Sobs sounded as the file cabinet was pushed aside, revealing an interior hiding space. Several wounded were propped up against the walls, and my heartstrings jerked when I saw a woman crouch protectively over an unconscious, bloody man. From their casual clothes, they were employees, not guards or doctors, and their thoughts revealed that all were convinced they were about to die at the hands—and fangs—of two merciless monsters.

Once, not too long ago, I’d felt the same way about vampires. Despite the fact that each of them would murder me given the chance, I went over to Bones and touched his arm.

“Don’t,” I said very softly.

His mouth twisted, not the cruel smile he’d flashed when he took out the guards in the ceiling, but something wry.

“As if you needed to say it, Kitten.”

Then his gaze flashed bright green as he turned his attention to the terrified onlookers.

“Unlike the bastards you work for, I don’t murder innocents, so if you weren’t directly involved in kidnapping or experimenting on my people, you won’t be harmed. Until then, don’t move or speak. Kitten?”

I went over to them, glad to hear their heart rates return to a normal rhythm as his power convinced them they wouldn’t be murdered on the spot. Then I searched through the standing and the wounded. The man we sought wasn’t among them, but he was here. I could hear his thoughts, not to mention his heavy breathing.

“There,” I said, pointing at the closed entrance to the elevation platform.

Bones shut his eyes. Moments later, the steel door swished open, revealing the stained circular pad that, a mile or so up, led to the concrete igloo and freedom.

Thanks to Bones’s power, the platform wasn’t operational at the moment. No human could climb those slick steel walls, either, so I wasn’t surprised to see Madigan pressed as far away from the door as he could manage, trying to hide but unable to escape.

What I didn’t expect was the Desert Eagle handgun he had pressed to his temple.

“Come one step closer, and I’ll shoot,” he warned.

Caught off guard, I laughed. I’d imagined him saying lots of things when we found him, but that hadn’t been anywhere on my list.

“Is that supposed to be a threat? Did you miss the part where we wanted you dead?”

Madigan’s lips stretched in something too ugly to be called a smile. “Yes, but you want information more. Let me go, and you have a chance of getting it one day. Move another inch, and I’ll splatter what I know all over this wall instead.”

For once, he didn’t sing anything in his mind, so I heard him loud and clear when he thought, Try me and see, Crawfield.

He’d never get my last name right.