Chapter 26

26

Apparently, Ethan doesn’t have guards posted at all the doors, but he does have one stationed here at the front.

I back up hastily, the feel of the man’s polyester jacket still on my face, and breathlessly explain, “There’s a fire.”

Blocking the door with his largeness—and doing a fine job of it—he gazes into the foyer and frowns.

The man is enormous—easily six-four, maybe six-five, and at least three hundred pounds. It’s not all muscle, either. He doesn’t look like he’d run very fast, but if he tackled you, you’d be squished.

Deciding to believe us, he takes us each by an arm and escorts us outside.

Ethan’s staff scurries around the grounds, pulling hoses and looking a little lost. Our massive nanny barks out orders to anyone who will listen to him as he leads us away from the house and onto the grass.

Letting us go once we’re at a safe distance, he gives us a sharp look. “Stay.”

I rub my arm where his meaty paw clamped over it, making sure it’s not permanently dented. “Instead of working on obedience training, don’t you have a handy kennel you could lock us in?” That earns me a glare, and I lift my hands in surrender. “It was a joke.”

Deciding to ignore me, he turns back to the house and crosses his huge arms.

“I take it you’re not a vampire,” I say.

“Second stage,” he answers, eyes on the pandemonium. Smoke rises from the back of the house, telling me it’s not a false alarm.

Cassian actually set the place on fire.

“So, you can be out in the daytime?” I ask the guard.

“Yeah.” He frowns at me. “I have to wear sunscreen, though.”

“Same,” I say. “What’s your name?”

His frown deepens. “Hilo.”

“I’m Piper.”

“I know.”

I try to think of something else to say, mostly because I’m nervous. But when I realize Hilo is distracted, I sneak a peek at my phone.

My heart seizes when I see Noah is still in New Castle, but now his avatar is gray. What happened to his phone? What happened to him ?

I tuck the phone away and try to breathe. Noah is a professional hunter. He’ll be fine.

I scan the property for some sign of Cassian or Max. Nothing yet.

But then I hear sirens.

“That was fast,” Olivia says.

Too fast, maybe. We’re pretty far out here for the fire department to arrive that quickly—unless someone called them before the fire got started. Which I suspect Cassian did.

Minutes later, a firetruck flies into the drive. It’s a little surreal, being on-site of another emergency less than twenty- four hours after the first. Several police cars follow it in, then an ambulance, another firetruck, and a second ambulance.

Suddenly, the property is crawling with first responders, and the chaos is very welcome. Just as I’m trying to catch Olivia’s eye to silently tell her to start creeping backward, a fireman appears at my side.

“Ma’am, were you inside while the fire was burning?” he asks.

My knees nearly buckle when I realize it’s Noah under all that gear, but he subtly shakes his head, telling me to play along.

“Yes,” I answer. “My friend and I both were.”

“We need you to sit down with one of the paramedics for a quick examination.”

“Okay,” I say breathlessly, grabbing Olivia’s arm and yanking her with me.

When our massive guard starts to follow, Noah asks, “Sir, were you inside while the fire was going?”

“No, but?—”

“Then you need to stay out of the way while we see to those who might have inhaled smoke.”

The man’s face scrunches up, but his eyes travel over Noah’s uniform. After several tense seconds, he gives him a curt nod.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” I whisper as we walk, relief making me shaky. “Your avatar turned gray while you were in New Castle, and Ethan said?—”

“Yeah,” Noah growls. “I found the real Colin locked in a closet.”

“Is he okay?” I gasp.

“He’s going to need that support group.”

“What happened to your phone though?”

“I busted it during the fight.”

A paramedic greets us when we’re close to the ambulance—a paramedic who’s not a paramedic at all.

I gape at my brother, wondering how they pulled off this charade. “Are any of these people actual first responders?” I hiss to Noah.

“Most of them are.”

“How…?”

“I told you—Cassian knows people.”

“Handy,” I say dumbly.

“Yeah,” Noah grunts. “And now I need to go in there and help him. He’s inside, looking for Ethan.”

I grasp his arm. “You can’t go in there—don’t you see the smoke? The crazy vampire set a real fire.”

Noah gives me a cocky grin before he lowers his visor. “I got this.”

“Wait…”

But he’s already jogging toward the mansion.

“Come on,” Max says urgently. “Get in.”

Olivia goes first, and I follow, and then Max locks the doors behind us.

