I heard about Branson, Mircea went on. Poor Leila, are you still trying to find me? Don’t you know that you won’t succeed?

One day we will, I sent back, fighting a swell of frustration and bitterness.

Vlad and I were forced to search for Mircea the normal way because he’d somehow managed to block me. I could link to anyone else if I had their essence imprint, but though Vlad had brought me artifact after artifact of Mircea’s, I was unable to link to him. He was either magically or psychically preventing me. If it was the former, I was screwed, so I chose to believe it was the latter. That way, I still had a chance that my powers would grow, and I’d beat him at his own psychic game.

So naïve, Mircea said, ending his words with a tsking sound. I wonder how my father stands you.

Stepfather, I corrected immediately. Or call him Uncle Drac if you must, but Vlad is not your father.

Another mystical slash across my shoulders had me biting back a cry of pain. Wow, he’s sensitive about that, I realized, filing the information away for later. Good thing Mircea couldn’t hear my thoughts unless I deliberately directed them to him. Unfortunately, that meant I couldn’t hear his thoughts, either, or I might have learned where he was.

Within moments, the pain faded and my skin knit itself back into smooth, unblemished flesh. That’s one of the reasons why I didn’t call out for help. Mircea could hurt me, yes, but there were limits on what he’d do. It wasn’t because he had a conscience; every injury he inflicted on me had to be carved into his own flesh first.

That was the beauty—and the curse—of the spell that bound us together. It had forced Mircea to stop the suicide-inducing aspect of it so I no longer had the urge to chop off my own head. The flip side was, even if Vlad and I did find Mircea, we couldn’t kill him. Not without killing me, too.

Seriously, what do you get out of our little talks? I went on, thanking God that Vlad lost his ability to read my mind as soon as I became a vampire. Otherwise, he’d overhear everything I was thinking, and know that Mircea was mentally messaging me as well as cutting into me.

Perhaps I do it to find out why you mean so much to Vlad, he snapped. Thus far, it’s a mystery. You’re not as beautiful as his former lovers and you’re a damn sight less intelligent.

Must be my electric personality, then, I deadpanned, but inwardly, I was intrigued. Why did he keep logging on to my mind to talk to me? It couldn’t be just to trade insults. Sure, Mircea had only been in his late teens when he was turned into a vampire, but that was over five hundred years ago. More than that, Mircea was usually smug when he used our link for his mental and physical assaults. Now, he sounded upset. Maybe enough to lose his cool and reveal something critical for me to use against him?

I pressed my advantage. This is the sixth time you’ve contacted me in the past four months. I used to think it was because you were testing our connection to make sure that the spell still bound us flesh to flesh and blood to blood, but you don’t need to talk me up to cut into me. Why do you keep doing it? Are you bored? Or are you just really, really lonely?

I’ll show you why, he said with a snarl.

I didn’t like the sound of that. Before I could reply, he said, What? in a surprised way, then abruptly dropped our link.

“Damn you,” I muttered. Not that he could hear me anymore. I didn’t know how I could always tell when he was really gone, but it was as if a door closed in my mind.

Didn’t matter, I decided. Mircea was probably bluffing on whatever he was about to “show” me. In any event, now I had to change clothes and destroy this bloody dress. If Vlad caught sight of it, it would enrage him, and he was wound up enough already.

If I were the vindictive type like Mircea, I could get his attention back by cutting into him the same way he’d carved into me. But, even though my dress was already trashed, I didn’t do it. For one, I might be getting more vindictive by the day, but I wasn’t masochistic. Yet.

I went into my bedroom closet. A few minutes later, I was deciding between a pale blue dress and a lavender one when a new pain erupted in my chest. Unlike before, this pain was so ferocious, I dropped to the floor. Once there, I found myself gasping for air I no longer needed. I recognized this kind of pain, and fear made me attempt to crawl to the door, but my limbs stopped working. All I could do was twitch in agony.

This wasn’t Mircea hurting me for his usual cruel kicks. It was something far worse.

Hollywood had it wrong when it came to vampires. You didn’t shove a wooden stake through their heart to kill one. That would only give those of my kind a nasty splinter and an even worse temper. Instead, you cut their head off, burned them into ashes, or destroyed their heart with silver. From what I was feeling, Mircea had just stabbed himself—and thus me—in the heart with a silver knife. The only reason we weren’t already dead was because Mircea hadn’t twisted the blade. Yet.

Chapter 3

I tried to call out to Vlad. He couldn’t do anything to stop this, but some desperate part of me needed to see him one last time. Yet all I could manage was a gasping whisper. Vlad might have supernatural hearing, but he was three floors below me and there was endless banging, clanging, and other noise from the construction on the mansion’s south wing.

All I had was my mind, and though it felt almost as frozen as my limbs, I summoned the last of my strength to establish a link to him, then let out a mental shout.

Vlad!

A wave of energy filled the room, followed by a slew of emotions slamming into mine. That was more effective than a reply to let me know that he’d heard me. Moments later, I saw a tall, dark form moving with blurring speed toward me.