But Kylie Moon doesn’t belong to the elites; she belongs to my elder brother, Rook. They’re fated. Written in the fucking stars. Which means right now he’s holed up somewhere safe with her, probably basking in the glow of what happens when destiny finally stops dragging its feet and gets naked.
Lucky bastard.
Meanwhile, Cal and I are standing in the middle of a ballroom full of elite vampires who would happily rip our heads off if they knew who we were.
Rook doesn’t know we’reherehere, though, and he wouldn’t like it if he did. He thinks we’re running surveillance from asafedistance. He doesn’t have a clue we walked straight into the viper’s den.
I adjust my mask and give my best impression of an apatheticGQmodel in a tuxedo.
Across the ballroom, my brother Cal stands like a marble statue, pretending not to hear every heartbeat in the room. He’s the youngest of us three Slater brothers, and I swear, his hearing is supernatural even by vampire standards. Most vampires can hear things humans can’t, but Cal could hear a squirrel fart three counties over if he focused hard enough.
“Tell me again why I didn’t draw the straw for the brother who gets to stay with the girl?” I tease, murmuring so quietly, I’m basically just moving my lips.
Cal glances up, meeting my eyes, and the look on his face says,Stop being such an annoying fuck right now.
This is what I’m talking about. The Avengers would kill for hearing like his.
Chastised, I fade into the background as much as I can, and it’s clear by the way Cal is basically standing between two lush potted plants across the ballroom, he’s doing the same.
This event is being held in the kind of decadent mansion most people only see in movies, and it’s located in one of the most opulent areas in Boston. Lit chandeliers are hanging from the extraordinarily tall ceilings, marble covering every square foot of floor, and a string quartet of men in tuxedos plays classical music in a ballroom that sits past the opulent staircase that’s showcased near the entrance.
People are dressed to impress. The men are all wearing sleek suits or tuxedos, and the women are in formal gowns. Masks cover the men’s faces, but the women’s are on full display.
Predator and unknowing prey is clearly the vibe here.
Pretentious, evil fucks.
The entire scene bleeds arrogance that only comes with generational money and a complete lack of fear. Every man in this room holds power, and clearly, believes he’s untouchable. But that’s because the world has always bent the knee for every single bastard standing in this room.
Even if most humans don’t know that vampires exist, the vampire elite have always been something to fear.
Though, I can’t deny the masks are tasteful. They don’t showcase feathers or sequins or gawdy bullshit. They’re just sleek black lacquer over bone-white and shaped to each male face with perfection. Cal and I managed to snag two off a table when we snuck in through a back-door entrance, blending in despite the fact that we’d never have been invited, even if we hadn’t killed some of their friends.
My brothers and I are not elite vampires by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, the elite believe we’re beneath them, lower-class scum under their shiny shoes. Blue-collar-ant-worker bitches who do all the dirty work that keeps society moving.
To them, I’m a scrub. A lowly twenty-seven-year-old vampire who works a blue-collar job as a repo man. They see my brothers—Rook is a garbage man, and Cal is a mechanic and does demolition work—as the same.
Frankly, it’s a tale as old as time. Our genetics might be otherworldly like theirs, but our lineage doesn’t stem from the “right” bloodlines.
I read the room. An outsider to this situation—someone who isn’t aware of vampire elites and how they secretly rule and hold power in a human world—wouldn’t know the truth about why this event is happening. They’d probably think it’s a fancy masquerade ball for billionaires or some shit, but they’d be missing a huge piece of the depraved puzzle.
Because while the bottomless pit of behaviors of men seeking power is the same for vampires as it is for humans, my kind takes it to another level. Women are merchandise to be bought, sold, andused. And the human corporations involved are just another pawn.
In my periphery, I see Holland Thorne drift toward the staircase. He’s in a black tuxedo with a mask like mine, and his posture is smooth and confident. He’s not one of the elites—he’s a gofer for them, a fucking errand man—but he moves like someone who desperately wants to be part of their club.
He’s the one Cal and I followed here. We’ve known him for years, mostly from playing hockey against each other in a rec league in Concordia, and he’s been a real piece of shit the whole time. But it’s only lately that he upped his dickheadedness exponentially.
Kylie Moon was his assignment—a human woman with the highly covetedblood of the three—and my brother Rook’s fated mate. Holland was supposed to lure her into this world without her even knowing what she signed up for, subsequently stealing her right out from under a Slater brother’s nose and leaving us to deal with Rook’s broken ass.
If it weren’t for our extreme measures, she’d be here tonight. Holland Thorne would no doubt be parading her around theroom so the elites could decide how much she’s worth. But instead, she’s with Rook in an undisclosed location in Worcester.
My brother knew Kylie was his the instant he turned the magic number twenty-eight—an important year in all male vampires’ lives. It’s the year the aging process slows down to about a fifth of a normal human. But more importantly, it’s the year you lock in on your beloved and are capable of feelingthe bond. It’s when destiny helps you findher.
But the elites’ bullshit games have destroyed most fated mate bonds from ever occurring. They’ve spent the last century using their mighty influence to keep all the human women with theblood of the threeto themselves—because it gives them all the power and control—and sending the rest of the balance all out of whack.
It used to bethe blood of four, but one bloodline has already perished because of what the elites do.
Holland Thorne stinks up the room with his fake smiles and try-hard laughs as I look on from the shadows, and my impatience rears its ugly head. I swear, he’s such a slimy fucking prick. I reach my hand into the pocket of my dress slacks and grip the handle of my knife.
