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He put on his sunglasses and pulled his hood forward to hide his face

Zareb paced his living room restlessly The other va to come closer to hi Tellyou didn’t have time to tell

Ethan alone for three days The hell with talking, he wanted to get ured out where Garrity had Cassie, and Ethan wanted to be there now He’d kill every one of the bastards And if they’d hurt her--he wouldn’t even consider the possibility that she was dead--he’d kill them slowly No Second One for thehts on that

But Zareb wouldn’t get his ass ot an answer to his question "The Collector is a scientist and a fucking entrepreneur according to what the guy said last night I told you about the coffins and the binders This Collector rewards those ork for hiy from captive valanced at his watch

"The Collector created the beasts He’s a steenius The beasts really are made from a bunch of other animals" He stopped and closed his eyes This was the hardest part to tell "He searches particularly for vampires from our bloodline who’re lost to the Second One I don’t kno the hell he does it, but he uses their brain cells to create the beasts’ brains They have our intelligence, hunting ability, and the Second One’sThe one difference is that the Collector has programmed their brains so that he or his people can control them" He turned away "I’m sure he was pissed off that one of his beasts killed Darren and that Garrity didn’t get a chance to harvest his brain"

The gathered vampires moved restlessly Their hate, their need to kill battered at Ethan

"After we take care of Garrity, this Collector is fucking finished" Death lived in Zareb’s eyes "Let’s go"

Ethan was oblivious to the dark streets, to the others in the car He reached out with his thoughts, searching, searching Dareare that the car had stopped He climbed out and waited while other cars parked nearby

Zareb had pulled out all the stops Twenty of his children surrounded hiuarded his home stood a little apart from them

One of the brothers spoke "We left her alone, so we’re here to help get her back"

Zareb nodded "We’re awhere we think Garrity is headquartered He’s grown careless and arrogant He doesn’t kno many children I have or hoerful we are when united" He stared into the darkness "Run, liding silently around buildings and through streets Ethan was the first to reach the abandoned building The rest spread out around it, looking for other ways in He wanted to tear the door off with his bare hands, but Zareb er We don’t need any noise to announce our visit Let me" Zareb touched the door and it simply dissolved

Ethan stepped inside and then froze He knelt and touched his finger to the floor Her blood, her scent He looked back "She’s here"

They flowed silently into the building

Cassie lay in her glass coffin She could see everything as long as she didn’t have to turn her head Her hts and eht hi she could move--for a lifetime?

No, no, no! Horror broke over her in waves of terror and despair She was a vampire She could live for many lifetimes Like this

She couldn’t even twitch, but her senses were so sharp they almost hurt Cassie could hear sounds frohter, and a discussion about when the best time to bury her would be Her heartbeat raced, and she would’ve screa up frorave as clods of earth landed on top of her coffin over and over until she was imprisoned in darkness Since she couldn’t pray for death, she’d pray for insanity

Objects within her range of vision looked vibrant, almost unreal Every detail, no ht now she could see her binder working on another victim’s headstone His name was Jon Cassie never knew that hate could devour She didn’t need a Second One urging her to kill the binder bitch She’d put her shiny new fangs to good use if she ever got free

No smells seeped into the sealed coffin, but if fear had an odor, she was suffocating in it

At least they weren’t starving her Out of the corner of her eye she could see a stand with a bag of blood hanging fro down a narrow tube that had been inserted through a s in the coffin Since her ar into her body

Cassie closed her eyes, the only physical power she still controlled She would survive on blood untilWould some merciful person eventually remove the tube? Did she want to die from starvation? Would she die? A question she hadn’t asked Maybe even starvation wouldn’t kill her, just torture her forever