“You can come. The vampire king will protect you,” was all I said.
Ruby looked to her companion and he nodded.
“Very well. Be ready for us in a few days. I’ll call you on the same number to coordinate everything.” She smoothed her braid and looked out at the tree line.
“What?” I asked her. A somber mood had fallen over our little group, but I sensed she had more to say.
“I was never into the religious aspect of being a hunter, which is why I chose House of Thorn, but … I bought Maz’s sales pitch that the vampires were evil murdering rapists with no self-control. I’ve killed so many…” Her eyes grew distant; the guilt was eating at her as it did to me.
“We all believed it, and no doubt some deserved it. We just have to move forward now with what we do know.” I grasped her hand. She nodded, rapidly blinking away tears.
“Thank you, Aspen. I wasn’t sure where to go from here, but I think together we can change things. Forever.” She reached over and gave me a hug.
I wrapped my arms around her and squeezed, pulling back to look her in the eyes. “When it’s time to take Maz down, I want to be the one,” I told her through clenched teeth.
Surprise mixed with pride shone on her face, and she nodded once.
I wanted Maz to look down the barrel of a shotgun while I pulled the trigger and then took her head off with razor wire.
“I’ll call you.” Ruby stood and gave us both a subtle nod before leaving. Liv and I sat there for a long while just watching the people meander in and out of the rose garden.
“Tons more breeder enclaves,” Liv said somberly.
I nodded. “I can’t even imagine…”
“We have to stop them all,” she declared. “For my mom. For yours. For all of the women.”
I inclined my head, reaching out to squeeze her hand. “We will. We totally will.”
Liv looked over at me. “Do you think Maz gave Sterling a hunter’s burial? I mean, if she had a service for him…”
My heart suddenly felt like it had grown wings. “Yes! Let’s go.” I pulled her upright and she smiled as we ran to my car, stopping only once to snap off a single white rose.
If Maz was keeping the illusion of Sterling falling in battle, she would have buried him in the society cemetery with all of the other fallen hunters. The least I could do while I was here was pay my respects.
It wasa short drive to the private society cemetery. I’d been here a couple times in my years growing up around hunters, but the most memorable was when I was fifteen. I’d come for Mia’s funeral. She’d fallen in battle—or at least that’s what Maz had told us. Now I wondered if she’d just gotten too close, found something out. Mia was one of my fighting instructors and a senior hunter. Her death had hit us all hard.
“Thinking of Mia?” Liv asked as I passed farmland and pulled into the open gates of the graveyard.
I nodded. “It’s the day we made our backup plan, remember? Our way out?”
Liv grinned. “Private island and hottie husbands.”
I snickered. How naive we were, thinking we could just make enough money and leave. When Maz wanted you gone, you were gone, and now we didn’t even have our money. Not that I wanted that dirty blood money now anyway.
“You think Maz knows about the Yaak Montana house?” I asked Liv.
Liv nodded. “We wired the cash from the society’s chosen credit union. She probably owns the freaking bank.”
That was depressing. I loved that place, and now we really had nowhere to go if shit hit the fan. I guess we had Vampire City, but that didn’t feel like home. Not yet. After parking my Beetle off to the side, we roamed the multiple acreage graveyard until finally, in the back right corner by a weeping willow tree, I saw the freshly churned earth in a mound. I walked over hesitantly, Liv following behind me. I was scared to see his name, scared to have the finality of it burned into my soul.
Sterling was dead, I knew that. I saw his head, but this … this made it real.
The closer I got, the easier it was to make out the letters carved into the granite headstone.
Sterling Rose.
It was him.
