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“What do you suggest we do?” Dad asked, his ancient gaze sweeping Rowan’s land.

“As much as I hate to say it, I think we should wait a little longer.” The thought didn’t sit well with me. “We don’t have much choice. There hasn’t been a hint of her since she disappeared. I’ve gone over that land for months now and couldn’t recover a hint of where that vampire might have taken her.”

“We could split up and travel to places her mother might have gone.”

“I already did that.”

Dad stiffened. He’d already known I’d done everything in my power to find her, but he didn’t like hearing how close we all were to hitting a brick wall.

“There has to be something else.”

“I’m out here for hours a day, every day, scanning the world, looking for her. I believe in Moira, Dad. She will find a way to contact us. Keep the faith.”

Dad sighed and uncurled his lean frame. “I’ll do my best.”

He held out a hand to help me up, but I shook my head. “I’ll stay out here for a little longer.”

His eyes softened. “Good hunting, Evangeline.”

The smile I gave him had too many teeth. Good hunting, indeed.

Chapter

Three

Two left ribs, a femur, right arm, three toes, and the left side of my hip all broken. Several cracked teeth, split tongue, multiple contusions, cuts, and burns in too many areas to catalog.

Today’s session was worse than usual.

I wouldn’t be able to speak for a while—maybe even days. Perhaps it wasn’t a bad thing. My mouth got me into trouble way more than my actions did. Flipping someone off wasn’t nearly as gratifying as telling someone their micropenis was showing.

The downside? Eating might be out, too, which would leave my weakened state even worse off.

Mom sat at the kitchen table drinking a cup of fragrant tea. Earl Grey. The bitch knew it was my favorite.

My eyes burned, but I refused to shed a single tear.

She gave a small, closed-lipped smile. “Liaza had fun today.”

I hoped Liaza got his micro peen snatched by an angry hummingbird.

He had to die before she did. The vampire was too wily and too quick to let me handle Mom first.

Liaza was arrogant. He always had been. Therein lay his weakness.

My bitch mother’s only weakness was vanity. She loved and cared for no one. No family, no friends, no one other than Liaza, and she used him just like he used her. There was no one my mother would sacrifice herself for because she loved herself the most.

Life would be much easier if I was like that. I could have gone back to Seattle and lived the life of a hermit, only venturing out when I needed sustenance.

And maybe I would have done that if I hadn’t met Evie. My best friend, even through her own trauma, had shown me life was worth living and love was a gift we all deserved.

Well. Everyone except for my bitch of a mother.

Minka, as she went by now, was gorgeous. Long dark hair flowed down her shoulders in shining waves. Her face was sharp and angular, framed by rosebud lips and wide green eyes.

Pureblood eyes. Mine were that color once upon a time, before Minka had gotten her claws into me and sold me to Liaza to turn me into a monster. Now my eyes were pits of vast darkness. No matter how much magic I stole from someone’s blood, my eyes had never changed back.

A good thing, because if they had, I’d look more like my mother than I was comfortable with. We resembled each other. DNA was difficult to hide. Standing beside each other, most people would correctly guess we were related, but where Mom was soft, I was lean. Where she was short, I was tall. Where her skin had been touched by the sun, I was pale as cream.