Amelia smiled and kissed Byron tenderly. “Good answer. Let’s go and find out about my past.”

She stood and Byron followed suit.

“Oh,” Amelia said, “a certain someone has been visiting Katie in her room every night, taking her tea.”

Byron raised her eyebrows. “Interesting. I’ve only seen Alexis’s softer side once before. She was a younger vampire and didn’t see the danger in loving a fragile human. I warned Alexis loving a human would always end in pain, and now look where we are.”

“Katie is besotted with Alexis. I’m sure she is. That’s why she bickers so much with her, but will Alexis take her chance at happiness? I don’t know.”

“Sometimes,” Byron said, “love doesn’t give you a choice.”

* * *

Victorija was crawling in her skin, her hands shaking, as she tried to type on the laptop on her desk. She’d remembered the girl in The Sanctuary, the girl who bit her when they were fighting to take Amelia, the girl she couldn’t compel.

Amelia had called her Daisy, and it didn’t take long to find out she worked beside Amelia, and her name was Daisy MacDougall. A whole litany of hits turned up on that name—blogs, interviews on human–paranormal websites—all calling Daisy a monster hunter.

Victorija clicked on a YouTube link and found herself watching Daisy and a group of friends, ghost hunting in an old churchyard. She paused the video, took a screenshot, and enlarged it.

“Daisy MacDougall.” She reached forward with her shaking hand and said, “Why you?”

When she had tasted her blood in The Sanctuary, it had been like a punch in the chest, and when she looked in her eyes there was something so familiar about them.

On a hunch she went to the births, marriages, and deaths website for the UK. The results would take her hours to go through, but Victorija knew she had to trace this girl’s family back in time, and she had a sinking feeling of where that might lead and what it would mean for her. Death or a broken vow.

* * *

A line of black SUVs and a classic Rolls-Royce ambled through the English countryside. In one of the black SUVs was Katie, who was now well enough to travel. She was still weak, but the doctor thought a change of scene would help.

Katie pulled the blanket under her chin to try to comfort herself. The moment she stepped out of her room this morning, she realized how different she still felt. As she passed the spot on the landing where Josie had attacked her, she had to conceal the panic she felt.

If she had shown the terror and fear that was deep inside her bones, Byron might have left her at home, and she couldn’t bear that. Since her mother and father had flown in to be by her side, she’d hardly been able to breathe.