“Take a seat on the gurney,” a maybe-paramedic says.

Max leaps into the driver’s seat moments later, and we’re off, making a hasty getaway in an ambulance, of all things.

“You two breathing okay?” the paramedic asks.

“We weren’t even close to the fire,” I tell him, and then I gesture to his uniform. “Are you legit?”

“I am, but the ambulance belongs to Cassian. My name is Carlos.”

He’s slender, not much taller than me, probably in his mid-thirties, and he has a friendly smile.

“Thanks for rescuing us,” I say.

“Which hospital are we going to?” Olivia asks.

“We’re going to Cassian’s vacation home in Aspen.”

“Fancy,” Olivia mutters.

“So, you work for Cassian?” I ask Carlos.

“Nah, but I work with NIHA often, and he called in a favor. Wanted someone on site in case you two needed medical attention.”

“A considerate arsonist,” I breathe out a laugh, overwhelmed.

Olivia makes a strange noise. When I glance over, I see she’s turned her head and is looking at the wall behind us. But she wipes her eyes with her hands, telling me she’s not interested in the strange medical instruments.

“Hey,” I say softly, wrapping my arm around her shoulder. “You okay?”

Carlos decides it’s a good time to leave, and he escapes to the empty passenger seat.

She looks back, her face red and her eyes wet. “I’m fine. It was just…”

“Scary?”

She nods, and a fresh wave of tears makes her duck her face into her hands. “The hot stone massage was really nice though.”

I laugh even as my eyes grow misty. “We’ll get real massages after this is all over. You can book with Alessio.”

“Poor Alessio,” she says with a sigh, lowering her hands. “He used to be the most handsome man I’d ever laid eyes on.”

I frown. “He’s not anymore?”

She lifts a brow, giving me a look. I’ve known her long enough to decipher it.

“No.” I shake my head. “You’re not having those thoughts about a vampire. Especially not a vampire as vampirey as Cassian.”

“That’s not a word.”

“I don’t care.”

She lowers her voice and leans in. “I didn’t say I want to marry him and have his vampire babies. I just think he’s hot.”

“Vampires can’t have babies.”

“Small detail.”

I laugh, shaking my head.

“Thank you for facing Ethan for me,” she whispers, changing the subject. “I know that had to have been really hard.”

I exhale my lingering tension, reminding my body I’m now safe when it tries to go into panic mode again. “It’s okay. It was the only way to figure out where he was keeping you.”

“Do you think Cassian and Noah will be okay?” she whispers, her voice small.

“It sounds like they do this sort of thing all the time,” I say, reassuring her and myself. “They’ll be fine.”

She nods, and I turn my eyes toward the back window, fervently hoping my words will prove true.

Cassian’s home makes Ethan’s place look like the help’s bunkhouse.

It’s massive, and it has turrets .

“Is that a castle?” Olivia whispers, gripping the back of Max’s seat and peering out the front window as we drive down the mile-long cobblestone drive.

The mansion sits in a wildflower meadow that’s surrounded by blue spruces and aspens. The building is shaped like an L, with a courtyard at its center. Unlike Ethan’s property, there are no mermaids. There is, however, a formal garden at the heart of the courtyard with a huge urn centerpiece. Bright white geraniums are the focal point, with lavender petunias and purple ornamental sweet potato vines flowing over the edges and cascading into the complicated center of the boxwood knot.

“He has rose trees,” I murmur, my eyes moving through the landscape.

“Breathe,” Olivia instructs, poking me in the ribs.

“ Oof. ” I swat her away. “It’s gorgeous.”

“You’re still talking about the flowers, aren’t you?”

“What else would I be talking about?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe Cassian Palace .”

“It does have a name,” Carlos says from the passenger seat. “But I don’t remember what it is.”

This place is unreal. It looks like it belongs in medieval France, not in the middle of Colorado. Though, to be fair, if it was going to be anywhere, it would be here in Aspen.

Max follows Carlos’s directions and parks in front of the house.

A woman walks down the sweeping entry steps as we filter out of the ambulance. She’s wearing a navy sleeveless blouse, a pair of white shorts, and white tennis shoes. I’m not sure if she’s about to play pickleball or if she’s one of Cassian’s employees.

She appears to be in her early forties, with lowlights in her blonde hair, and she walks with the air of someone who seems very efficient.

