Gus looked over at the row of decanters. “Scotch if you have it.”

“Heaven forbid I ever run out of that,” Max said, beaming. “I have an eighteen-year-old single malt Glenlivet that I think you’ll like. Please, have a seat. I’ll pour you a glass.”

Kenna and Fallon plopped down in the chairs facing the desk, and moving another from across the room, Gus placed it between his daughters. “Cath and I wanted to thank you again for letting us stay here.”

“Oh, please. You don’t need to thank me,” Max said, handing Gus his drink. “I’m just glad you’re all safe.”

Enjoyment skewed Gus’s features when he took a sip of the liquor. “Wow, this is really good.”

“I thought you’d like it.”

Gus took another taste, drawing the courage to ask a question he was almost sure he already knew the answer to. “Um…earlier, when I asked about Lisa…is she all right?”

Max seemed to deflate in his chair. “Regrettably, no. Napoleon’s people reached her before we could. She’s dead.”

“No,” Kenna cried out, springing to her feet. “She can’t be. She always let me text her about fashion stuff. Lisa can’t be dead. She just can’t be.”

Gus wrapped his arm around Kenna’s waist, and a second later, she was wailing in his lap. “I’m sorry, sweetie. I liked her, too,” he said, his voice cracking as he rubbed his daughter’s back. “I liked her a lot.”

“Did you kill the vamps that murdered her?”

Max and Gus turned to Fallon, who shrugged at their astonished expressions. “What? It’s not like they’re mortals, and they deserve to die, don’t they? Lisa was innocent. She didn’t do anything wrong.”

The two men exchanged looks, and Max took the lead. “The vampires who did it were gone by the time my team got there,” Max said, picking up his drink. “And because of what…because of what had happened, I thought it prudent I send that team to join the one gathering up Gunnar and his family.”

“They’re safe—right?” Gus said, edging forward in his seat.

“Yes, yes, they are,” Max said, dipping his head. “Gunnar wanted to head up to his father’s, so I told both teams to go with them. They’ll stay up there until we get all of this sorted. Oskar, Gunnar’s father, is quite familiar with the needs of my kind, so he’ll make sure my teams are safe when the sun is up, and when it goes down, they’ll have eight of my finest protecting them.”

“Thank God.” Gus took another sip of his drink. “What about Bennett? Does she know?”