimly.
Of course they did. When it rains it pours. Except in his case it felt like acid.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, scratching at his arm. The prickles under his skin were getting worse. A sire wasn’t meant to be away from their changing progeny for this long.
“The Coalition knows.”
Saiden’s entire body locked up at the three words nobody ever wanted to hear. “Knows what exactly?”
