Ben watched over Dez as she drifted to sleep. The nurse had just come in to give her some medicine that was supposed to kill the pain. The goons at the door had checked over the nurse’s badge like they were the Secret Service or something. He thought that was good.

The doctors all said she was going to be fine, but Ben still watched all the monitors and took note of any unusual jump or extra beep. He had liked hearing the tiny thrum of the baby’s heartbeat when they brought in the machine to check. It sounded kind of fast to him, but it made Dez smile, so he thought that fast was probably okay. Her face was swollen and both of her eyes were black. She was all covered up, but he knew she had bruises on her legs, abdomen, and even her chest. It made him sick to even think about it.

He heard a rustling sound in the hall, then the goons started to block the door.

“Get away from me. I’m with them, you idiots.”

It was Tenzin. He walked to the door and put a hand up on one of the guard’s broad shoulders.

“It’s okay, guys. She’s with us.”

They parted to let her pass, and Tenzin stomped in the room.

“Idiots.”

“Calm down. They’re just guarding Dez. That’s what they’re supposed to do.”

She looked around with narrowed eyes. “I’ve never been in a hospital before.”

“What, never?”

“No.”

Tenzin walked over to the sleeping Dez and put her hand on her forehead. Then she pushed back the blanket that covered her and laid her ear against Dez’s belly, dislodging some of the monitors. Ben rushed over.

“Hey! Tenzin, that’s—”

“Shhh.” She put both hands on Dez’s belly and held them there for a minute, listening to whatever mysterious sounds the baby was making. Then she straightened and pulled the blanket up.

“I’ll let the healers put the electrical equipment back. She’s going to be fine. The baby sounds active and her heart is good. Does she have any cuts that need healing?”

“No. Matt said… well, she has to be here for a while, so it’s probably not a good idea to heal anything they would really notice. None of her cuts were major. Just scrapes from the street and stuff.” He fell silent and went back to his chair beside Dez. Tenzin pulled a chair over and sat next to him.

She said, “I went to the alley.”

Ben couldn’t say anything. The police had told him. They’d told him he’d killed a man. In his heart, he’d known it the second the knife plunged in the man’s belly. He’d meant to kill him, and he knew exactly what he was aiming for.

“I tracked the other man who attacked you both. It’s been taken care of.”

He nodded. Was he a bad person for being relieved that Tenzin had finished off the other man instead of him? He felt frozen. He didn’t know how to feel. He shouldn’t have taken them into that alley. He shouldn’t have done a lot of things. Dez might not have known better, but he should have. He stared at the monitors above Dez’s head.

Tenzin’s voice was uncharacteristically soft when she finally spoke. “Was this the first?”

The first person he’d ever killed? Ben nodded.

He was familiar with violence. It had been a constant, lurking shadow his whole life. Ben had seen a lot. He’d watched a man kick another to death and leave him broken in an alley. He’d seen a gloating man stabbed, his blood spilling out in the mud as the money was stolen from his body by greedy hands. But Ben had never killed anyone.

“Ben?”

He whispered, “Yeah?”

“Was the man attacking Dez?”

He nodded.

“Was he hurting the baby?”

“He…” He swallowed the lump in his throat. “He was kicking her. He had to see she was pregnant. Her shirt was up, and her belly… He couldn’t have—”

“You were defending Dez. You were protecting the baby.”

He blinked back the tears, but they fell down his face anyway.

Tenzin slipped her hand in his, and Ben gripped her small fingers.

“You did well, Benjamin. You did right.”

Ben held on to Tenzin’s hand, and the two sat in silence as Dez slept under their watch.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Svaneti, Republic of Georgia

November 2012

Giovanni decided that the home of Arosh—which could only be described as a palace—was an odd, but not uncomfortable combination of museum and harem. Silks and tapestries hung from the windowless walls. The rooms were lit by golden oil lamps and heated by glowing braziers. The rooms they had been shown to when they arrived were equipped with luxurious baths and opulent furnishings. The only electricity in the palace seemed to be in the bedrooms, a nod to the humans who occupied most of the rooms.

And by humans, Giovanni meant women. Dozens of them. Hundreds, possibly. Women of every age, shape, and color ran laughing through the house. They cooked Giovanni and Carwyn rich meals and offered their willing wrists for the vampires to drink. They tended the house and the gardens. They read books in the vast library. Many were beautiful, but not all. Some bore the scars of past abuse or injury, but all seemed content. Most appeared to be between seventeen and forty, but a few older women passed them in the halls, as well.

And one woman, a regal beauty named Zarine, ruled the house.

Her accent was Armenian. Her long, black hair curled down her back and her brown eyes were warm and wise. She appeared to be in her fifties or sixties, and she was fiercely protective of her master.