“Where would the fun be in that?” Wulfe answered. But then he said soberly, “You don’t know Iacopo the way I know Iacopo. If I had warned you . . .”

“The Lord of Night,” said Stefan reluctantly, “is the reason Wulfe is the way he is, Adam. He wasn’t always . . .”

“Crazy?” suggested Darryl.

“No,” said Marsilia with a sigh, letting go of Wulfe. He settled semigracefully onto the grass at her feet. “He was always strange. But he didn’t used to enjoy pulling wings off butterflies.”

“He wasn’t sadistic,” clarified Stefan. “Bonarata inspires loyalty by using various methods, and some of them are damaging.”

Marsilia opened her mouth, glanced down at Wulfe, then closed it again.

“Especially to those of us who loved him,” said Stefan insistently.

Darryl looked at Adam for permission and got it. He said, “Not that we don’t appreciate learning more about our enemy. But what we need to know is how are we to get Mercy back? Where did he take her? Why he took her matters only in that it will allow us to use that knowledge to get her back.”

As Darryl took the lead, Adam fought his wolf to a brutal standstill. He had to think. He had to think in order to see and plan the best way to help Mercy, to get her back. And in order to do that, his wolf spirit was going to have to . . . He had been trying to restrain the wolf, and it had put them at odds.

“I don’t know where he took her,” Marsilia answered Darryl. “He has homes in New York, Florida, and Arizona as well as South America. I don’t know why he took her—other than to catch our attention.”

We have to hunt, Adam whispered to the wild spirit who shared his body, the wild spirit he both despised and gloried in. We have to hunt, find Mercy, and destroy the one who took her from us. And teach them that Mercy is ours.

Inside him, the wolf paused, considering Adam’s argument. After a moment, the beast agreed.

Freed of that battle, though he remained wary, aware that the wolf was only biding his time, Adam turned to the more important situation. First, to make certain his allies would shoot his enemies before they would shoot him.

“Compared to Bonarata,” said Adam slowly, “Mercy matters not at all to you, Marsilia. So why did you approach us?”

She raised her chin. “I did not know it was one of yours he took at first. But even so, let us be honest, yes? Had he taken one of mine, I still would have come to you for help. I am myself a power in the vampire hierarchy. But when I was exiled . . . I quit trying. I existed, but for all intents and purposes, I did not direct my seethe other than to see to it that my people were safe and behaved themselves in such a manner as not to attract human attention. The result of my inattention is that outside of me and Wulfe, my seethe holds no individually powerful vampire. Wulfe . . .” She glanced down at the vampire, who, still sitting on the grass, had leaned his head against her knee. “I cannot in all fairness ask Wulfe to face Bonarata in person again.”