“Hi, Carlos,” she says affectionately. “Did everything go all right?”

“So far so good,” he says.

I hope Noah and Cassian are okay. I texted Cassian fifteen minutes ago, but I haven’t heard back. It hasn’t even been quite an hour, though. I’m sure everything is fine.

But that doesn’t stop me from looking at my phone again.

“Piper, this is Melissa,” Carlos says.

The woman warmly shakes my hand. Her skin is hot like Olivia’s, so she must be a regular human. “Welcome to Chateau Chevalier.”

“You were close,” I say to Olivia.

She nods knowingly, smiling when it’s her turn to take Melissa’s hand.

Noise on the road beyond the drive catches our attention, and a minute later, a black, unmarked SUV comes into view and pauses outside the automatic gates.

They open, and it drives in.

Noah leaps out of the driver’s seat and immediately begins stripping his firefighter gear. Cassian emerges from the driver’s side and then does the same.

Olivia and I shamelessly gawk.

“What is it about uniforms?” she whispers, holding back a giggle.

“It’s not just the uniforms.” My eyes run over Noah. “No offense to Hilo, but he wouldn’t put on quite the same show.”

She nods sagely.

As soon as Noah is free of the heavy gear, he jogs over to me, grabbing me by the arms like he’s going to kiss me.

“Hi,” I say breathlessly. “Glad you’re not dead.”

“Same.” He frowns. “What were you thinking going after Ethan without me?”

“I didn’t think you’d let me go, and I couldn’t figure out how else we were going to save Olivia.”

“Piper.” Noah begins to shake his head. “I?—”

“Can you two do this later?” Cassian asks. “We have a vampire to interrogate.”

“You have Ethan?” I whisper, my eyes widening.

“Yeah,” Noah says.

“How’d you get him out of the house?”

Noah watches as Max and Carlos hurry to help Cassian unload the vampire. “We drugged him and threw him in the back.”

“Drugged him? With what?”

“A sedative. His system will process it fairly quickly. It’ll knock a vampire out for a few hours, but we’re probably running out of time.”

And he’s not wrong. The men pull Ethan from the back, and though he’s very floppy, he’s awake.

He mumbles all kinds of incoherent threats, his eyes still mostly closed.

“What if someone saw you and alerted the cops?” I ask, getting a little panicky.

“One, no one saw us. Two, Ethan is an unregistered vampire. His people aren’t going to report him as missing.”

“Okay…” I say, but I’m still nervous as Noah and I follow the men inside.

I gape a little as we step into the foyer. Ethan has antler chandeliers. Cassian has chandeliers, too, but his are crystal.

The floors are hardwood, it smells faintly of orange oil, and natural light spills in from the massive windows.

Apparently, the daylight drug is working well.

“He admitted that he killed Kevin,” I tell Noah as we walk. “Or rather, he paid a guy to kill Kevin. The same guy he hired to kill you.”

“Ah,” Noah says darkly.

“What happened with that?”

“I knocked him out, but he woke up too quickly and got away while I was looking for Colin.”

It doesn’t make me feel great that an assassin with a grudge is out there, but we have other things to worry about right now—namely, a vampire who’s growing louder and angrier by the second.

Cassian leads us down a set of stairs that go to the basement. Or, judging from the dark stone walls, limited light, and general foreboding feeling, the dungeon .

I don’t see any cells, though, and there are shelves of bottles, so it might just be a wine cellar.

“Carlos, stay with Olivia and Max,” Cassian instructs when we reach what looks like a storage room. He flicks on the light —a single fixture with two fluorescent tube lights. It looks out of place in the almost medieval space.

Along the walls, there are shelves with books, random cardboard boxes, and more bottles, but at the center, there’s nothing but a folding chair.

“Piper, you come in with Noah and me,” Cassian says.

“I don’t know that I necessarily want to be involved?—”

“Piper, now ,” the super old vampire commands in a no-nonsense tone that has me hopping.

“Okay, coming.” I step into the room.

Max and Carlos deposit Ethan on the chair and then leave, closing the door behind them. It shuts with an ominous echo that makes me want to run even though I’m not the one in trouble here.

Ethan half-sits, half-lies on the chair, slumped down, about to slither right out of the hard metal seat and onto the harder stone floor. “You’re going to pay for this,” he slurs.

Cassian steps forward, looking formidable. I think I’m finally going to see the scary side I knew was lurking under his pretty exterior. “How are you feeling? Snapping out of it?”

Ethan swears a few times, his eyes flashing, and pushes himself back onto the seat.

Cassian extends his hand. “We need to have a chat, so if you could pull yourself together?—”

“You son of a…”

I blink, startled by the combination of words coming out of Ethan’s mouth. He’s usually so mild-mannered.

Cassian listens, his expression impassive, as Ethan tells him what he can do with himself—and frankly, his suggestions aren’t very nice.

I glance at Noah and find him resting against the wall, one foot pressed against the stone. His expression is grim, and he holds a stake.

“Are you finished?” Cassian asks when Ethan runs out of four-letter words. “You’re looking a bit worse for wear. Do you need coffee?”

“Can you drink coffee?” I ask Cassian, surprised.

“In moderation, yes,” he answers. “It’s mostly water.”

“Oh, right—zero calories. There’s not much actual plant in there, I guess?”

“Exactly. Teas are the same.”

“What about wine?” I gesture toward our angry captive. “I’ve seen Ethan drink it twice.”

“If the product is fermented, we can generally?—”

“Can we discuss this later?” Noah asks dryly.

“Sure.” Cassian chuckles, turning back to Ethan. “How are you feeling, champ?”

There’s something about Cassian saying “champ” in his muddled European accent that makes me snort.

Ethan turns his eyes on me, his face contorted with hurt. The genuine emotion startles me. Clearing my throat, I join Noah next to the wall.

“I think you’re feeling well enough we can begin,” Cassian says, his tone becoming businesslike. “My name is Cassian Chevalier: Prince of the Chevalier line.”

“He’s really a prince?” I whisper to Noah.

Rolling his eyes, Noah nods.

Ignoring us, Cassian continues, “You were infected through my bloodline, and therefore, you are my problem. I am your judge and your jury. But because I’m feeling benevolent, and Piper and Olivia have returned to us unscathed, I’m going to give you two options. The first: you can give us a detailed list of your crimes, tell me who infected you, and admit who’s your contact at NIHA.”

Ethan laughs, shaking his head like he thinks this whole thing is ridiculous.

“Or I can execute you right here, as is my right, to ensure the integrity of my line.”

Ethan pales a little, but he doesn’t answer.

Cassian gestures to the corners of the room, at cameras I didn’t even notice. “Which will it be? Shall we begin recording your confession or end this now?”

“And if I confess?” Ethan says, his voice sharp with growing fear.

“Instead of, say, two life sentences, I’ll see if the judge will give you one.”

“How long is a life sentence?” I ask Noah quietly.

“When vampires are involved, it’s usually a hundred years, but often, they’ll be charged with multiple life sentences in severe cases.”

“And capital punishment?”

“It was officially abolished in Colorado in 2020, but it’s still doled out by the heads of a bloodline.”

Ethan looks like a cornered animal, his eyes moving between Cassian, Noah, and me.

“Noah, the stake,” Cassian says, extending his hand backward.

Noah hands him the weapon, and Ethan zeroes in on it, gulping.

“You’re out of time.” Cassian steps forward. “What will it be?”

I don’t think any of us expects Ethan to lunge forward, least of all me. But he leaps past Cassian, fangs bared like a cornered predator.

I scream, throwing my hands up like that will protect me. One second, he’s inches away from me, and the next, he’s on the floor. Noah pins him in place, and Cassian leans over him.

“That was the wrong choice, Ethan,” Cassian says, adjusting his grip on the stake.

“Reid,” Ethan sputters quickly. “He’s the head of the investigations division for the region. He made a deal with the woman who changed me.”

Noah jerks his head up to Cassian.

Cassian grasps Ethan by the collar of his polo shirt and yanks him to his feet. “What woman?”

“I don’t know her name.”

Cassian smashes him against the closest bookshelf. “What was her name?”

“I DON’T KNOW!” Ethan cries. “I really don’t. Please, I don’t know . She doesn’t share her name.”

Noah touches Cassian’s shoulder. “I think he’s telling the truth.”

“Fine,” Cassian says, looking like it’s taking a great deal of willpower to resist shoving the stake into the sniveling vampire’s heart. “Tell me everything else—and don’t leave anything out.”

“I will,” Ethan vows, tears welling in his eyes. “I swear, I will.”

With a heavy sigh, Cassian yanks him back to the chair. “Get on with it then.”